Tag Archive for 'music'

So I’ve had this app as a utility in my standard workstation install for many, many years, MP3Gain. It’s a windows app (I believe written in VB no less) which can losslessly, statistically normalise the gain on your mp3 tracks. It does both individual track gain or album gain for those strange albums that need to be adjusted as one, and as I said it does this all without need to transcode the mp3, so no data loss.

One of the limitations of it being lossless is that it only alters gain in 1.5dB increments, something about mp3 keyframes. Regardless, it’s an essential tool for any music collection, if for no other reason than the fact that it can tell you about and then remove the clipping on so many of the mp3 encoded tracks out there these days.

I guess this is the main reason I’m blogging about this application right now. Many people don’t realise that the mp3 spec has digital ranges for maximum and minimum signal that most tracks these days seem to go past in the interest of the loudness effect. Most people either never noticed it on their PC’s or blamed it on crappy PC speakers, but with the proliferation of mp3 players out there now you’re more likely to hear this distortion and clipping in your earphones.

If you have this problem, then suck down MP3Gain and run it over your music collection. It’s a sure fire cure for mp3 distortion and clipping, but why is this app still needed these days?