The secret of maximum loudness (part 2) 

the real secret to loudness was the friends we made along the way.

'Make it sound as good as possible' - 1000% true. Anytime I listen to a well produced/mixed/mastered song, no matter how loud it already is I want to turn it up even more.

Dan telling us all to cut it out and use the volume knob what a legend

"Hack your listener's brain, and make them want to turn it up." *i sat here watching this by myself and applaused no cap*

100% educational. Forget him never begging for the subscribe, he's not even plugging the product.

I heard somewhere that 'the end user has control over the volume of the song but not the quality'. Also I've been waiting for this video for a long time despite knowing all this, I just love watching Dan's videos.

Loud Mixes (squashed to crap to create artificial loudness) are for low listening levels so we can...well..."hear" it at low volume. Low Mixes (more dynamic) are for loud listening levels so we can...well..."feel" it at high volume. Thank you Dan for getting the message out.

So the secret to maximum loudness is turning the volume up? Im both satisfied and perplexed by that obvious answer

One thing you can do if you’re making an album that you want people to listen to all the way through is to consider what level the first track starts at. If you want impactful punchy loud parts, you can start the first song ever so slightly quieter. The audience will set the level. Then loud really is louder. Of course, you have to be careful how much extra dynamic range you leave, because if you annoy people they will simply turn your music off. But with a spare decibel or two, you can have a heavier impact, like classical recordings, which sound genuinely loud when they’re loud. Basically i’m saying, leave a little space. A track that does this is Radiohead’s track Palo Alto. The track gives you the idea it will be at one level… but then the chorus kicks in, and you get insanely loud guitars. Hats off to them for having the stones to do this. It really makes the track stand out. (Also, it’s a great song)

I'm convinced the first track on NIN's "broken" is just to get the listener to turn up the volume, so when the guitars slam in during the second track, it smacks you in the face.

woop woop! always happy to see these videos coming in!

FINALLY IVE BEEN WAITING

I have to say I'm always impressed with the quality of production and information in these videos. I can't praise it enough!

This is basicly what i've been saying to everyone since I started doing mixing and mastering. Glad I can now point everyone to this, once again, perfectly explained video. Thanks Mr Worral ;-)

15 years into the music business and I STILL get to learn from Dan! What a scientist!

I love this channel, the content is so well edited and thoughtfully written.

Wow, Mr. Worrall. Just wow. I've made a playlist of your Fabfilter videos and at each stage of my mixing process I review the relevant plugins and I achieve very satisfying results. Your videos have helped my ears to mature, separate fact from fiction and complete a project with a sense of doing the best I could at my ability as well as knowing that in the future I will see room for improvement which will be used in future projects. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge and wisdom. I hope it is worth your time.

The punchline was totally worth the wait - and it's the absolute truth. When a great track plays - and I'm in the mood for it, I will just turn it up loud and rock my head to it. That was the perfect denouement to a very informative film. Thank you, Dan.

worth the wait from part 1. thank you dan and fabilter homies!!

Dan Worrall, a gushing fountain of wisdom. Thanks so much for all this excellent education!

Thanks Dan, these two videos have been SO helpful to understand the whole issue and how we should approach loudness when mastering!

Oh sh*#!! I didn't read the video description and was not ready for Dan "The Man" popping back here. I instantly hit full screen and start making obeisance. Respect, Dan and FabFilter!🙏

Dan the man making everything make sense and organizing my brain, as usual.

If there is some kind of reward for production tutorial videos these 2 parts would be first on the list to get it!! You deserve a reward for this no doubt!!!

Brilliant! Loving these FabFilter videos.. so informative and well produced!

Beautiful advice in the end!

sooooo incredible. So much power in all of this! thank you thank you thank you!

This is the BEST video on this topic I have ever seen - THANKS!!

Being in radio for about 46 years I noticed the sometimes dramatic, insane increase of loudness. And what a war it was (and still seems to be). To me it's very simple: if a recording of a song is mastered too much in my face, I simply *don't play it*. It won't be at the playlist at all. Radio uses it's own processing in order to cater listeners invironmentalwise best (at least our radio station KilRock does...). Even the Big Names in the industry (don't mention any names, but Orban is one of them) warn radio engineers in the manuals of their OptiMods for 'ear fatigue': the moment listeners will switch off because their ears are getting tired of the compressed sound overload they experience. A too heavily compressed mastered recording will be recognised by a multiband compressor from about 1982 and later. The device will just not proces the signal significantly. But there's a little catch here: when audio, coming straight from a mastering room is too compressed anyway, the listening experience will be a bit overwhelming anyway, so listeners will shut down their radios still because of that. At first, listeners will turn down the volume a bit. After a while, they still will switch off their radios because of the restless soundscape they experience. This behaviour counts heavenly in your ratings. Besides that: if you're a recording artist or engineer, I don't think you want to be remembered as a loudness freak in the first place. What I'd suggest is that the 100% uncompressed audio is kept available at all times. Who knows what kind of engineering we can expect in the near future? I certainly don't :o) Thanks for posting your videos. I like them very much!

you made my eyes tear with a big smile on my face at the end, thanks for that :)

Dan Worrall is my spirit animal.

finally the second part :) thank you

Just watched it again. Excellent video. Thanks.

Excellent tutorial Dan as always. Thanks a million!

Clear, concise info. Just the facts, no waffling. Thanks for that.

Brilliant as always!

Those last sentences just gave me goosebumps ! Thank for he video !

Wow, the last minute of the video reveals the secret! Fantastic! That's how I will make it now! THX so much! Thumbs up, pal!

Learned so much, laughed a little at the end. The answer was right there in front of us.

Been checking every day on the page for this

Thanks, one more great video.

The end made me smile. What a simple but brilliant conclusion. Thanks for all this information :)

Such a great ending 👍🏻👍🏻. Well done

learning about the loudness penalty website from this, thank you so much!! Continue to make great content!

Sooooo good! Welldone again and thank you!

due to the quality of what was explained and demonstrated here, including the advice/wisdom at the end, i had little choice but to locate the 'volume up' button and watch it through again. 👍🏻

Dan, you are KING! Thank you!

Man I was waiting for this like the conclusion to a good cliffhanger episode of my favorite show, and you didn't disappoint! Yes, the loudness war was always pointless and its interesting that streaming platforms are basically ending it.

The music in all your videos is simply amazing…❤ like a cherry on top.

I LOVE the conclusion!

Brilliantly executed!

Yep, that's the way to do it. Thanks, Dan!

Wow, I really liked the conclusion, not always will the "loudest" song sound better, so its better to focus on making our music actually sounding better, that will make the user crank it up 🤘❤🤘

great video! amazing conclusion

This is Gold Jerry, Gold!

Loved this!

much awaited. finally 🥰

Thanks so much, FabFilter😁😁😁

Thank you, sensei Dan!

Top class info in here and not just an advert for Pro-L 2. Which everyone should buy anyway.

Brilliant conclusion !

Anyone else here hit the like before watching?Your videos are the best in youtube.And I really appreciate all you doing.

Glorious message!

Been waiting for this sequel every single day

The practical tip at the end about actual loudness...brilliant.

educational, and uplifting. Thanks Dan

A lot of these questions have been bothering me for a long time. Thanks for the explanation!

Excellent video!

Thank you for making this video, the story is remarkable

man, the conclusion of this video made me tear up. So beautiful.

Lol these videos were spot on, top tier. Thank you and good job. So glad loudness war is coming to an end

I am holding so much thoughts, I am getting dizzy. Wonderful video. Instant classic!

FabFilter and Dan Worrall = great combination! This RU-vid video is at -1.2 dB. Lovely video guys! I was waiting for part 2. Side note: although I assume most people here know this, I want to point out the following: if you have a paid subscription with lossless audio (Apple Music, Tidal etcetera) make sure you listen with a wired headphone. Bluetooth headphones aren’t able to transmit high res lossless audio. In other words, if you listen to a lossless file with Bluetooth headphones, the end result is rather a lossy one. Nevertheless Bluetooth and it’s codecs are becoming better and better and maybe in the far future there will be a solution to listen lossless on a Bluetooth wireless headphone. Keep coming with these awesome video’s #FabFilter and #DanWorrall !

Thanks, Dan, for validating the instinct I had 20 years ago, before I knew anything about mastering: Make your listener turn up by making your audio sound a little quieter (and better) than the mainstream. I love all your videos!

..awesome videos from you!!! 🙂

BRAVO ! this video should be shown in all audio engineering schools !

Thank You for your work! This is the high level education!

This is a work of art disguised as a tutorial. Thanks again, Dan

Wow, this video is so good. It contains so much useful detailed information.

Thank you, Dan, you are a legend!

Super solid stuff!

Awesome! you are the industry standard Dan

thank you so much. it was a wonderful class.

Great Video('s). Thanks for the mass of information.

Dan is just phenomenal, really!

Every single producer and or mixing engineer needs to watch this.

This is spot on. I pushed a limiter hard, tried it in my car. Yes, at first it was louder. When I turned up the volume it was distorted bass, sounded crap. So, I turned down the limiter then tried that in the car. At first it sounded very low in volume but...when I cranked up the volume, the loudness was there, no bass distortion. Sounded so much clearer. So yes, Dan is spot on. Let people just crank that volume with no distortion. Top video Dan. 👍🙏

great video! Thank you

Thank you so much for this great video

Dude! u r the GOAT!

That end is priceless! :D

I love your content! You provide such wisdom. Thanks.

Dan, 0.2db from RU-vid perfection, not surprising. This man is the god of addicted producers, always come back to this to make the new musicians I meet even more happy!

Excellent! I like the knob to set up or down the volume ;)

Great videos, well produced and written, and all the music throughout is amazing as well. My thoughts on the last point (how to actually get maximum volume): I finally started thinking of mixing as just trying to find the perfect balance between everything, and not chasing actual volume at all, which sounds either obvious or counter intuitive but here's what I realized. The actual speakers/amps/headphones or whatever that plays the music is what literally causes the volume, be it loud or quiet. In my case, writing a Jungle or Dubstep tune it is easy to lose sight of the balance and try to second guess yourself, like "I might just overdo this frequency a little bit in case it's too quiet on x playback system" "little extra deep sub in case the PA has no subwoofer.." etc. but when it finally gets played live, whoever is running sound has balanced the frequencies just right (hopefully!) so the more balanced a mix is, the better it will sound. And most importantly, the VOLUME that I was trying to find in X or Y freq range, actually comes from the chest-high stack of AMPLIFIERS there.. In short, the Amplifiers create the actual Volume, not the song itself. The song is what the amplifiers use to MAKE loudness, it's not something that either is or isn't IN the audio to begin with. Anyway, might make sense or not but I am loving these videos guy

The Best! Thanks!

Thanks for this. Really helpful.

Brilliant! Thanks.

An excellent conclusion. Dan's right you know, if you want people to listen with great dynamic range but still get the excitement out of the parts that SHOULD be exciting, then make it so that they can't RESIST!

Very informative and educational. Thank you!