Why are shows so darn loud!?

Brad Sarno · From: St. Louis, MO USA

For audio (studio) engineers, they've found the SPL of 83 or 84 dB average loudness to be the best for balanced sense of EQ and fatigue factor. Even with that you need a break every hour. A 2 hour concert at 103dB is just ruthless. It took me 3 years to get used to playing live with foam earplugs in. Since then I've dramatically reversed the tinnitus in my ears as well as learned to play at a nice stage volume. I put them in when using a vacuum cleaner or anything loud, even a blender or a long car ride with the windows open. My ears used to scream with ringing, now it's just barely there. But it does flare up a bit after a loud feedback squeal or any real loud noise.

Brad Sarno

Terry VunCannon · From: Greensboro, North Carolina, USA

I have been using Pro-Musician "Ear Filters" for about 2 years now. I went to a local Hearing Clinic to get them. They checked my hearing, printed out the results, & took a mold of my ears to make my custom ear filters. (All for under $200/Best money I've spent) I use a 15 db cut filter in my plugs. I can change those to 8 db or 25 db cut if I want. I like the filters much better than regular "Ear Plugs" because I can still hear everything, lows, mids, & highs. Everything around me seems so clear with the filters in. I don't have to use them all the time, but when a band gets to loud, they really save my ears.

Chris Scruggs · From: Nashville, Tennessee, USA

I think it's hard to blame Elvis for loud bands. Elvis' stage set up in the 50's was a vocal mike, a hollowbody electric guitar with a 25 watt amp, an unmiked small drum kit, and an upright bass with a mike in front of it. When he began performing again in the late 60's, it was in casino's. I'm sure the casino wouldn't let a lounge show get too loud.

I don't think it's possible to blame the Beatles for loud bands, either.

When the Beatles did their first U.S. tour, they where playing to arenas of 30,000 screaming teenage girls. Their amplification came from two 50 watt Vox amps, and a 100 watt Vox bass amp.

None of their amps or drums where miked. That means they where playing arena's of screaming girls with only 200 watts of volume. That's less than one Nashville 1000. They also had no monitors.

When they played Shea Stadium, they had two 100 watt Vox guitar amps, and a 200 watt bass amp. This time Ringo had one overhead mike for his entire kit, and that was to around 100,000 people. They sang through the same P.A. system that the announcers spoke through at the ballgame. Once again, no monitiors.

The Stone's where about the same at that time.

I would assume Cab Calloway and Glen Miller in the 30's and 40's where louder than Elvis in '56, and the Beatles in '64. A 20 piece horn section is always louder than a Gretsch plugged into a Vox AC-30.

Eric West · From: Portland, Oregon, USA, R.I.P.

I've been meaning to mention horn bands.

My fondest memory of a horn band experience one was in 78 at Ocean City MD. Harry Weinstein was the Bandleader of the Navy Commodores. We were on the beach looking facing the shore. No amplification at all and it pinned my ears back.

I LOVED it.

Just because a person likes loud music doesn't mean they seek out jet engines to stick their heads in. People that like lots of light don't necessarily stare at the sun every time they get a chance.

There some people that I'm convinced stay indoors with the shades drawn and their earplugs in.

When it's rainy and dark out, I like to nap with quiet music on. Romantic music. Even when it's just me...

EJL

Gary Stewart · From: Spokane,WA,USA

Quantity not quality

Don E. Curtis · From: St Louis, Missouri, USA (deceased)

I probably shouldn't even get into this, but I too hate loud music...but the problem as I see it is just the steel guitar playing has changed, so has the way sound engineers mix...so even if it isn't too loud it's still too loud! Too much drums and way too much lead guitar. When we're out on the road and trying to listen to music in the front while people are sleeping in the back, once you get it at the nominal volume all you hear mostly are drums. I play several gigs with no drums at all...it can be done. But it's taste, "in the eye of the beholder". I try to make sure the drums are not too loud on my CD's, and I don't believe they are, but I can play it for an old school listener and ask them what they think, and they say, "The drums are too loud!"
Go figure, the times they are a changin'.
Don E. Curtis
Pedal Steel Guitar Owner

John Floyd · From: R.I.P.

Its too Loud if you have to wear These.

Eric West · From: Portland, Oregon, USA, R.I.P.

I've noticed several singers, regardless of being miked seem to think that they have to "yell", like Gilbert Godfrey or Robyn Leach. Notable is Michael McDonald on that telephone comercial.

Small wonder instruments had to be electrified a long time before the advent of drumsets. How the heck would a guy back up Ethyl Murman without a stack of marshals?

Give me Vince Gill any time...

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 28 December 2003 at 06:47 PM.]

Charles French · From: Ms.

Topic: Why are shows so darn loud!?

Usually because we get too old!

cf

Kevin Hatton · From: Buffalo, N.Y.

Chris, I still find it amazing that the Beatles and others were able to pull off those harmonies and playing having NO monitors and the low wattage equipment. Your uncle Earl was probably in the same situation more than once. Its just unimaginable to me. They had to be great talents. At a show last week the sound man just came by and asked me what I wanted in my monitor. We all got tailored monitor mixes. The drummer had two fifteens and a horn on either side of him for monitors!

Eric West · From: Portland, Oregon, USA, R.I.P.

Monitors: I tell them the more I have to listen to, the more money I want. It's nice to have an extension speaker from the guitar if anything. With an attenuation knob that I can use.

EJL

Jim Phelps · From: Mexico City, Mexico

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[This message was edited by Jim Phelps on 17 November 2004 at 08:07 PM.]

John Lacey · From: Black Diamond, Alberta, Canada

I've noticed thru the years of playing all kinds of venues that the bass response on stage has a lot to do with what we as steelers perceive of our volume. When I'm next to a loud bass player who also eq's with a lot of bass, his frequencies invade mine, causing me to turn up. That could be the genesis of a volume war.

Brad Sarno · From: St. Louis, MO USA

John Lacey, you nailed it exactly. The ear does funny things when it gets loaded down by low frequency sound pressure. Loud bass guitar can cause it, but often times it's the way kick drum subs get mixed in the monitors. The low's from a kick drum aren't pitch defined and when you mix bass guitar with that, you compound the mud factor. Then the bassist turns up to fight it. Then everyone has to turn up to hear themselves thru the mud. It all seems to start in the low end. It's a viscious cycle if there ever was one. I wish more engineers understood music better and had a handle on the appropriate use of the kick drum in a mix. Low end theory should be a fundamental subject for engineering students.

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Brad Sarno
Blue Jade Audio Mastering
St. Louis
http://home.earthlink.net/~bradsarno/

Savell · From: Slocomb, AL

I went to a outdoors Brad Paisley concert not long ago. It was so loud my ears hurt. I loved it for about the first 30 minutes, then I moved farther back and enjoyed it again for the rest of the show. He and his band are extremely talented and my guess is that the level of the music is dictated by what his soundman thinks is appropriate for the occasion and what he thinks will sell the crowd.

We older boys make too much out of a little thing. I have to agree that if its too loud back up or go home. I've had to make that decision on several occasions myself.

I do recall the best enjoyment came when we, the band members, could all hear each other and still hear the beer bottles crashing against the walls behind us. Seems that we were teamplayers back then. Sure beats the terms where whoever has the biggest amp runs the stage.

As for the church thing, I went to a church for a while where the music was very loud and very upbeat. The pastor ask me to bring my guitar and join in. So I did. I played licks and riffs that I haven't played since my college days when I played top 40 cover songs in the lounge circuit. Both the worship band members, congregation, staff and I were literally swept up in the excitement of a worship like I have never felt before. This is coming from someone that has played many years with traditional gospel groups in almost every denomination of churches. (I have even been asked to leave because of my playing style. One preacher said that he would not tolerate "Turkey in the Straw" in his church. One band fired me and said that they were a gospel band not a country showband.) Anyway, back to my great experience -- The intensity of the worship and the moving of the Holy Spirit was greater than I had ever been witness to. One Sunday morning as we played the entire stage with all the band members were completely stormed with a spirit of weeping and worship that one musician after another laid his instrument down and fell to his/her knees until no music was being played and a quiet hush came over the entire congregation. All this in the middle of the loudest (my amp volume was an 8 of 10 and my Digitech RP1 with full Santana settings) bands I had ever took part in.

I am not sure you can play too loud for God's ears. However, I am also not sure that volume is an element to the criteria for which God is evaluating.

Loud is relative...

But if ya'll want to get together and form a group to quiet today's music down just a bit, I'll sign up. We could call it "MALM" (Musicians Against Loud Music}

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Savell Norsworthy
Fessenden / Alembic Epic / Peavey Amps
Savell Ministries

Roger Rettig · From: Naples, FL

"More talent in my monitor, please!"

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