[MLA] More good news (Spotify)

[Ian Shepherd]

Hi Eelco,

> So please encourage them to make the new LOUD ! Maybe the best strategy is to find one of the worst offenders when it comes to smashing audio and challenge him to make a louder master than you can for the new Spotify target level. A loudness contest for the new world! 

Absolutely, that’s my current “angle” on the topic - do they want to SOUND loud, or just BE loud ? Because if they want to SOUND loud, balanced dynamics are the way forward.

And this argument is working well with people who are open to persuasion - but there are some who aren’t. And just like climate change deniers, they will cherry-pick the exceptions to try and disprove the rule - and a “gamed” track with a high-frequency is a perfect example for them to point at and say “see ?”.

> One other strategic position we should consider is FM radio. It is still quite important for artists. So we have to proof that a track that is mastered loud for -14 LUFS will also sound louder on the radio than a traditional sausage. This should be easy to do, since the sausages generally sound softer after radio processing than more dynamic tracks. But we should definitely proof it. So perhaps we should build two targets into the loudness contest: the jury judges the subjective loudness of the track at -14 LUFS _and_ after a standard Optimod process (= like on air). Bob Orban will likely offer his help, but I also have very good contacts at Omnia if needed, or at the Dutch public pop music station (that has so much compression that a telephone line at -30 dB sounds equally loud as a -4 LUFS CD track…)

Interesting idea, we should certainly explore this ! We’d need a great-sounding mainstream example, ideally.

Ian