Hey guys, this is about a problem that has been haunting audiophiles in the modern age.
I am sure you all have atleast one pyramid CD of Rahmans. Put this in and listen to the songs, now find the same songs from another distributor (alai oosai, ayngaran), you will notice that the volume is noticeable higher. This is because of the loudness war. Distributors nowadays are increasing their volume levels to "sound" better, when what is at stake is audio dynamics. Some of you might be wondering why this might be a problem (just reduce the volume and its all fine). However, what happens is, there is a maximum volume level that a CD can accept (this is called a loudness ceiling). basically u cannot increase the volume higher than this level, so what distributors do is increase the parts that are not at their maximum. The end result? We get tracks that have a constant volume (static) without any dynamics. What ARR might have initially planned to sound soft and subtle now sounds loud. This causes distortion and no matter how much you reduce the volume on your speakers to match lets say the volume levels of a pyramid CD, that distrotion is still there because the original has been altered. This was not that noticeable till we heard mayilirage (what a track that was!), but because ARR designed that track with very very high dynamics especially with the bass tabla, when audio distributors increased the volume, those sounds that were already at their maximum now sound distorted and so the complaints by many people about its quality. Let me tell you all something, ARR made no mistake with its quality, its all distributors fault. I also noticed the same problem with guru (tamil) version --> aaruyire around 4 25 when she goes "nee ilatha iravoa". The hindi version (Sony BMG) was CRYSTAL clear, but the same song at the same places had distortions in tamil (Ayngaran). For the time being, lets contribute to this discussion about which distributor has the better quality. IMO, pyramid tops them all! Let me know what you all think. Remmeber dont just look at volume levels, but observe the dynamics. low volume doesnt necessarily mean better. You can put ur tracks into programs like goldwave and observe the waveform. I have done this with some tracks and pyramid scores! but unfortunately i only have pyramid and ayngaran. This problem must be stopped now otherwise we will hear damaged music like mayilirage and aaruyirae (fortunately its not evident like in these tracks). This is a form of harrasment. I know there is are sound engineers and audiophiles in this group who know WAY more than me and have been aware of this from day one. I just wanted to share something that I thought concerns all of us who love quality damage-free music. I request people like Gopal and Vijay to look into this matter and inform ARR so that he is aware of this(i am sure he is) and he advises the distributors regarding the same.
