I wanted to make a post about this in hopes of finding other people who have experienced the same.
I was listening to music on shuffle (edit: via TIDAL streaming integration) recently and as is sometimes the case a track that is AAC 96 came on. Typically the behavior I see with this format is the song will play as normal, or wont at all (typically just “plays” silence until track time passes or is skipped).
However, that did not happen this time. No, this time I was met with a loud digital distortion screech, and then the track playing at unbelievably loud volume. The equivalent of my amplifier getting cranked and then high gain turned on. I have not been able to determine the cause for this, even with the same track. I was very careful when replaying the same track, had the volume at 5% or so, but the next time I played it, it played back at normal volume. Suffice to say, I haven’t been able to replicate the issue. Which is good for my ears, but also I now listen in constant fear.
This was with TIDAL Streaming. I should have clarified. I will edit the original post. Additionally, I feel like having the option to specify allowed file formats or blacklist formats for playback would be nice.
With Tidal, there is the additional snag that for obscure or very new albums there can be no loudness computed yet.
You can tell by the absence of the loudness graph on the seek bar.
I was actually just able to recreate the issue and then some with an AAC song, fortunately I was not wearing headphones this time and using speakers. This time had extreme levels of distortion and was very loud. When I turned the volume down to almost nothing, it normalized and the song played correctly and sounded fine. I’m more inclined to believe it’s an issue with my DAC being confused by the format, so my previous suggestion about specifying allowed encode types would be swell.
Could you specifiy which album title and artist is affected?
Have you noticed the presence of the loudness graph on the seekbar? Or was it just a line?
There actually seems to be loudness issues with the entire album which is AAC 96. The album is DEMIDEVIL by Ashnikko. I mentioned in my original post typical AAC content either plays fine, or doesn’t play at all - usually the latter. For example Bo Burnham’s INSIDE albums uploaded in AAC don’t play at all, nor does Eearthgang’s Ghetto Gods album. It’s an odd duality of zero volume or way too much with this format.
Thanks! Additionally, any thoughts on why other AAC format albums seem to have zero volume? Some tracks show a solid loudness graph with no peaks or valleys, and other songs show no graph, but still don’t play.
If you could, please. It’s not really the end of the world, just kind of odd when sometimes shuffle comes on and a song is “playing” but nothing is audible. Only applies to that format.
