Some feedback from people who visited this site:
From Derrick E. W. Acker, Owner, Quetzal Recording
"... I must agree that a poorly mastered album is very irritating to listen to.
However, the increase in audio levels is to take advantage and utilize the
full 16 bits of resolution on a CD. Quatization is one of the things that
can make digital recordings sound unpleasing. Simply put, it is the
difference between two or more bits. The lower a digital signal the more
the quantization is audible because you are dealing with the lower level of
bits. If the audio signal is low you're going to increase the volume of
your playback system in turn magnifying quantization. I always compare this
issue of resolution to your television screen. It has a givin specification
for its resolution and in orfer to take advantage of it the whole screen is
utilized. However, if you shrink down the picture within the screen you
will have sit in closer to view it, thus the pixels will be more noticable
and the resolution will be grainy."
| Too silent: |  |
becomes: |  |
when played at higher volume |
Optimal mastering: 
,
Answer: you are right. I will even continue with the television comparison: mastering louder is like zooming in. But when you zoom in too much, you don't see the edges of the object anymore or the edges are distorted (when limiting), and that's the problem.
Too loud with limiting becomes:
you still see the complete picture, but she isn't as cute anymore...
Some interesting quotes found on the web: In this context: the maximized mix still sounds good in the studio, but the equipment used by the consumer cannot play it back correctly.
From gabe@panix.com Mon Jul 31 01:54:15 CDT 1995
It is traditionally used for rock and pop productions, where for some
reason there is a notion that the LOUDER a recording is, the BETTER
it is.
There are some cases where normalizing is specifically not done. One
example is very quiet music. If you have recorded, say, a clavichord,
it would be foolhardy to place it on the CD such that the highest
peak = 0 dBfs. If you did that, the listener would need to place his
volume control very close to the bottom extreme in order to get an
accurate listening level. Since most volume controls loose resolution
at their lowest extremes, the chances of this having a negative impact
on your sound is quite high. Further, most listeners tend to play their
CDs with the volume knob in one area or range, and normalizing very
quiet instruments is just begging for someone to play them too loud.
From bill@bilver.oau.org Mon Jul 31 21:26:39 CDT 1995
I didn't realize they were still carrying on that 'tradition'
but I can tell you where it started and one anecodte.
As singles became the driving force in the music industry you
had to make 'your' production stand out.
Juke boxes had a fixed level. The reasoning was that if your
record was louder than the others on the box you had a better
chance for sales because it was sure to be heard. Too low a
level and it was lost in the background.
This probably started in the late '50s when the music industry
started it's explosive growth as the sales started shifting
>from the young adult / college age to the high school and
lower.
An old line pop producer, Shelby Singleton, one told me he blew
out two cutter heads at Masterfonics (in Nashville) trying to
get his latest single 'hotter'. That had to be a lot of power
because those were Neumann heads that here helium cooled.
There reall hadn't been any 'level wars' that I am aware of
until the advent of the '45 which was introduced in 1949.
However the record companies kept shipping 78's to the radio
stations until Capitol switched to promos on 45's in July 1954
for 1) lower cost shipping 2) safer delivery 3) longer record
life. The rest of the industry followed shortly.
In the next year or so Columbia tried to set a standard, at
least for radio station promotional copies, by using what they
called CSL (Columbia Standard Level).
They shipped a special level setting 45 and a set of stickers.
You played the 45' and marked the level on the 'pot at which
this gave you a 100% (0 db) reading on the meter, so that
anytime you played one of their records you could just pot-up
to the mark and know it was right.
All the promotional 45's from them that met this 'standard' were
shipped with white labels and red printing, while their
previous copies were white with black. This was just at the
changeover in pop music styles and just before the time of the
'hot' pressing.
Until the mid '50s' there were few independant record
companies and virtually everything was from the three major
companies, RCA, Columbia and Decca, and the "new kid on the
block", Capitol. Within the next few years the business would
be turned upside down.
Thus ends today's "music history" lesson.
From: LBLASKE@aol.com
Combining normalization with DSP like "Ultramaximizing" can yield some pretty
hot signals. If you insist on using up all available headroom, make sure
your playback equipment can handle it.