Hace poco leí un interesante artículo aparecido en la última edición de la revista Rolling Stone (esa que tiene a los “tatas” Led Zeppelin en portada) acerca de cómo los avances tecnológicos en la industria musical han llevado, paradójicamente, a una de las peores épocas en cuanto a calidad de sonido se refiere. Y es que desde hace algo más de una década que se viene sacrificando la pureza sonora, los matices, las texturas, colores y formas de las canciones y los discos en pro de tener más volumen, más sonido… ejem, ruido, bulla, decibeles la mayor parte del tiempo.
Pero para entender este fenómeno hay que entender el contexto, y en eso mucho tiene que decir el estilo de vida desde hace algunos años en adelante, en donde todo es rápido, vertiginoso, ir de acá para allá, poco descanso, poco tiempo para uno mismo y las personas que uno quiere, poco tiempo para realmente escuchar música. Entonces, surgieron nuevos inventos en donde la música cupo perfectamente en aparatos cómodos y transportables (porta CD, I-pod, MP3 player, etc), o bien se adaptó al auto, al trabajo, la computadora, mientras el oyente continuaba haciendo sus quehaceres, y como en casi todas las labores cotidianas se debe lidiar con gran cantidad de ruido (micros, artefactos, bocinas, voces, etc), los discos desde mediados de los noventa comenzaron a verse incrementados en volumen, en distorsión, generando un sonido más plano que antes, hablando de los rangos de frecuencias con los que los ingenieros grababan las pistas; en gran parte debido al fenómeno de la Compresión.
En la música, la compresión consiste en limitar el rango sonoro, “levantado” las señales más débiles (o de plano suprimiéndolas si son muy bajas) y “bajando” las más fuertes, creando esta especie de planicie sonora; y esto se puede evidenciar claramente en los discos desde los noventa en adelante. Es cosa de escuchar What’s The Story… (Oasis), Hybrid Theory (Linkin Park), St. Anger (Metallica), Chinese Democracy (Guns N’ Roses), Medulla (Björk), Rockstar Supernova (idem); por citar algunos, para darse cuenta de esta saturación constante a los oídos, en donde a cada rato, casi frenéticamente, hay y hay algo sonando, y a veces cuesta distinguir entre los instrumentos, y claro, qué importa si uno está viajando o en el pub, la cosa es que suene; y si de compresión se trata, también está el fenómeno MP3, en el cual canciones son transformadas en base de datos aptos para lectura en el computador y otros dispositivos, y mientras más comprimido esté el archivo, menos pesa, y por ende, mayor capacidad para ser almacenados en CD’s, I-pod, etc.
Y pese a los avances tecnológicos, hoy siguen sorprendiendo gratamente los sonidos de antaño, de aquellos discos y canciones que tenían esa calidez, ese toque, esa sensibilidad y emotividad de músicos que trabajaban con instrumentos y equipos que hoy parecen pasados de moda, pero que; sin embargo, dieron y dan los mejores sonidos de todos los tiempos. Por ello seguimos escuchando “Time” (Pink Floyd), “Englishman In New York” (Sting), “Hotel California” (Eagles), “Private Investigations” (Dire Straits), “Stairway To Heaven” (Led Zeppelin), “Bohemian Rapsody” (Queen), “And You And I” (Yes), “Suite: Clouds, Rain” (David Gates) o “Enjoy The Silence” (Depeche Mode).
De todo esto se puede concluir algo muy atingente; la tecnología, por mucho que se desarrolle, no puede y nunca va a reemplazar al esfuerzo, al trabajo hecho con dedicación, al sonido logrado, detallado, captado en su preciso instante, en ese en que los músicos dieron lo mejor de sí para crear música para durar… para escuchar.
10 comentarios:
Hola hermanito !!.
Te escribo desde la hermana republica en el compu de James (por ello la falta de tildes y demases del idioma espanol jeje).
Interesantisimo tema, de verdad. Hace mucho tiempo que empeze a captar esto que en ingles se conoce como "Loudness War", la cual se basa en el mito absurdo de las companias disqueras, en las cuales creen que si un disco o un single es masterizado usando la mayor cantidad de Db posibles, tendra mayor posibilidad de tener difusion o Radio Airplay.
Al respecto lo que se usa, como bien lo adelantaste, es la compresion, lo cual tiende a ser maltinterpretado y confundido por el publico que no conoce el tema. No es reducir el tamano del archivo, como cuando uno lo pasa a .zip o .rar, sino es disminuir o reducir la distancia del rango o espectro dinamico sonoro. Vale decir, la distancia en Db desde el sonido mas debil y sutil y el mas fuerte o estridente.
En todas las grabaciones hay un punto critico, por sobre el cual aparece el clipping, o esos "tics" que suenan cuando se alcanza un nivel muy elevado de sonido general, que usualmente lo da la bateria, mas especificamente la caja. Para lo cual los "ingenieros" masterizan el disco suprimiendole esos peak del snare drum, para lo cual podran en seguida aumentar la senal general sin llegar al clipping.
Ello conlleva a un volumen mucho mayor, lo cual desgraciadamente aun (sobre todo en el contexto de conciertos en vivo) se cree que un volumen altisimo es sinonimo de un sonido potente, demoledor, pero ello lleva inevitablemente a la perdida del punch de la bateria e instrumentos, esa claridad, definicion y calidez que tanto anoramos de la era analoga
... como ves, podria estar hablando horas y horas, pero prefiero dejer unos links al respecto
SALUDOS DESDE BARILOCHE !!!
http://anarchangel.blogspot.com/2008/01/why-todays-cds-sound-like-crap.html
jajaja buen tema!
casi imagino a ponki dando una clase acerca de la tecnología del ruido jaja
ando flojo pa redactar asi q guardaré mi opninión pa un momento más adecuado.
chao
Holaaaaaaa. Muchas gracias por lo saludos de cumple y efectivamente son 28 primaveras, que lindo no? Pucha me he demorado ene en contestar los saludos y no he podido leer muchos blog, porque estoy por salir de vacaciones y he tenido caleta de pega. Pero pormeto interiorizarme de tu escrito lo antes posible. Un abarzo grande y seguimos en contacto ;)
Pinky!...interesante analisis de las tecnologias pero creo que no se deberia mezclar las cosas porque no es culpa de la tecnologia que los gustos musicales de las masas que hacen discos comerciales para vender. Es como decir que el reggeton es un fenomeno asociado al Ipod o al BlackBerry.....
Se sigue realizando excelente musica con voces liricas en el metal gotico sinfonico en donde la compresion en 128 kbps quita bastante y se nota la diferencia en 256 kbps.
Aparte muy poca gente tiene tiempo y odio para diferenciarlo, porque con audifonos es casi inintenigible.
Saludos
Aquí va algo más:
http://www.cdmasteringservices.com/dynamicrange.htm
What Happened To Dynamic Range?
By
Mastering Engineer, Bob Speer
What happened to dynamic range? That's a question that should be asked of record labels, producers, artists, and last but not least, recording and mastering engineers. The question needs to be asked because we're the ones responsible for what's happened to our music. Much of the music we listen to today is nothing more than distortion with a beat (see the sine wave reference in the chart below). It's not because the music is inferior. Great music is suffering because it lacks dynamic range. When music lacks dynamic range, it lacks punch, emotion, and clarity. The record labels blame digital downloads, MP3s, CD burners, and others for the lack of CD sales. While there is some truth to their constant whining, they only have themselves to blame for the steady decline in CD sales. The record labels need to reevaluate what they consider to be good music.
Much of the music being produced today isn't music at all. It's best described as anti-music. It's anti-music because the life is being squashed out of it through over compression during the tracking, mixing, and mastering stages. It's simply, non musical. It's no wonder that consumers don't want to pay for the CDs being produced today. They're over priced and they sound bad.
In 2005, CD music sales in the U.S. slid to their lowest level since 1996, ending all hopes that the music industry's downward sales trend may have bottomed out. This is according to sales data released by Nielsen SoundScan, a tracking firm that measures point of sale purchases across the U.S. Although there was a slight upturn in sales in 2004, total CD sales fell 7.2 percent from 2004 to 618.9 million units in 2005, the lowest since 1996, when they were 616.6 million. It's time for all of us in the music industry to wake up! Our musical heritage is being threatened by this wave of anti-music.
What is dynamic range anyway? Dynamic range is the difference between the softest and loudest sounds we can hear. Or, to put it another way, the difference between the softest and loudest sounds in a recording. Dynamic range is measured in decibels (dB). For comparison, the typical dynamic range for a cassette recording is around 60 dB, while CDs can reach a dynamic range of 96dB.
For years we've tried to recreate the excitement of a live performance by trying to maintain as wide a dynamic range as possible. This has always been difficult with analog recording. We had to keep the softest signals above the noise floor while keeping the loudest signals below the level of distortion. To keep the soft signals from being buried in tape hiss, we had to record with as high a level as possible. To keep our loud signals from distorting, we had to compress the signal which resulted in a restricted dynamic range. As the years went by, many improvements were made in recorder and tape technology. This, along with various types of tape noise reduction systems, helped to improve the dynamic range of our recordings, but it was still limiting.
Then one day we awoke to a new technology, "digital recording." Wow, now with a dynamic range of over 90 dB, our recordings could almost rival a live performance. Well, in theory, yes. However, the music industry had other ideas.
Rather than use this new technology to take advantage of it's wide dynamic range, the music industry went in the opposite direction. They decided that louder is better. Suddenly, we found ourselves in a race to see whose CD was the loudest. The only way to make CDs louder was to keep compressing the signal more and more. That's where we are today. Everyone's trying to make their CD sound louder than everyone else's. The term that is used for this process is called, hot. Yes, most of today's music is recorded hot. The net result, distortion with a beat.
In December, 2001, several prominent individuals in the recording industry served on a panel to judge the best engineered CD for the Grammy's. After listening to over 200 CDs, they couldn't find a single CD worthy of a Grammy based on the criteria they were given. Everything they listened to was squashed to death with heavy amounts compression. What they wound up doing was selecting the CD that had the least amount of engineering. In reality, the winner didn't win because of great engineering, he won simply because he had messed with the signal the least. On second thought, maybe that was great engineering. For the record, the winner that year was Norah Jones' CD, "Come Away With Me."
Here's a quote from Roger Nichols, one of the participants on that panel. "Last month, I listened to all the CDs submitted
to NARAS for consideration in the 'Best Engineered Non-Classical' Grammy category. We listened to about 3 to 4 cuts
from the 267 albums that were submitted. Every single CD was squashed to death with no dynamic range. The Finalizers
and plug-ins were cranked to 'eleven' so that their CD would be the loudest. Not one attempted to take advantage of the
dynamic range or cleanliness of digital recording." - Roger Nichols Grammy winning engineer for Steely Dan, Beach Boys and
more. EQ Magazine January, 2002, issue.
The Myth Of Radio-Ready CDs. (mastering specifically for radio)
Radio ready is an ambiguous term created by marketing professionals whose goal is to sell a product or service. It's in your best interest to be an informed artist or producer. Radio is the great leveler. It takes songs that are soft and dynamic, and brings them up in level to compete with the so called loud songs. In doing so, the dynamics of these songs are greatly reduced. But that's not all. Radio compressors are designed to drive peaks down. They will view a loud song as one huge peak and will
reduce it's overall level. This can make a loud song lower in level than a properly mastered recording. Loud songs don't sound louder on the radio. They sound softer and distorted. The exact opposite of what was intended. So, why do many still believe their CD needs to be mastered loud to sound good on the radio? It's because of misinformation. Recordings need no special processing to sound good on the radio. Radio limits peaks and raises the level on its own. Mastering music specifically for radio (making it loud) only serves to make it sound worse. Also see: What Happens To My Song When It's Played On The Radio?.
There's no excitement in today's music. There's no texture, and certainly no reason to buy it. Many people today accept this hot sound because that's all they know. They weren't brought up on music that sounds "musical." I can't believe what we've done to our music. We've somehow allowed radio, with it's limited dynamic range and frequency response, to become the standard for what sounds good. We want the CDs we buy to sound like they do on the radio. What happened to recreating the excitement of a live performance? Does any of this make sense? Is it possible that we've moved forward with our technology, but backward in our thinking? The loudness wars have been with us for a long time. With analog, there was a "loudness" limit. With digital technology, however, there is no limit. The music industry now has the ability to destroy it's own product
Don't Fall For The Loud CD Trap
Below is a chart that traces the increase in CD levels. It clearly shows how the average level of CDs has changed over the years due to the "Level Wars" engaged in by the music industry. CDs produced in 1985 had an average (RMS) level of -18dB. This left plenty of room for musical peaks, or to put it another way, punch. It's the average level, not the peak level, that gives music it's perceived loudness. As we move into the 90's we can see the slow change taking place as the music industry enters into the "Level Wars" and begins to destroy our music. The average level of CDs in 1990 was -12dB. Then, as our chart shows, the level was raised to -6dB in 1995. In 2000, CDs reached an average level of -3dB. Since 2000, many CDs have been produced at an average level that's between digital zero and -3db. As the average level of CDs was raised, dynamic range was reduced. By 2002, this raise in average level was so severe, it caused a big loss in clarity and reduced the overall quality of commercial CDs. By 2005, it became even worse.
There needs to be a compromise in what the average level of CDs should be. I believe we should go back to the level of 1990 (actually -14dB would be a good compromise). This compromise would give us a healthy level as well as enough headroom to generate the musical peaks that would reestablish what's missing in today's music! For the record, I personally prefer -18db.
There's one question that artists, producers, and record labels should ask themselves before they even hit the record button.
Is it better to produce music that listeners will want to turn up, or produce music that listeners will want to turn down?
Hopefully, one day we'll wake up from this nightmare. Then we can record, mix, and master music the way it was meant to be.
It's high time we took advantage of what digital technology has given us. The ability to make recordings without noise or distortion, while at the same time preserving the natural dynamics of our music!
Say it with me, very loud. "BRING BACK DYNAMIC RANGE!"
Sólo para narrar mi experiencia: Hace poco quise preparar un video usando como fondo musical un rock lento de los 60s. para esto compré un CD de "Grandes Exitos" y copié la canción requerida a mi PC. Al reproducir la canción me pareció de volumen muy alto, distorsionada, sobre todo la batería y las cuerdas, que son dos de las mejores partes del original. La voz de la cantante sonaba chillante en partes.
Al ver la onda que generó la pieza en mi programa de grabación supe porqué: Era un muro de sonido, las partes altas totalmente contra el límite de la gráfica y ninguna distinción entre suaves y fuertes. Remasterización de acuerdo a la moda, volumen al máximo y un producto pésimo.
Investigando las causas fue como llegué a este blog.
Sobra decir que no utilizé la tal canción.
Saludos.
Super interesante el escrito y los comentarios, la verdad es que no cachaba eso..pero bueno..debe ser parecido a lo que ha pasado con la industria automotriz...hasta hace no mucho los autos en vez de ser mas economicos consumian un nivel de combustible bastante parecido a los iniciales, porque los consumidores preferian contar con mas potencia asi que en vez de pasar le pulcritud al medio ambiente, la pasabamos a la chala...
Finalmente con el tema enregetico y el calentamiento global las automotoras han empezado a crear autos mass economicos y amigables con el medio ambiente....
qué deberá pasar para que las disqueras usen la tecnologia en pos de la calidad...?
un abrazo al par de gemelos, al chorizo y al belo
El disco chinese democracy precisamente no fue victima de la loudness war. Documentate un poco por internet por que incluso leí un artículo con una entrevista a uno de los que hicieron el master del CD (o un cargo similar)que decía que se cuidó muchísimo su post producción y que la propia banda eligió para sacar el mercado la versión menos aumentada de sonido en dB, la que sonaba más limpia. Seguramente lo encuentres. Un saludo
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