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Lack of Clarity In Modern Day Trance
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| Beatflux |
I'm probably not the only person that has noticed it. It's been sitting at the back of my mind and I haven't been able to really articulate it until now.
Trance alongside modern dance has aspired to look more and more like a brick type of waveform, so that just in case you only listen to a snippet of a track you will be forced to ask yourself, "What the hell is that noise?"
Using a limiters and compressors to make tracks louder is a funny thing; it makes things appear to sound louder, but they can also make a mix as a whole have much less clarity.
Some key points about clarity and masking:
-The louder a mix sounds, the harder it is to achieve clarity.
-The further away sounds are in regard to frequency and time, the easier it is to achieve clarity.
-The thicker the timbre, the greater the effect of masking
-A thin sound would be a sine wave(only one frequency[the fundamental]), and a thick sound would be noise(every frequency represented)
-When a sound's volume increases, it's masking effect in terms of the width of frequencies it affects also grows
-Sounds do not have to be playing simultaneously to mask each other(premasking and postmasking)
Why does clarity get reduced when you compress and limit a track to make it sound louder?
Let's take a simple closed hihat as an example. Typically it'll look like a pointy peak that swoops down. So you have a sound that is loud for a very short time, and then drops down in volume very quickly. But if you apply a limiter to it, it won't look like a pointy anymore, it'll look more like a plateau. So now it sounds louder, which also means it sounds better for the moment. At this point, the hihat is spending more time at it's peak level. It sounds louder and it is louder, but now that loudness has a much higher potential to mask other sounds. Take this idea of masking and apply to everything in the mix. Everything that has been made louder is now a much more effective masker.
I stumbled across an article by Bob Katz that is sobering concerning the use of a compressor and limiter. I took the liberty of bolding what I thought was especially important.
| quote: | COMPRESSION: Yes, Compression can certainly affect the apparent "power" of music, and I have no objections to the use of compression to affect material's "sound"---that's all to taste. Just (in my not so humble opinion), please do yourself and your clients and the future of the audio world a favor by carefully comparing the compressed versus the bypassed version at equal apparent loudness.
Adjust the makeup gain of the compressor so that in bypass, the apparent loudness is the same. Now listen again... is there really a subjective improvement? At least 5 times out of 10 you will be very sobered to realize that what you had thought was an improvement in "power" or "punch" was really just a loudness difference, and at least 2-3 times out of 10 you will also be sobered to realize that what you thought was an improvement was actually a degradation, at least to some aspects of a sound. I don't often find even the best multiband compression to be totally a win-win situation, and yes, I use it, but I'm much too honest with myself to think it's always a win-win situation.
LIMITING:
2 to 3 dB of digital limiting (carefully designed as a sample-accurate, razor-sharp limiter, not a "fast compressor") does nothing but raise the apparent loudness while also subtlely or seriously screwing up the transient response, depth, imaging, or tonal characteristics of the music.
Please, do the world a favor. Next time you want to limit to impress yourself, try this test:
Try 1 dB of limiting, thus raising the gain by 1 dB.
Now, A/B compare the limited versus the unlimited version. First impression: Oh boy! The limited version sounds more impressive, more powerful, doesn't it? Second impression: Well, here's a very sobering thought. While comparing the limited versus the unlimited version, move your volume control up when you bypass the limiter and back down when limiting is in, by that same exact 1 dB. Hmmmm.... what did the limiter do, exactly? Did it really make your material sound more powerful, or did it just make it sound hotter (louder)? And in the process of making it louder, what did it do to the sound? Better, or is it really worse?
When that fact sinks in, then it might be possible to extrapolate to: if the client is there, and you want to impress him with what you've done, instead of patching in a limiter, why not just turn the volume up and say, "OK, here's the mastered version. Gee, doesn't that sound better?" It certainly would be no more dishonest than just patching in the limiter without giving him the attendant lecture about the possible negatives of what it may do to the sound. When was the last time you did mention to your client what limiting actually does? And whether it accomplishes anything, even in a 6 CD carousel player. For every 6 CDs you pick to go with your new CD, I can pick 6 others that are either louder or softer. |
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| SDM |
| just lower the volume on each instrument abit. |
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| Fledz |
| quote: | Originally posted by Beatflux
I'm probably not the only person that has noticed it. |
No . We've only been talking about the loudness wars and loss of dynamics for the past 5 years. |
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| MrJiveBoJingles |
Good post.
It is important to note that even if a high level of compression is used without any distortion at all, it can still wreck a mix by muddying it together. Avoiding clipping is not the only thing producers should concern themselves with when it comes to compression. |
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| Kysora |
| Andy Blueman's mastering prowess really shows through in his breakdowns, he does tend to overdo it during the buildups/climaxes. I'm amazed that you randomly picked the worst mastered song Andy Blueman has done, tracks like The World To Come and his new remix of In Motion are much cleaner, but probably still "bad" by your guys' standards. |
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| SDM |
| i think that was sort of the point |
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| Nightshift |
| I dont think Andy Blueman masters his own tracks. |
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| DigiNut |
| I'd bet that this is part of the reason why more "minimal" music has become the new trend. It's probably entirely subconscious, but it's a bit like the sensation of leaving a big noisy crowd for the relative silence outside or in your own home. We need a certain amount of "white space" in audio the same way we need it in visuals. |
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| wrzonance |
| quote: | Originally posted by DigiNut
I'd bet that this is part of the reason why more "minimal" music has become the new trend. It's probably entirely subconscious, but it's a bit like the sensation of leaving a big noisy crowd for the relative silence outside or in your own home. We need a certain amount of "white space" in audio the same way we need it in visuals. |
Weird/good point. I was at a show Friday night that idoru on these forums opened at. Very minimal, very techno (but slow)... which I guess is the trend.
To be totally honest, I was really stoned, but it was really enjoyable. The system in the club was cranked (almost too loud for me, an old man at 23), and the tracks were great... but it was defiantly minimal. I remember saying how I hated it... but it's actually pretty enjoyable.
I don't even know what today's trance sounds like... but if it's like JBJ's example I can see why music lovers in the trance genre are just as upset as the people in the rock/pop genre (Metallica's Death Magnet comes to mind). |
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| Richard Butler |
I'm getting more and more into less full mixes. One of the most common comments producers get on another forum is 'your track is'nt full enough', almost like they are so robotised they can't see beyond anything other than a really cluttered ear tiring fullness. Fashion I spose.
Last night I was listening to sandervandorns recent album called supernaturalistic of something, and it was really nice and empty, dynamic and fresh, but I've had it a few months and not liked it before. But my young son put it on in the car and we were both transfixed on a kind on musical journey. But his lead sounds are incredible, so don't need much else. He uses things like the DSI big beast synth and moog voyager. |
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| pozz |
Listen to an orchestra play. the wash of sound you get is both clear and pure mud. especially if you arent experienced in classical music, you wont be able to pick out sounds that come out of separate instruments.
thickness, fullness, the kind i like, is always to do with the layers of many sounds - compression is only a way to get a particular layer to sound a particular way. |
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