more generally i would add that if you master yourself, you should distinguish between "audio mastering" and "technical mastering".

the one process can enhances the "music", and is often required because the person who made the mix doesnt have good speakers or doesnt have the idea to compare and mix his material against industry standards or against any comparison material.

but the latter is a process of which you require one per medium. i.e. mastering for CD is different than mastering for DVD or for mp3, and for streaming you theoretically need to make one master per streaming service.

none of the processes neccessarily require a limiter, gate, compressor or EQing, but they can.

 

Again, if you have a song with loudness louder than -14LUFS you can just turn down the gain/fader/volume (to reach -14LUFS) and export it. That simple.
But then again: -14LUFS IS NOT A TARGET!

Edit: I'm part of a mastering collective and we are currently in the process of at least convincing Spotify to change their guidelines on their "how to master" tips, to at least inform that loudness normalization will be introduced, rather than convincing people that -14LUFS is a target.
All music is different. Loudness normalization is a way to 1) end the loudness war and 2) make music more dynamic again. But some music/genres are loud and doesn't benefit of being as dynamic as -14LUFS.

 

Last edited: Oct 23, 2021

does rumble have a different leveling compliance? because in all the videos i've uplpaded i cant remember having this conversation. and latest one had a million hits, sounded pretty much the same as the one i had on hard drive

 

alot of my friends monitize across 10-14 formats, and yt is the biggest P.I.T.A of them all, i purged yt a long time ago, no exposure.
50 hits for a P.I.T.A vs a million hits monitized is a no brainer

 

what do platforms have against the loudness war?
This is discrimination against sound engineers

• I love sausage waveforms
• I can't breathe without my multiband limiter
• Freedom for our overcompressed mastering
• Boycott LUFS

-14 is fake news

 

no, but "streaming service XY" is a target.

the strange thing about these "guidelines" is that they are not needed for using spotify.

if something is "too loud", they simply adjust it by changing the gain.

the bigger issue is with music which is "not loud enough" but has peaks of -0.1, then it´ll be destroyed by a limiter, and all only because they want to help their listeners that they do not need to change the volume.

what a nonsense.

and btw, i also think it is nonsese that these platforms mostly apply gain change during streaming. it somehow seemed more logical to create a copy of the file.

if they want to give people useful "tips" they should start with thing likes "dont use dithering" or "less is more" and not confuse them with numbers of more or less no meaning.

they want their material to be around the same listening experience, not make "full on psytrance" less loud because they hate loud music.

so they try to find a compromise.

while it is okay to make overcompressed tracks less loud, it is not okay to destroy experimental music, classical music, or audiobooks.

 

i identify as a -14LUFS, there, problem solved

 

No, they removed/disabled the limiter of lower loudness material.
https://themasteringshow.com/episode-77/

 

Just watch this video (yes it is a promo for the concert) But! Look at the statistics for sys admins >100% / 90% (content loudness 0.9db) is very loud for me at 50% volume in headphones I almost deafened, it how? Where is the penalty for loud music?

Here's what I got:

 

Last edited: Oct 26, 2021

? Lemme do the math for you. Track downloaded -13.2LUFSi, +0.3TP. Adjusted by YT by -0,9dB => track replay -14.1LUFSi @ -0.4TP.
Means LUFSi is ok, TP 0.6 too high.
What penalty did you expect, if I may ask?

 

@No Avenger dude, it's weird, this video is loud for me, I try to make a track at a similar volume, YouTube lowers the volume for me

 

Strange. What LUFS and TP values has your track and by how much is it lowered?

 

@No Avenger
Is it normal that my track after exporting looks like this?
I know it looks like a "brick".
But I read Spotify's mastering tips and it says: If your master's louder than -14dB integrated LUFS, make sure it stays below -2dB TP (True Peak) to avoid extra distortion. This is because louder tracks are more susceptible to extra distortion in the transcoding process.
I did -2.0dbTP, and this is what came out, from the sound engineer's point of view, is it a terrible sound wave?
But the track sounds good (That's probably because I prefer the "Mono" technique.) the penalty is -4.0 dB youtube, Yes I need to make tracks for YouTube, no other streaming services.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

 

Depends on your compressor and limiter settings. It could look more dynamic as well as less. I have seen both.

AFAIK, that's a Spotify specific rule.

That means that you track has -10LUFS at -1TP. Since YT's actual target is -14, your track is lowered by 4. Normal procedure.

For modern HM that's quite ok, I have seen worse.

 

windows movie editor go BBBBBBRRRRRRRRRRRR!!

 

Sidenote: The "-2dBTP for louder material than -14LUFS" is just a tip/guideline (to completely avoid ISP clipping). Not a rule. Not many MEs abide to this.

 

Last edited: Oct 27, 2021