A Living Prayer (question related to song by AKUS)

[Dan B]

Does anyone else have Lonely Runs Both Ways by AKUS? The last song on the album is absolutely awesome, except when Allison really starts belting out those high notes. Actually, I think it’s just one note. For whatever reason it’s just too piercing for me to enjoy. I’ve played the album through my Dayton Budget Project, More Pees and Modula MT’s and get the same thing with all of them. I suppose it’s a bit more noticeable on the Modula’s but then, isn’t everything?

I'm wondering where this note is in the frequency range? Is there any possibility it could be showing a weakness in my projects?

I suppose this is either my hearing or something to do with the recording. Other than these unusual parts, the recording sounds incredibly awesome to me.

Any thoughts?

[JonMarsh]

Could be the recording or a mode in your room- have you listened to it on some classy headphones for comparison?

[Davey]

I don't think any of the AKUS recordings (I have all of them) are that great, but that particular track is recorded pretty well. She does hit a high (for her) note near the end, but it sounds very clean on my system.

Cheers,

Davey.

[Dan B]

The 3 different speakers I've listened on, are in 3 different rooms. Unfortunately the Modula's MT's are in probably the worst room, but this is where I (we) listen the most.

I don't have any decent head phones (I've got one of these blue collar cash flow issues going on)

The only time I've noticed any thing like this is on this one song and only when Alison really lets loose. maybe its just that this note is so high and Alison is such a powerful singer?

[ThomasW]

You might download the freeware SpectroLab program and take a look at what's on the CD

http://www.qsl.net/dl4yhf/spectra1.html

[dwk]

I just put it on and it sounded pretty clean to my ears here too on the Unities, for whatever that's worth. I figure the compression driver was running at about 0.1% of capacity, though.

I do think this is the type of track that might have caused problems on other systems I've had though. KD Lang's "Hymns of the 49th Parallel" is another one - she's lower in freq than Alison, but goes 'forte' quite a bit which tends to bring out harshness.

[Dan B]

You might download the freeware SpectroLab program and take a look at what's on the CD
http://www.qsl.net/dl4yhf/spectra1.html

Hi Thomas,
Thanks for recommending the software I gave it a try and this is what I came up with. Since I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed this might be really off the mark... And now maybe a little off topic? Uffda

The upper section of this graph is a classical piece the lower section is Ron Block & Alison's "A Living Prayer"

I inserted a line and the word "here" to mark where Alison sounds harsh to me.

To do this measurement I ran a CD player into a line level input on my sound card and then started the Spectrum Lab software..

Now, do I understand this correctly, that the amplitude graph shows peaking in both pieces of music but more so in Alison's song? And certainly where I notice a harsh sound? Coulden't this cause harshness?

If the picture dosen't show up you can find it HERE

[ThomasW]

Hi,

It would be handy (easier to see) if you reran the graph with a different color palette.

This is the standard palette people are using.

[WillyD]

Dan - You aren't the only one to notice this problem. I hear it quite easily at around 2:50-55.

It does it on all of my speakers and my Audio Technica A500 headphones.

It has to be the recording.

[Dan B]

Is this ok?

New color pallete

That pic is too small...
Try THIS

[Dan B]

Dan - You aren't the only one to notice this problem. I hear it quite easily at around 2:50-55.

It does it on all of my speakers and my Audio Technica A500 headphones.

It has to be the recording.

Thanks Willy,
I was beginning to think it had to do with being in the Ramones cover band in high school, or the broken ear drum a few years back....

[ThomasW]

Looks like it's pretty 'hot' from 400-4kHZ

[Davey]

I ripped that track and loaded it into CoolEdit 2000 for a look.

http://home.comcast.net/~dreite/Temp/AKUS.jpg

There are a couple of places where the recorded level approaches 0dbFS but there are no clipped samples as would be seen on many other contemporary recordings. (Many AKUS recordings are compressed heavily, but this particular track is not bad.)

She sings "take my liiiiiiiiiife and let me be" twice near the end of the tune. That is the area of interest eh? I just listened to my recording again with my Etymotic ear buds and also with my Orion's....it sounds very clean.

Cheers,

Davey.

[WillyD]

Hey folks, I thought I'd update this thread with my experiences. I was listening to the Mark Knopfler and Emmylou Harris album "All The Roadrunning" and noticed some harsh sounds. I knew something was wrong since this album had to be recorded/mastered/engineered well and I heard that it was.

So I checked my audio player, and sure enough, it was clipping. Something in the settings was causing a lot of my music to clip. So I checked "A Living Prayer" again after turning on the volume control to attenuate the signal, and sure enough, no more clipping, or harsh sounds on her high notes.

[Dennis H]

Willy, which audio player are you using? I read on another forum where someone found his Squeezebox sounded better if he turned down the volume a few dB with the digital control. I don't really understand why that should be true but I'm willing to believe there's something going on that I haven't thought about. Maybe something that happens when you upsample to 24 bits that gets fixed when you subtract a bit (6dB)?

[WillyD]

Hey Dennis,

I am using Foobar. I assume you have heard of it. Well, I have it set up for kernel streaming but I am not using the popular upsample techniquie. I had all of the DSPs turned off. Other specifics are my Chaintech AV710 soundcard.

I actually first saw evidence of the clipping in the Via AudioDeck program (it comes with the newest drivers available from ViaArena.com). It has a couple of channel meters that show the relative level for what is being currently payed, for the L/R channels. They were often topping out, and I thought that was strange.

But anyways, after I realized what was going on (not that I have found the specific cause of the problem) I checked the net and it seemed like I wasn't the only one experiencing a clipping problem. I turned on the volume control DSP and then turned Foobar's internal volume down a bit, to about 75%.

[cjd]

Yeah, I know a lot of computer cards clip - the X-whatevers do horribly (along with also having *really* high output voltages)

C

[tktran]

Hi Dan B,

I have this CD too, and out of curiosity I ran it through Wavelab.

Short version- It's on the CD.

Long version- As far as the level is concerned, there's no clipping on the recording, but it does reach the maximum 0.00dBFS just prior to this 2:52-2:55 period. If your preamp or amplifer is clipping, that's a different matter.

The part that is suspicious is the "Liiiiiiife" around 2:52:20-2:55:30. Now
like an opera singer who can shatter a wineglass, whether you think this sounds exciting pure, powerful, clean or just plain painful, IMHO that's a subjective interpretation. But one thing for sure, there's something funny going on in the recording.

From 2:52:20-2:55:30 Wavelab's 3D Frequency Analysis (Frequency vs Time vs SPL) and shows ~6 discrete 'harmonics', from ~100Hz all the way to 4Khz, increasingly higher in level as we go up in frequency, the loudest by far is centred around 1Khz, but all with sustains for a long periods (ringing for over 3+ secs).

Reminds me of a CSD curve of some poorly designed metal cone driver with a bad resonances well within the passband.

[Dan B]

Hi Dan B,

I have this CD too, and out of curiosity I ran it through Wavelab.

Short version- It's on the CD.

Long version- As far as the level is concerned, there's no clipping on the recording, but it does reach the maximum 0.00dBFS just prior to this 2:52-2:55 period. If your preamp or amplifer is clipping, that's a different matter.

The part that is suspicious is the "Liiiiiiife" around 2:52:20-2:55:30. Now
like an opera singer who can shatter a wineglass, whether you think this sounds exciting pure, powerful, clean or just plain painful, IMHO that's a subjective interpretation. But one thing for sure, there's something funny going on in the recording.

From 2:52:20-2:55:30 Wavelab's 3D Frequency Analysis (Frequency vs Time vs SPL) and shows ~6 discrete 'harmonics', from ~100Hz all the way to 4Khz, increasingly higher in level as we go up in frequency, the loudest by far is centred around 1Khz, but all with sustains for a long periods (ringing for over 3+ secs).

Reminds me of a CSD curve of some poorly designed metal cone driver with a bad resonances well within the passband.

Thanks for checking this out.
It would be interesting to know more about the harmonics causing this. In my blue collar mind I imagine Alison's voice somehow overpowering the mic at close range, I guess thats to simple though..

[cjd]

Well, vocal cords can be overdriven too...