Public awareness of the so-called ‘loudness war’ has been increasing of late, thanks to exposure in non-specialist publications (The Guardian and The Wall Street Journal have both featured articles about it), and also because of initiatives like Dynamic Range Day.
Described as a “day of online activity to make people more aware of the loudness war”, Dynamic Range Day makes use of social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook to try to educate both music-industry professionals and the record-buying public about the deleterious effects of excessive dynamic-range reduction (which is not an easy thing to do, as any studio geek who’s tried to explain compression to a less technically-inclined friend will know!).
The people behind Dynamic Range Day have organised a competition, in which entrants must read the open letter to the music industry (available on the Dynamic Range Day web site), and answer three questions relating to it. The winner of the competition will receive an SSL Mynx rack loaded with a Bus Compressor, a pair of B&W CM1 loudspeakers, a TC Electronic LM6 loudness meter, a free CD mastering session from Fluid Mastering, and much more!
This year, Dynamic Range Day will be held on Friday March 16th. For more information, check out the web site, below.
