Quote:
Originally Posted by telejake
My question is; how can anyone stand the compressed sound of an MP3/ipod? Artists spend tons of money to record in 96K or even 192K and it's turned to cr*p on one of those things. I have heard everyone from Phil Ramone to Hans Zimmer say the world of quality recording is in serious trouble. I work in the digital console world and even live guys are seeing the effects of this. The MP3/ipod generation does not know quality sound. They think the compressed sound of an MP3 is good!  |
As someone who has made his living with his ears, I'll say this right now: I don't care.
Sure, artists record at 192 sometimes (I'll go ahead and assume based on my knowledge of the recording industry that most don't) but they know full well that it's going to 16 bit 44.1k right out of mastering. The difference between 96k and 192k is not audible. That's right. Not audible. The difference is simply in the amount of data that you've got to work with once it's time to start degrading it.
What does bother me is the very obvious results of overcompression in the loudness wars in mastering - that and the near-obligation that commercial radio stations feel to redline every second of programming until it turns into mush.
There's my point though. My iPod playing 192k .mp3s sounds clearer than does my local radio station, but I don't hear anyone whining that radio stations are bad - I hear people writing nostalgic songs about them.
And isn't the argument pretty much moot as long as you're enjoying the song? I mean, it's a
song we're talking about here. I don't buy records from my favorite artists so that I can enjoy the recording. I buy them for songs.
I'm sorry, but I feel like this constant nitpicking by engineers such as myself (and I've done it) is ultimately only geeky cork-sniffing.
Go listen to Alan Lomax's recordings of Lead Belly. Are you going to complain that "Good Night Irene" is unlistenable? It's one of the best things I've ever heard.
As far as the subject matter of the thread goes - the RIAA freaks me out. They may not be the ones who technically make the laws, but they seem to be defacto lawmakers anyway. It seems as though congress is scared to call them on their bull for fear of being accused of being anti-free-market - which is worse than being called a communist today.
And before anyone comes rushing to the defense of the RIAA as an organization devoted to representing artists, understand that the group has been demonstrated to be as shady as they come. The RIAA listed the punk-powerhouse Fat Records as one of its members when it started to make its moves against digital music. Fat had to threaten legal action to get removed from legal documents involved in the RIAA's court cases. Six months later, RIAA put Fat back on the list, against its wishes. Fat wasn't alone. The list contained a large number of artists and labels who were never, ever associated with the RIAA, but it sure was a nice long list to bring to court...
Make no mistake, if allowed to, the RIAA will make sure you're charged royalties for CDs you own, based on how often you might listen to them over your lifetime. It's time for the major labels to sit down and inform their lab-grown pop acts (the ones who whine the loudest about digital music) that they might have to do what millions of musicians all over the world have to do to make a living - actually play their music for an audience.