OK, let's get this out of the way right up front. I'm a Mixerman fan. I've written before about the extraordinarily amusing and interesting Daily Adventures Of Mixerman audiobook before, and I regularly recomend his book Zen and the Art of Mixing to people.
He's a controversial figure who stirs up a lot of debate online, and that's fine.
Because he has a habit of saying things like this:
"You do need to get your record to level, or no one will be able to turn it up loud enough to hear it in their car. So, at this point–and I can’t believe I’m about to write this–it would seem to make more sense to use an automated mastering service."
Or this:
"Unless you’re paying to have your record mixed, you shouldn’t pay to have it mastered either.”
[Record scratch]
This statement comes right at the end of the section on mastering in his new book, and is bound to be the biggest take-away people get from the topic.
But it's completely wrong.
You've probably heard by now that Spotify recently announced it will soon be possible for anyone to upload directly to their streaming service, without going through an agregator like TuneCore or CD Baby.
What you may not have heard yet is that along with that, they've also published recommendations for the best format and specifications for your music when you do.
These include some interesting details (like the fact that they support 24-bit files) and confirm several things we already knew - that they're now using LUFS instead of ReplayGain for loudness normalization, and that their default Distribution Loudness level is -14 LUFS, for example.
There's one suggestion that may raise a few eyebrows though, and that's the recommendation that files should peak no higher than -2 dBTP (True Peak) - thanks to Christopher Carvalo for the heads-up.
[Update - Since I posted this last week, Spotify have updated their FAQ to clarify that the -2 dBTP recommendation only applies to material mastered louder than -14 LUFS. If your material measures -14 LUFS or lower, the True Peak recommendation is -1 dBTP]
People are loving the Loudness Penalty website - but some of them have been saying
Who cares what the numbers say ? The important thing is - how does it sound ?
And of course we agree !
Which is why we've added a new feature to the site - Live Loudness Preview
To see it in action in less than 30 seconds, check out the video above. But in this post I want to take a little more time to explain why we're so excited about this new function. (Which, by the way, works on mobile as well - and, the whole site is significantly faster this time around)
Firstly though:
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I've been talking about this image for years. Literally, I'd describe it in almost every conversation, interview or lecture when I talked about loudness. And it always got a great reaction.
But it didn't exist !
Except in my head.
...until now.
