Volume too Quiet

[thoyski]

Hi Everyone -
I've noticed that when I export projects out of LMMS and upload to Soundcloud, they are significantly quieter than other songs posted by others. I have to turn my volume up (almost as much as 75% in some cases) to have my songs be at the same volume as those that have just played right before. This happens while in LMMS as well. I go to Soundcloud, play a song, come back to LMMS, and I can barely hear what I'm working on.
While it does raise volume, for me, all the master volume really does in LMMS is distort the music and it sounds absolutely terrible. The thing that annoys me most is that when I turn the volume up manually on my computer, no distortion occurs. So I guess I just want to find a way to increase the decibels? Anyway, any advice/support you could give would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[musikbear]

Hi Everyone

Hi, Welcome to the forum thoyski! Here are all our important links:
http://lmms.io/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=4740
-And a few rules for Avatars, signatures, posting and using the right sub-forum :)

I've noticed that when I export projects out of LMMS and upload to Soundcloud, they are significantly quieter than other songs posted by others.

When youre done mixing your song, how high are the dB meters in the individual channels?
We would also like to hear an actual output from one of your projects
In accordance to that
Look in the folder Demo-songs
Open and export Onion exactly as you do your own projects, then upload that to soundcloud, and paste both links here

[Artro Fifteen]

I can definitely second this. I would love to see where this goes!

Everything is just so quiet! I get that your typical accomplished, big name music artist has a highly paid mastering and production team, but the disparity between that and LMMS is still pretty ridiculous at times.

The master volume maybe can give you a 5% nudge up in volume but after that usually all my kicks and sometimes even bass just becomes garbage. Not to mention, sometimes it's at 200% and I'm questioning whether I've lost my hearing.

I've tried other options. Useless. FX Mixer doesn't work. The Master FX Fader 0 (the one on the left, for clarity) is as useful as the above master volume slider. Mixing your instruments into separate FX channels may seem like it works - but be careful. You may find that your music is "louder" but in reality the kicks and basses are compensated for the other instruments.

Adding insult to injury is external sound boosting programs (I haven't tried all that's out there, so I tread more carefully). But whether you use such a program off the web or off an install, they end up distorting - and at pretty low settings too.

I've come to the conclusion that some instruments are simply louder than others. Saws and pianos give you loud, solid sound. Imported samples always seem to be another good choice, though your mileage may vary. On the other hand, pads and the default sample kicks are devilishly hard to amplify without distorting. This is a pretty bleak conclusion to be made, but after more than half a year I haven't found any other explanation. At least knowing this, I've been able to make most of my newer songs competently loud enough (i.e. ~60 on my compute volume).

I can only hope that there's a workaround for this. As I said, I'm keen to see where this discussion goes.

[Artro Fifteen]

Just a few more examples of the frustration:

Adding an amplifier effect through the effects chain in FX Mixer doesn't work. BassBooster is a joke from the few times I've tried it. Don't even think about Dynamics Processor - you eventually just find out that like mixing, maybe you can boost your mids or trebles, but a universal boost of everything? No game.

Disclaimer: these are useful and essential when applied to instruments and tracks individually. Neither should mixing, a time-tested tradition in all levels of music production, be completely neglected. It's just that for the purpose of making your whole song louder, they're as useful as rocks.

[musikbear]

Just a few more examples of the frustration:

Can you please also do the things i asked OOP for.
Export a demo-song, and document your dB settings with screenshots.

[thoyski]

Hello again, 1st off - Thank you for the help so far and sorry for taking so long to do this.

Disclaimer: I am a total new guy to most of this so I'm afraid I didn't exactly understand what "Open and export Onion" meant

Anyway, here is the first link to Ashore which was the demo project I uploaded (No alteration at all):
https://soundcloud.com/tru_11/ashore-te ... mms-volume

And just for reference here is a terrible D&B remix that I made of "Canon in D" which was composed of mostly VSTs and drum samples pulled from the internet. The mixing on this (especially bass) is kinda terrible:
https://soundcloud.com/tru_11/canon-in- ... mms-volume

Side note for my own project: I don't really know if this will help or not, but the bass you hear in the drop is the phase bass preset in Watson which is set at -11.94 decibels or 25.3% to give you some idea maybe.

Second side note: Seeing as how the Ashore project is significantly louder than my own project, I'm wondering if it's just the VSTs that are too quiet. Ashore is still a bit quieter than other SC songs though.

Anyway, thanks again for your help, let me know if I can do anything else that might help you figure this out.

[musikbear]

here is a terrible D&B remix

I find it very fine. Good work, not terrible
[/quote]
But..
This one is going to be difficult, because i hear both projects loud and clear..
Here is a recording of this:
https://soundcloud.com/musikbear/volume-compare

What i have done is to find 2 aprox. similar sequences in the two tracks, then i make low-volume recording with identical settings in both tracks
If one of the tracks was significantly different in volume, it would be very obvious in the wave-form
as you can see it is not. Both tracks is in the almost exact area
I have NO idea why you hear your own track as almost silent.. 8[

[thoyski]

I'm afraid I can't view your track

[musikbear]

I'm afraid I can't view your track :(

Ah c... souncloud has made a doodoo, i will reupload asap tonight

______________
Now i cant find your project *sigh*

[thoyski]

No problem, but what do you mean you can't find it?