Some of you may have read in the
Soundtracks topic my little review of
Uriah Heep's latest studio album, 2011's "
Into The Wild", which I highly praised. Unfortunately, I also had to mention the horrible loudness war production of the album.
I only discovered
Uriah Heep in the mid 1990's, even though the band released their first album in 1970, and since then it became one of my all time favorite bands. I'm decades younger than the original band members, but I'm sure there are lots of fans of younger age groups around.
I never really cared for the band's output during the 1990's and the 2000's, sticking to the albums recorded with original vocalist
David Byron and the 3 albums with his sucessor,
John Lawton. That's why the surprising excellence of the "Into The Wild" album made such an impact on me, and certainly on a lot of other fans.
The horrible "loudness war" mastering, however, has been bothering me ever since I first heard the album, so I decided to write to the band's management about it. Below is the exchange of messages between us, and I'll keep this topic updated when there are further developments.
From: Pedro Corbett <pedro.corbett@brasil-livre.org>
Sent: 28 April 2012 08:28
To: QEDG@QEDG.co.uk
Cc: ClaireStone@theagencygroup.com
Subject: Best Uriah Heep album in 20 years destroyed by loudness war mastering
What kind of amateurs are you to have allowed for the best Uriah Heep album in over 20 years, "Into The Wild", to be sonically destroyed by one of the most extreme examples of "loudness war" mastering in history? Or perhaps you're so dumb you don't even know what that means? It means this:
The dynamic range of these great songs was annihilated, the album is so loud that it's painful to listen to. A decent remastering must me made urgently. You have commited a crime.
Since you probably are complete technical morons, take some time to watch and read the material below carefully:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTBoMlsw-0I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMNJEC1G-fE
http://www.turnmeup.org
Fuck you,
Pedro Corbett
* * *
From: "QEDG" <qedg@qedg.co.uk>
To: Pedro Corbett <pedro.corbett@brasil-livre.org>
Cc: "'Claire Stone'" <clairestone@theagencygroup.com>
Subject: RE: Best Uriah Heep album in 20 years destroyed by loudness war mastering
Date: Mon, 30 Apr 2012 12:25:48 +0100
Dear Pedro,
Thank you for your interesting letter, this has been passed to the band’s producer.
However, he will no doubt consider the case of Arkell vs. Pressdram Ltd (1971) if responding to your email.
Kind Regards,
QEDG Management
* * *
About the Arkell vs Pressdram case they cite in their reply (you gotta admire the English style of burying the knife while smiling at you):
Arkell vs. Pressdram
An unlikely piece of British legal history occurred in the case Arkell v. Pressdram. The plaintiff (Arkell) was the subject of an article relating to illicit payments, and for a change the magazine (Private Eye) had ample evidence to back up the article. Arkell's lawyers wrote a letter in which, unusually, they said: "Our client's attitude to damages will depend on the nature of your reply". The response consisted, in part, of the following: "We would be interested to know what your client’s attitude to damages would be if the nature of our reply were as follows : Fuck off".
* * *
From: Pedro Corbett <pedro.corbett@brasil-livre.org>
To: "QEDG" <qedg@qedg.co.uk>
Subject: RE: Best Uriah Heep album in 20 years destroyed by loudness war mastering
> At 30/04/2012 08:25, you wrote:
>
> However, he will no doubt consider the case of Arkell vs. Pressdram Ltd (1971) if responding to your email.
That would be very nice, given the exponentially increasing amount of interest the loudness war has been gaining. His "fuck off" would be actually directed at his own lack of skill as a producer (with which perhaps a psychiatrist could help him, since he might be in denial of that fact), rather than at me.
It would also be a pleasure to spread his words all over the internet - actually, that's one of my areas of expertise, non-intrusive internet promotion and marketing.
I do apologize if I directed my "fuck you" to the wrong party, but unfortunately there was no contact information for the band or the producer on the band's site. So, let's change that to a FUCK HIM (the producer) instead of you (or not, if he was working as he was instructed to by the band's management).
Let's make something clear here - you may care only about the commercial side of things, but I and millions of others have grown up listening to Uriah Heep, and we love the band and we care about their legacy and their place in the history of music. However, even speaking from a strictly commercial perspective, like many other labels and producers have already realized, a "loudness war" produced album will hurt a band's reputation (even when it's not the band's fault) and that album's sales. I can think of no better example than Metallica's latest studio album, "Death Magnetic":
Remix or remaster Death Magnetic! Petition (currently 22K+ signatures)
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/re- ... netic.html
Metallica's "Death Magnetic" Sounds Better In Guitar Hero (Ian Shepherd, Mastering Engineer)
http://mastering-media.blogspot.com.br/ ... etter.html
Metallica's "Death Magnetic" - Stop The Loudness Wars
http://mastering-media.blogspot.com.br/ ... dness.html
Anyways, thank you for replying. That means you do care about this issue, even though you might not admit it. I will be starting an online petition for the remastering of "Into The Wild" soon. And if possible, forward both my emails to the band. They don't deserve to know about this through the media or other outside parties.
Fuck the producer,
Pedro Corbett
