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I'd take it from a different angle - those worried about "fidelity" that don't play instruments and have never worked on a studio recording simply have no idea

by beat 13y ago

I'd take it from a different angle - those worried about "fidelity" that don't play instruments and have never worked on a studio recording simply have no idea what they're talking about. They latch on to numbers because numbers are easy to understand, and bigger == better, right? After engineering/producing a bunch of albums, one thing I can say for sure is that a good-sounding album is totally fake relative to the actual, natural sounds of the instruments involved. That's fine, because it sounds good. An accurate recording doesn't sound good. It's too loud or too quiet (often in the same passage), lacks a sense of space, and lacks impact.

beat 13y ago
Here's an example of what I'm talking about. When mixing guitar/bass/drums, I'll often high-pass guitars around 200hz - basically, throwing out any signal below that with an equalizer. And if you listen to the guitar by itself, it sounds like it's been gutted. But in the context of a mix, the change to the guitar is inaudible - but the drums and bass sound better! The heart of the guitar's sound is in the midrange, not the bass range. You can lose the bass range and as long as other instruments are there, your ears fill in the missing information for you. Meanwhile, the heart of the kick drum and bass guitar are in that lower range, so getting other instruments out of their way makes them easier to hear.
jensgk 13y ago
Absolutely. Music is purely a subjective experience, and it is absolutely ok to prefer a special sound over "fidelity". This also justifies the "vinyl record" craze, as long as the "fidelity" argument is not used. If it sounds good it is good :-)
- beat 13y ago
  Yeah, but that line of reasoning opens up the "You think it's good because it's just warm distortion" line from the head over heart crowd, and it's often not at all true. You can spot these people because they'll use THD (total harmonic distortion) like a meaningful number. THD specs are generated by 1khz sine waves. It deliberately ignores both dynamics and harmonic content - the fundamental building blocks of music. It's like measuring how well a car drives 50mph.
Daishiman 13y ago
Let's go even one step further: anything that's being amplified on a microphone for live performance is already "artificial". I do sound engineering for a band and I tweak the hell out of the EQ for live performance, also adding compressors and reverbs, and the difference night and day compared to bands that don't care about that, or don't have a sound guy who knows what they should like.

by beat 13y ago

beat 13y ago

Here's an example of what I'm talking about. When mixing guitar/bass/drums, I'll often high-pass guitars around 200hz - basically, throwing out any signal below that with an equalizer. And if you listen to the guitar by itself, it sounds like it's been gutted. But in the context of a mix, the change to the guitar is inaudible - but the drums and bass sound better! The heart of the guitar's sound is in the midrange, not the bass range. You can lose the bass range and as long as other instruments are there, your ears fill in the missing information for you. Meanwhile, the heart of the kick drum and bass guitar are in that lower range, so getting other instruments out of their way makes them easier to hear.

jensgk 13y ago

Absolutely. Music is purely a subjective experience, and it is absolutely ok to prefer a special sound over "fidelity". This also justifies the "vinyl record" craze, as long as the "fidelity" argument is not used. If it sounds good it is good :-)

beat 13y ago
Yeah, but that line of reasoning opens up the "You think it's good because it's just warm distortion" line from the head over heart crowd, and it's often not at all true. You can spot these people because they'll use THD (total harmonic distortion) like a meaningful number. THD specs are generated by 1khz sine waves. It deliberately ignores both dynamics and harmonic content - the fundamental building blocks of music. It's like measuring how well a car drives 50mph.

Daishiman 13y ago

Let's go even one step further: anything that's being amplified on a microphone for live performance is already "artificial". I do sound engineering for a band and I tweak the hell out of the EQ for live performance, also adding compressors and reverbs, and the difference night and day compared to bands that don't care about that, or don't have a sound guy who knows what they should like.