Loudness war and vinyl?

The effects of the loudness war and cd sound quality are well documented. Digital medium has made it possible to make recordings hotter in was not possible with vinyl, how are these loud digital recordings cut for the vinyl editions? Is there a different production of it or is the compressed version used and just at a lower sound level?

I find many older recordings have more life to them than some current releases.

 

The mastering process for vinyl is different than that of digital. There are certain things you have to do because of the restrictions of the medium. But it shouldn't be exempt from 'the loudness war' if thats what the label want.

When they talk about 'loudness' what is happening is they are using compression and limiting to push the quiet parts as loud as possible. By pushing everything to the 0dB limit you are increasing the average volume level (measured with RMS not peak). This gives the impression that a recording is louder.

 

The loudness war has some implication which are less well known. The video posted over on the 'lossy compression' thread is also relevant to this discussion:

http://www.audiosmile.com/forum/showpost.php?p=294030&postcount=2

 

Vinyl records, especially singles, were "hotted up" no end, back in the day, but the kind of compression if used by a master, was to beef up the tone and give the sound more "punch" on playback, rather than strip the music of any dynamics and feeling. George Peckham (Porky prime cuts of yore) was showing a fairchild valve compressor that he swore by even now, for digital mastering.

I think that all these tools should be used with extreme discretion. Trouble is, many newbie engineers are too heavy handed IMO.

 

Dance records were always mastered for impact on a big soundsystem that's already being pushed. Someone like Dillinja would focus on making records that really pushed the levels of bass.

Here's a video with him talking about mastering vinyl: