Listening levels

General
1

I am curious about, at what spl level everyone usually listens to music?

I normally listen at 85-95 db. Sometimes I like to listen at 105db.

2

85ish.

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3

Depends on the music, but I haven’t measured the levels, I’d guess around 75-85. WAF can be a factor of course.

Some albums such as Deep Purple’s Made in Japan, sound loud when they’re not played loud, if that makes sense. Other times, the production seems to require an up or down adjustment to make it sound ‘right’: Voodoo Chile (Slight Return) seems to need a decent amount of volume to make it sound ‘right’. On the other hand, I play ‘Kind of Blue’ relatively softly as it seems to suit the music.

I never listen to anything over 95dB, which I’m guessing as that’s the stated level our lawn mower generates at 1m - and that’s too loud for my ears. That’s at home, anyway.

I must get a phone app to measure the levels.

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4

I agree, some productions require different levels. Most metal sounds loud no matter what level. If I listen to Blues or Jazz, it has to be cranked. Better recording, usually.

One in particular, is Wishing Well from Michael Ruff. I can play that at 105 db and it still sounds like I could play it louder.

5

My typical listening is around 85db peaks with the occasional “crank it up” moments where I will peak over 100db depending what speakers I am playing, of course.

I find better/more dynamic recordings to be less fatiguing at any level. that being said, I listen to a very wide variety of music across many genres with hit or moss recording quality. I mix enough of the well recorded stuff with the poorly recorded stuff that it prevents me from fatigue on extended sessions.

Sadly, most of my listening these days is in my car due to my one hour each way commute. I spend it primarily with the Outlaw Country, Willies Roadhouse, Lithium, 80s Alternative, and the Spectrum channels on Sirius although sometimes I queue up a long playlist I created on Amazon Music and listen to that. I don’t listen nearly as loud in my car as I do at home, however. It will play plenty loud and sounds decent enough for a factory setup (thank you Harman), but for some reason I just treat it as background music while driving. I am learning quite a few artists new to me so that is fun.

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I think it’s partially due to my age, but I don’t like anything with peaks much lower than 87db or so. 92db and up and I’m starting to wince. That get’s fatiguing really fast.

The chosen music obviously plays into the selected spl for the listening sessions, but rarely am I tickling the 90db range these days.

A resolving and dynamic system that sounds full and rich at lower levels is a big part of my listening levels. When I was younger and couldn’t afford descent gear, I had to crank the volume up to get everything from the content. Now I can relax and hear everything beautifully at a comfortable spl.

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7

I typically listen at 80-85 dB levels, sometimes a little louder

Occasionally I miss large studio monitors that can play 110-115 dB without distortion or compression

Lots of guys around here love Klipsch LaScalas, but I have not heard any of those systems

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