Is digital simply degrading the quality of music, and wrongly conditioning an entire generation of listeners? Yes, according to Neil Young, who shared a plan to improve sound quality during an interview at the D: Dive Into Media conference on Tuesday (complete interview here).
Turns out Young has goals that are aligned with those of Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre, but are they aligned with most consumers? Or, even Apple, whose iPod (and now iPhone) effectively set the standard for acceptable (ie, 'good enough') digital fidelity among music fans?
Iovine has talked about delivering super high-end (and large) music files from iTunes, and Young called for the creation of hardware players capable of reading files that are far better (and bigger) than MP3s. Apparently created by 'some rich guy,' though the challenge seems complex and the target audience suspect. Still, Young noted that MP3s pick up just a fraction of the original recording.
Comments Closed
DanceMusicHub Wednesday, February 01, 2012
My personal preference is WAV my professional preference (for a download site I'm associated with) is MP3 320k. There was little demand for wav so DMH canned it as the cost of storage and bandwidth far outweighed the benefit.
Reality is there is a market for a full spectrum of sound quality but consumption via earphones means mp3 192k meets the needs of the bulk of the marketplace.
vania81 Wednesday, February 01, 2012
There's always a choice between covenience and quality. And people always choose convenience. I bet there were rivals to compact cassette & VHS that provided better quality but were less convenient.
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driver40 Thursday, February 02, 2012
This Cheryl Englehart is turning into a Spam Queen. Get a clue. Take it outside.
Tom Washington Wednesday, February 01, 2012
visitor Wednesday, February 01, 2012
weirdest poem ever
Bobby Marin Wednesday, February 01, 2012
James Wednesday, February 01, 2012
I wish Young was right - it would be great for the industry if it could find a whole new format that rejuvenated sales and the appreciation of music as an art form - but he's not. Take the 24-bit wav source of a typical rock record, convert to a 320 kbps MP3, then flip the phase and add them - you'll hear just how little is left out in a good quality MP3 conversion. I don't believe Young himself, especially after decades of rocking out, would pass a double-blind test on this.
Jeff Robinson Wednesday, February 01, 2012
"I don't believe Young himself, especially after decades of rocking out, would pass a double-blind test on this."
A monkey could hear the difference between a 24-bit, 192 kHz audio file and a 128 kbps .mp3.
The original poster doesn't appear to know about Nyquist Theorem and how it relates to digital audio.
James Thursday, February 02, 2012
320 kbps, not 128 kbps. And I have twenty five years experience recording music.
Jeff Robinson Thursday, February 02, 2012
"Take the 24-bit wav source of a typical rock record, convert to a 320 kbps MP3, then flip the phase and add them - you'll hear just how little is left out in a good quality MP3 conversion."
Explain how you'd set up this experiment.
Converting a 320 kbps .mp3 into a .wav to play back with software is different than playing it through a codec.
Cliff Baldwin Wednesday, February 01, 2012
If Neil Young (or anyone else) can actually hear the difference between a simple 256K Dolby file like the ones they use for Itunes and an uncompressed master in a fair blind test, then there is something to talk about. Otherwise this is all B.S. Really people. You haven't been able to hear the diference in any of this since MP3 went the way of the dodo bird and bitrates got to 256. Enjoy your rich warm vinyl records. Download high quality music legally. Enjoy the music. But shut the f!@#$ up when you don't know what you're talking about. Seriously.
imispgh Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Sorry but you people who say there is no difference or run your null tests are wrong. My guess is you are either close minded or listen to poorly recorded music on the usual drack people use for stereos and headphones. Seriously though, and this is not an elist point, most consumer audio goods are crap. It does not cost a lot or even too much more to lownsomething good. (Another issue is setting up the speakers right and treeating first order reflections and bass issues below 300hz - but most consumers won't go that far. Even though all of that is actually more important than getting stellar gear).Example - Apple headsets are crap. Most headsets under 50$ are crap. Most full range speakers under $500 a pair are crap. How much difference should you hear? There is a huge clarity difference beteen 128k mp3 amd 320k mp3. (If you cannot hear that you have a problem to solve.) Jumping to good equipment will get you a similair gain in quality. Stay away from most popular consumer brands. There a literally dozens of high end companies who are very well established who sell equipment that isn't much more than the usual stuff. Yes the high end industry can be ridiculously expensive and elitist. But don't let that stop you from trying out the lower end of the high end. I assure you it is a mind blowing experiance. EVERY friend who has asked me to help them get a system has purchased systems made by high end vendors they never heard of once they heard the difference and realized it wasn't that much more money. (And usually the warranties are better too).
Roger Bixley Wednesday, February 01, 2012
You left out one part of your rant: Most music is crap. So why spend $1000 on high end speakers and $300 for amazing headphones when most of the music being put out today is garbage?
bob Wednesday, February 01, 2012
so buy and listen to old music if you don't like the new stuff, there must be some music you like
Globaljukeboxer Wednesday, February 01, 2012
>> Most music is crap. I can't move for the glorious stuff ! I mean that Baby Huey and his Hard Times for a kick off and then there's Lil Bob, Los Mirlos, O V Wright, Geater Davies, 1500 hours of archived Give The Drummer Some programmes, Atahualpa Yupanqui, that bloke from Iran, Kourosh somethingorother and his 70's hit ' Leila ', Mumbai's fab Lorna, Calvin Leavy and so on ! You'd need nine lives ...
Econ Thursday, February 02, 2012
So what? I can tell the driving difference between a Ferrari and a Chevette. Guess which one I can afford?
Sheesh. CD's were a massivley better format than cassettes from an audiophile perspective and the music industry still managed to make most of them sound like shite.
Pat Wednesday, February 01, 2012
phylum sinter Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Sorry Neil, you're about 10 years too late on this one. If there was to be any switch in our idea of what "acceptable sound quality" is for our music, it should have began building steam around 2002, when broadband started to gain prevalence and hard drives were available at under a dollar a gigabyte.
Now that most people have been groomed to appreciate compressed formats with near-CD quality (though you might find some people still being ok with 128kbps... yeesh) the campaign required to both convert the existing libraries of services and individuals cannot be done by you, or Jimmy Iovine, or Dr. Dre. You'd need Apple, Rdio, Spotify, Amazon, Grooveshark, Beatport, and every other digital distributor on your side before you'd make any headway... and convincing them may be a harder sell than you realize. Harder still would be the initial reaction from them that the increased bandwidth would mean that they would want to sell each song for more - and when approached by this possibility, i doubt you'd find even 10% of music buyers online willing to do such.
Furthermore, "some rich guy" with a line of higher quality decoders will not be enough to convince people to switch their current, cheap mp3 players to upgrade to this better format if the price jumps as well. Most of the popular players could probably shoehorn in a higher resolution codec into them via software, but even then you have what others have said already - convenience (and i'll add: competitive pricing) trumps quality.
It would be more feasible if the entire industry was closer to the video industry, where a standard of physical media could be upgraded like the jump from DVD to Blu-Ray, but given that digital music consumption has all but destroyed the need for physical formats for the average consumer, i doubt we'll see a new format with force to reverse the tides anytime soon.
Prove me wrong though, i'd love to raise the bar with you. But if you'll excuse me, i have some 192kbps streaming to do. To my high quality speakers.
balbers Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Well, to Neil's credit, he has been preaching this same message for probably a decade. But he doesn't seem to be making too much progress with the general public.
But I have a couple questions-
I understand he's passionate about this subject, but does he not realize he's just pounding his head against the wall trying to get people use higher bitrates? I mean, I've read multiple interviews of him over the years, but it's not like he's changing anybody's habits. I think the best he could do is put something in the liner notes of his own albums to the effect of 'I'm glad that you like my music, but if you rip it into your computer at some crappy bitrate, what you'll be hearing is not the music that I recorded, and not how I intended this recording to sound. You're cheating yourself and compromising the music.'
Secondly, since Neil has played so many excruciatingly loud concerts for several decades, and is what, 65 years old now? Does anybody think that he can actually hear anything outside of the range of about 8000-12,000 hertz?
Econ Thursday, February 02, 2012
Even rich audiophiles make compromises. The most popular audiophile phono cartidges ALWAYS sacrificed dynamic range for something else - a cartridge with greater dynamic range will pickup more surface noise, etc and the extra signal in those extended ranges didn't provide extra enjoyment versus the extra noise you got.
Even the mere act of portability is a compromise - I'm going to get environmental noise that drowns out whatever extra signal I might pick up with a "better" format. And the option for high-quality listening in a controlled (usually home) environment exists... and is shrinking due the realities of the average person's actual life. Neil can continue to release his high-end versions but there is a low ceiling on the market for these. The market CHOSE MP3 over CD - they know the compromises they are making; the market chose slightly reduced quality for cost. And the consumers who don't want to make that compromise are STILL being served by the original options.
There certainly IS a market for high-end digital but if the price or convenience isn't there that market will always be small.
Technology Has No Morals Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Internet = McDonald'
The convenience of the digital age has forced people to choose between quality and convenience, but they shouldn’t have to make that choice."- Neil Young
@WFMU Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Did we mention? Neil Young hates digital music. Like really really hates it.
@MachineTweet Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Yet another reason to hate Neil Young?
@FelixBDesfosses Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Neil Young n'aime pas la musique en format digital, mais en vinyle, oui monsieur!
@dr_tunca Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Dijital yaşam insanları yüksek kalite orjinal kayıtlar yerine kalitesi düşük ama pratik mp3'lere yöneltti!
@SOCANRodney Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Neil Young speaks. I listen.
@Olcracker Wednesday, February 01, 2012
I've been preaching this for years. Glad Neil's on board.
WILL Wednesday, February 01, 2012
"..choose between quality and convenience". Yes! people won't go back to paying $15 for an album full of fillers!! Forget the quality of recording and focus on the quality of music. This was the problem and it won't be reversed. Blame Jamourqai for that!!
brooklyn habitat Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Not sure I believe this - also from the interview
"I talked to Steve about it. We were working on it," Young said. "You've got to believe if he lived long enough he would eventually try to do what I'm trying to do."
Visitor Wednesday, February 01, 2012
the problem is not the content it's the consumption. We've conditioned ourselves to consume music as a commodity. It's about volume not quality. how many comments have we all read here in which somone says they have 40 days worth of music? my question is WHY? the market is the equivalent of tourists spending entire trips photographing cities without actually experiencing them.
Ho Ho Ho! Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Shut the fuck up, Facebook warriors. Neil Young tracks and mixes his stuff through a UA 610 and a Neve 8078 console. You track mix your stuff through Ableton Live (cracked, of course, because you want to stick it to the Evil Ableton for making something that works). Good luck buying a single Neve preamp from your Facebook Likes.
MCR Thursday, February 02, 2012
'Digital Is Degrading Our Music, Not Improving It...'
actually, technology does not degrade music. people do...
@seventanterpost Thursday, February 02, 2012
All I can say is "amen"
Dane Spencer Saturday, February 04, 2012
VINYL AT HOME, CD IN CAR, IPOD TRAVELING OR RUNNING!
Rick L Sunday, February 12, 2012
As technology in amplification and speakers have improved, I noticed the quality of the music I listen to DECREASING. It did not matter how good my amplifier or speakers were, music was sounding more and more like a flat "wall" of sound.
I began building a music server
with a good DAC and to my surpirse, I can not purchase 24 bit 96kHz
music. There is so little of it available. I would not mind paying a
little bit more for the music I like.
Sites like HD Music have a small offering, but if I want to purchase Adele or Coldplay in 24bit quality, it's just not available.
One day, hopefully, the music industry will wake up and realize that medicore quality is hurting their sales.
RL
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