iPad
Well, I can't tell ya' how much I'm lovin' the MacBook. Freakin' awesome. I can't wait to get my Mac Mini all set up in studio shape again and then I'm thinking about getting a small relatively inexpensive audio interface for the MacBook, and then I can run it into the Mackie Onyx firewire mixer I've got and use it as another platform of
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Yeah. Macs don't quite have that same "virus/malware free" status they did even a few years ago, but I still think it's much more rare than getting fucked over by that shit on a PC.
I've heard of Sound Forge and Acid Pro--even heard good things about them--but they are PC specific, yes? I've got a couple of the Sony Acid sound samples discs by one of my favourite ambient artists Rapoon that are intended to be used on Acid, but since they are all in...um they're on the Mini so I can't quite look them up, but I think they're AIFFs or WAVs I can easily important them into a variety of recording software. Although I have wondered, at times, if they'd be easier to work with in Acid as sometimes they don't quite loop properly without tinkering or some little hitch like that. It might simply be the way the files are themselves and nothing to do with what progarm they're imported into.
Anyway, I've thought--off and on--for several years now about trying to learn something about Linux and maybe getting a Linux based box up and running. But I'm lazy and unmotivated to learn it, I guess.
Yeah, my Mom got her first computer recently--a cheap Acer laptop, but she doesn't need to do anything very serious or intensive with it--and it came installed with Windows 8. She doesn't really know squat about using a computer, so here I am supposed to show her how to use it and help her out, and I've gotta' sit down and learn some of the basic in and outs of this stupid new Windows 8: freakin' drag and I really don't like it.
Oh, as far as Audacity goes, I use it less than I should. Since getting Propellerhead's Record I use that the most. But Audacity used to help me out with certain things I couldn't get done in Garageband back when that was my main goto for recording and sound production. If nothing else I found Audacity, in my limit use of it, a solid program and I ought to explore it more. It's really slick for getting really sharp precision edits on cuts of sounds you want to make loop seamlessly (or as seamlessly as possible depending on the source)--better than anything else I've used as far as that goes.
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Apple products, however, ARE made much better ... and I'm not sure if prices have gone down on their laptops and towers, but you can get a boss PC for about a grand now (used to be 2-4 grand about 10 years ago). Macs, back in the day, ran waaay higher than that for price.
Sound Forge is made for Mac OS X ... runs about 400 in the marketplace, or wink wink, nudge nudge :D.
I think Acid Pro is PC-only.
My buddy has some version of Apple which has a PC-side to it that he can run PC-only apps on ... I heard they're making more of their desktops and laptops to work like that.
I hate to say it, but you can still find vendors selling Windows 7 out there ... unless she bought the full version of 8 with a buncha extra programs, might be worth it just to wipe her drive and start over with a far superior MS product.
I swear, the leadership since Gates left has been entirely clueless to the marketplace ... chief example is how they blundered E3 with the XB1 reveal. Kotaku.com covered every mis-step and hilarious thud.
On Sound Forge ... I tend to edit my music files, especially the older ones (anything made pre-1995). The old recording style used to optimize the CDs for stereo systems, the old-style cabinets with the receivers, the multiple sliders for the frequencies, and whatnot ... it was a lot like they recorded and pressed records, in terms of audio output. The max db on those older recordings is usually 3-6 db from the max (before it clips).
Today's music is almost all processed to be riiiight at the peak, from like .5 db all the way smashed right up against the peak. So all those party jam and similar music groups like LMFAO, Skrillex ... their audio files look like a solid block of audio when you open them up in the Forge. They have everything so tweaked now (and actually well done) to where you're getting the optimal range on every frequency, and it doesn't sound like a wall of sound, like one would expect.
I have never really bothered to read up on the difference in mastering between 20 years ago and from like 15 years back through today ... my guess is that with the advent of iPods and so many many personal mobile devices, the songs from yesteryear's masterings did not sound all that great with the much-less-powerful earbuds and headphones that people would use with those devices. So they jack all that shit up to peak so that people don't have to fiddle with the volume and potentially blow out their ears on a wild guitar shred, drum roll, frontman scream, stuff like that.
I honestly prefer that peak-mastering style ... I don't use mobile devices either ... most of the time I'm listening to stuff on a 5.1 system, so what peak-mastering does for me is that I have much less need to turn up the volume, I can leave it pretty low and hear every cymbal, every blip, and whatnot.
The one problem I get is when I happen to have an older album that I forgot to up-mix to peak in with some newer music (or music I've up-mixed) in a random play ... it'll come in almost inaudible if it's really old (where the peaks were like 6 db below or more).
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I'll tell ya' what: it is very tempting about the starting from scratch with Windows 7 thing. And, nah, it's only got the OS and nothing else. At least I think so: it's hard to tell with all the junky "apps" that are included on the Start screen that are really nothing more than built advertisements for products and services (or so it seems to me). However, Mom might not understand why more money and a different operating system is required when she just got this machine brand new. And I'm almost 100% certain I really don't want to explain it to her, lol!
As for the changes in the mastering process, it's actually a very interesting (I think so anyway, but that sorta' makes sense, yah?) and controversial topic. Check out this wikipedia entry on The Loudness Wars for insight into the process, and putting that same phrase into Google gets a schwack of results.
Some people find the overly compressed music fatiguing, and I think at times it can be. I certainly find that certain amped up high end frequencies can be tedious to my ears. I don't necessarily mind the practices of over compression that occur these days--and for the past several years--with most music recordings, but, mostly, I simply wish that all my recordings played at the same level. So, yeah, like you, it bugs me more when I'm trying to make a "mix" or a playlist and songs that would otherwise fit very neatly together don't simply because of volume levels. I've thought to do as you have, and simply take the songs into some audio software and "remaster" them myself--which in this means, for your average consumer, and probably myself included--nothing more subtle than throwing on some sort of "brickwall" style limiter and cranking that shit.
I'm hesitant to do so, though, because, really, this is not only an alteration of the recording the artist and producers intended the listener to hear (like adding a few swirls of colour to a Jackson Pollock print so it'll better match your couch, for example), but it actually is a sort of vandalization or destruction of the sounds that were originally recorded.
On the heels of this, one thing I've learned in music and sound production is it is almost always better to turn things down rather than up. If a track isn't sitting in a mix very well volume wise, for example, it is better to turn other tracks down than turn that one up. Same goes when fine tuning levels of individual frequencies. The idea here is that by turning things down to make them work together better, you are leaving yourself "space" or "room" for further adjustments down the line. Cranking everything up entails you're going to run out of any "headroom" pretty damn quick. Although, I suppose if at the end of the process all a particular listener wants is a louder volume, then these little "turn it down not up" tricks don't matter as much.
If you take the time to look into the topic any further, you'll find that there are several audio engineers--from those offering recording and mixing, to those who do the final polishes, the mastering, on those mixes--who really loathe the whole "loudness" thing, and would rather mix and master with a larger dynamic range than to squash the shit out every frequency. Of course, they also want to have jobs and make a living, so...
My own personal preference? I tend towards thinking and feeling that going for "dynamic range" over loudness probably results in more expressive and robust recordings. Sadly, I've ultimately tried to squash the shit out of pretty much every track I've ever made simply because I'm trying to get it to "sound" as loud as commercially produced tracks.
In the end, I think we must realize that volume and sound are not the same thing.
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