Comment by jdietrich | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jdietrich | Hacker News Reader

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Our perception of loudness is highly subjective and we quickly acclimatise to loud music. Music sounds superficially better at louder volumes, hence the notorious loudness war in music production [1]. This is one of the big risks of using headphones - it's easy for the volume to creep up to dangerous levels if you're not worried about disturbing the neighbours.

Sound engineers often suffer from a significant degree of noise-induced hearing loss. Hearing loss is highly dose-dependent, so working with live sound equipment on a daily basis is far more damaging than going to the occasional loud concert. As a result, they tend to set the house volume too loud. Noise-induced hearing loss affects the high frequencies first, so live sound is often extremely shrill and trebly to compensate. Those engineers who don't have noise-induced hearing loss have made a habit of wearing ear protection, which has basically the same effect.

The unfortunate solution is to wear ear protection to any amplified live music event. I recommend the Etymotic ER-20xs [2]. You'll hear a better, more balanced sound at a much safer volume level.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war

[2]https://www.etymotic.com/consumer/hearing-protection/er20xs....

Are the ER-20xs a significant step up from the ER-20s?

I used to wear ER-20s and they were fine. Alpine MusicSafe Pro were good too. Both comfortable, and did they job.

Alpine PartyPlugs didn't sounds as good to me, but they were more discrete so great for house parties and stuff.

I switched to Ear Peace HD's about a year ago.

Ear Peace are mentioned below the article. I don't know if it was sponsored. I'm certainly not sponsored by them.

I love EDM, DnB especially, but I'm a mosher at heart. The EPHD's don't hurt as much if an errant crowd-surfer happens to smack into my ear.

The EPHD's are even less noticeable than the Alpine PartyPlugs too.

I started wearing earplugs when I started working with VoIP systems a decade and a half ago. I'd be going to a few metal gigs a month and it was always painfully loud. I'd have ringing in the ears after every gig, and I'd sleep badly and feel almost hungover the next morning.

I have similarly sensitive hearing to the lady in the article, even restaurants and cinemas will cause me to pop my earplugs in. I keep a set attached to my keys. (The EPHD's come with a black metal tube keyring case.)

I couldn't go back to not wearing earplugs. If anything, they made gigs sound better to me.

I haven't used the Ear Peace HDs. The ER-20xs is significantly smaller than the old ER-20, just barely protruding beyond the ear canal. The Ear Peace plugs may be a better option if you're prone to getting whacked in the head. The ER-20xs has an optional neck cord, which I find to be a handy feature. They also work with a range of foam and silicone tips, so are more likely to fit a broad range of ears.

>If anything, they made gigs sound better to me.

As I mentioned in my comment, the sound engineer is almost certainly either wearing ear plugs or half deaf. Either one causes a substantial roll-off of high frequencies, so the engineer is likely to subconsciously compensate by boosting the treble in the mix. If you've got plugs in, you're hearing something much closer to his intended mix. It's a totally perverse situation, but gigs almost always sound better with ear protection.

Cool, thanks! I'll grab a set of ER-20xs to try too.

This sounds like the most probable explanation for some experiences I had which I couldn't explain so far.

I've visited festivals that obviously hired professional people for their sound and had rather well-known bands on their line up (Iron Maiden and Hammerfall, for example) and that had terrible sound.

The volume would be cranked up way to much, proving to be even beyond the limits of the equipment, which led to the sound mostly being very obviously oversaturated. All the while I couldn't imagine being near the place without ear protection, which made the whole thing even more pointless.

Honestly, setups like that only ruin the experience of the paying customer. I can't fathom the idea that no-one who is organizing such events isn't having a sincere word with their sound crew after the first song.

Is there any reason not to use a decibel meter to set up volumes. And perhaps to use computer assistance to balance instrument volumes and profile the sound. Seems like a couple of mics around a room and you could adjust to get the best sound for the whole room rather than [just] the sound desk? I'd guess they're doing that already at big concerts.

It seems very like colour profiling to me. Graphic designers seem to match to objective standards though, whilst sound techs seem instead to use their own perception at the time?

Here in the UK, it's common for venues to have automatic sound limiting devices - exceed a certain threshold and power to the PA system is disconnected [1]. These systems are a source of constant frustration for engineers, performers and clients.

The problem is that good live sound is highly dynamic. If you ran the PA at exactly 85dBa all night, it would sound very flat and unengaging. You want to push the volume during lively upbeat songs and bring it back down for an intimate ballad, you want a bit of a lift during the chorus, you want natural crescendos and diminuendos. Really good engineers can maintain this sense of dynamism while keeping the overall levels under control by using time-averaged metering, but systems capable of that are quite costly.

Achieving a consistent volume level throughout the venue is much easier said than done. Normal loudspeakers follow the inverse square law, so the sound will be much louder close to the PA system. You can't just put a bunch of speakers all over the room, because you'll get weird phase effects - sound moves at about one foot per millisecond, so additional speakers tend to cause very unpleasant delay and comb filtering effects [2]. This can be mitigated by the use of electronic delay compensation for the additional relay speakers, but not eliminated entirely.

The inverse square law can be evaded by using a line array loudspeaker system [3]. Theses systems use multiple loudspeakers in a phased array, which produces a cylindrical rather than spherical wavefront. Line arrays give a much more even distribution of sound and also reduce the amount of energy that is reflected from the ceiling and floor, providing a much clearer sound with more accurate transient response. Historically, line arrays have been expensive and difficult to configure, so they have been confined to large venues and high-end touring systems. Compact integrated line array systems are now available from many manufacturers, so hopefully we should see an improvement in the general standard of live sound over the coming years.

[1] https://noiselimiters.co.uk/scx-noise-limiter-and-contactor-...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comb_filter

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_array

> If you ran the PA at exactly 85dBa all night, it would sound very flat and unengaging. //

I was thinking more having an RMS max target dBA/dB(SPL) and a cut-off above that to limit instantaneous volume rather than requiring a particular level for the night.

I'm in the UK; I know a little about phase effects having set up a few room level PAs (5 instruments, 3 mics, 6 speakers, single board; that sort of size). However, I'm not familiar with large set-ups as I've only attended smaller concerts of the order of 100s-1000s of people.

I'm pretty sure they do this. I go to gigs often and most sound tech's now walk around with iPad's/iPhone's during the soundcheck using them to measure levels. I think the problem is more than most venues will have a lot of speakers setup up around the stage (sides, above sometimes too) and that's it. So if it's a big venue the volume is necessary to make sure the people at the back are experiencing it properly too. Sound desks are often centre back of the room so that's where things tend to sound best. If your nearer the speakers you'll often miss things (for example you'll see someone playing a guitar solo and won't be able to hear it, if you go back towards the sound desk it'll be much more balanced).

Thank you for this very detailed write-up and also the specific product recommendation.

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