Professional CDs are louder than mine - why?

I have been recording off and on for several years and figure out most of what I need to know through good ol' trial and error. However, I have never figured out why professional CDs are louder than mine. I amplify the final mix until it starts clipping and I can get clean, good sounding recordings, but when I compare it to a professional recording of a similar ensemble, mine is quieter. Can anyone enlighten me?
Thanks,
Dave

go to www.izotope.com and download the "mastering guide." It explains everything way better than I can.

ORIGINAL: Daves Skunkworks

I have been recording off and on for several years and figure out most of what I need to know through good ol' trial and error. However, I have never figured out why professional CDs are louder than mine. I amplify the final mix until it starts clipping and I can get clean, good sounding recordings, but when I compare it to a professional recording of a similar ensemble, mine is quieter. Can anyone enlighten me?
Thanks,
Dave

Have you compared your mix to a CD that is at least 10 years old ? Your mix may be just fine. In the last 10 years there has been a loudness war going on with the major labels and they compress well beyond what could be considered a HiFi recording. In fact many have about the same dynamic range as FM radio.

If you still feel your mix is weak there are several things you can do. First work on the dynamics of each track with the clip gain envelope. If you can take out the peaks and lumps and maybe reduce the low end a bit on your tracks you will be able to get the higher in the mix without swamping the entire thing.

Second, add a compressor to your main bus during the mix so you can hear what you are going to get. Re-adjust it as needed during the mix till you get the loudness you want. Trying to compress after the mix will make some things get louder then others and mess up your mix in most cases.

Third, excessive low end is the most common thing in home studio mixes. If you listen to most pop songs it's amazing how little real low stuff there is on most tracks. If it sounds "good" solo there is a good chance it won't fit in the mix at any level without swamping the mix. So EQ out low end on some tracks till they all blend well and can come up a bit.

The better job you do with the clip gain envelope on each track the less work your main buss compressor has to do and it can make things louder without making dull spots from overtriggering on peaks that should have been caught at the track level. If the clip gain seems like too much work use a limiter on each track to catch just the worst peaks.

I agree that it is counterproductive to mix for "loudness" or to try and acheive "major label" compression targets. Unless you are doing pop or hiphop you are going to be ruining your music.
If you are hell bent on getting there than I reccomend you check out Waves plug ins. I have found them to be very good at increasing the loudness and density of mixes. Especially Maxbass and I think C4 or C3 is the other one, the multiband comp they have. Their stuff is pricey but I think you can still get a 30 day free demo.
Me, personally, I prefer to use as much of the 16 bits as I can for dynamic range.

Thanks a million. I have suspected compression, but not in the way several of you describe using it (which also helps me out with my blah attitude toward compression in general, that I need to change apparently) and also the mysterious world of "mastering" that I have no idea what it is. thanks for the link kfischer! Thanks for the other suggestions as well, I now have quite a bit to explore.
Dave

ORIGINAL: ohhey
Have you compared your mix to a CD that is at least 10 years old ?

I would be very happy if my mix be in the same level of these CDs.
My problem is I didn't get the same level and quality of sounds in the mix as in the host before mixing down. But this was with Cubase SX, now I'm redoing all my songs again in Sonar to see if there is a difference (well, I begin to like Sonar more actually).
I suspected that some host sounds better than other, but I did a test involving many hosts and recorded the same track in everyone. I didn't apply any effect, then opened these tracks (without mixing them down) in Audition, I couldn't hear any difference! So could it be dithering? Are different hosts using different method and algorithms for dithering?
Also, is it better to use another application like Samplitude or Audition for mixing and mastering? Or it is the same as long as I use the same effects?

Thanks Jack.
I think of the main problems is the bass. I checked with Elemental Audio Inspector, and there are a lot of things going under 40hz! Also it seems it masks the others. I started to cut under 40hz and it sounds better now. In additional to reading here (which is a great resource) I also have Art of Mixing book which I find very useful with the visual illustrations.
I read somewhere that if someone wants professional results, better give it to a Mixing Engineer and then take it to a Mastering Engineer and I'm convinced about that.

ORIGINAL: DonM

ORIGINAL: ohhey

Have you compared your mix to a CD that is at least 10 years old ? Your mix may be just fine. In the last 10 years there has been a loudness war going on with the major labels and they compress well beyond what could be considered a HiFi recording. In fact many have about the same dynamic range as FM radio.

OMG I couldn't agree MORE. In one session of my class I cover the erosion of the average to peak amplitude ratio in popular music over the past 15 years. Bob Katz has written much on this - It is dissapointing that iPods and their tiny amps own the dynamic range training for an entire generation where each tune in a playlist must share the same peak to average ratio or they'll sound wimply.

I've been delivering two eval masters to my clients over the past two years - one with audiophile dynamics - (in 16 bit albeit) and one with consumer dynamics (still 16 bit but with the eroaded avg to peak ratio that some many desire) Most pick the consumer range.

;(

-D

Exactly ! Even musicians that "should" know good sound when they hear it don't like dynamic range, they hate it, they can't stand it, it must hurt their ears. The days of HiFi sound are gone and maybe for good.

I just wanted to thank you guys for the info you are giving.
I can say I'm happy now :) I've reached or almost reached my 13 years old CDs sound level and quality! I just listened to my piece through the monitors this morning, and I felt shocked! (as I always listen through the headphones in the night when my wife goes to sleep which never told me such a difference!). Is that the same muddy and low volume piece that I listened before?!
What i did is that I took a pen and paper tried to visualize the tracks, which one I want to be in the front and which one to the left ..etc. I decided to use a maximum of 4 sounds playing simultaneously (considering the drums is just one), rechecked the sound sources and adjusted them, replaced the drums track with a track for every sound, then I cut under 40hz in the Master channel. It is amazing what a difference I have now though I just used one EQ! :)

ORIGINAL: itsomusiccompany
is there science to it or is is all magic?

i'd say 90% science, 10% magic, where magic=talent+experience. not that i know because i'm any good at it, that's just b.s. i pulled out of the air.

really though i think it's about 90% science and 10% taste. for example, take audioslave's first album (audioslave). released in 2002, and it's quite squashed. now on your ipod, with crappy headphones, you won't know the difference. but on budget monitors (behringer truths in my case), you can hear it. on my sennheiser hd 280pro headphones (again, budget), you can hear it. what blew me away though, was earlier today in my wife's new 2006 civic. i could still hear it.

i love audioslave, they are probably my favorite post-2000 rock band, period. so i'm not trying to bash them. but whoever mastered that album squashed it to death. on the radio and ipod though, you can't tell. so maybe the mastering guy knew what he was doing.

the funny thing is that cds were originally marketed for their dynamic range. once you've learned to remove unneeded bass (and unneeded highs), and you learn to adjust instruments in the mix, and you've learned that having more than one instrument eating up the same frequency range is superfluous, you're ready to make compromises between how hot your signal is and how good your mix sounds.

ok, so i took my audioslave cd to work today. i could hear it on crappy dell "business workstation" speakers. it sounded like the speakers were distorting a bit, but since the music itself was at office quiet levels, i know it wasn't the speakers.

so as was said above (for anyone still reading), doing the whole modern smashed-flat thing just ruins your music. if you must do it and your music sounds squashed to death, then you're on the right track i suppose.