Gamingforce Interactive Forums
85240 35212

Go Back   Exploding Garrmondo Weiner Interactive Swiss Army Penis > Garrmondo Entertainment > Media Centre
Register FAQ GFWiki Community Donate Arcade ChocoJournal Calendar

Notices

Welcome to the Exploding Garrmondo Weiner Interactive Swiss Army Penis.
GFF is a community of gaming and music enthusiasts. We have a team of dedicated moderators, constant member-organized activities, and plenty of custom features, including our unique journal system. If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ or our GFWiki. You will have to register before you can post. Membership is completely free (and gets rid of the pesky advertisement unit underneath this message).


Why is there intro/outro silence in songs?
Reply
 
Thread Tools
Maico
─ ─╘Don't rob me of my ─ ─ hate: It's all I have.


Member 4527

Level 17.53

Apr 2006


Reply With Quote
Old Sep 22, 2006, 03:25 AM Local time: Sep 22, 2006, 01:25 AM #1 of 6
Why is there intro/outro silence in songs?

So why was the Chillout Lounge forum closed and deleted? This type of question is prime candidate for said forum. WTF?

Anyway, just a random question I was wondering and was hoping some of you had an answer to why a lot of songs on CDs or whatever have moments of silence before and after the song, maybe a couple seconds, whatever. I know that sometimes songs were meant to be recorded one right after the other and it just sounds better with the fade out and fade in (for example, the Metallica S&M CDs).

It bugs me, especially when I'm driving in my car and have a mix CD and it shuffles to the next song but doesn't play right away (actually it does play right away, but there are those seconds of silence before the track) or the previous song takes a while to end before going to the next song (because it has like 3 seconds after it fades out of pure silence), which is probably most noticeable in Winamp since there is no lag between playing songs.

Almost all the music I get now I edit so that almost all the silence is taken out from the beginning and ending of the songs. I've got some random .mp3 and convert it to .wav and plug it into Sonic Foundry and zoom in to where the first and end sounds are and delete the silence before and after them, then I just re-encode it back to .mp3 using Exact Audio Copy. I keep the original .iso and encodings in an archival folder just for fun.

Most amazing jew boots
Dark Nation
Employed


Member 722

Level 44.20

Mar 2006


Reply With Quote
Old Sep 22, 2006, 03:46 AM Local time: Sep 22, 2006, 01:46 AM #2 of 6
I'm not sure if you're talking about slow intros into songs (sup Mars Volta), where the song gradually fades in, or if (more likely), you mean the 2 second pause between tracks.

IIRC, the original purpose was because in the early days, CD Players/Stero CD Players didn't have any sort of crossfade/seemless track feature, and only when CDs got super popular did they start adding that in. Of course now with mp3 playlists and no silence between songs on portable music players that limitation is pretty much gone. It may just be a vestige of the old days. One theory I have is that for Cassette tapes (possibly), the silence between songs was to subtily indicate a change of song.

Any Audiophilles care to correct/build on my hypothesis?

There's nowhere I can't reach.
Muzza
love me


Member 3476

Level 53.02

Mar 2006


Reply With Quote
Old Sep 22, 2006, 05:44 AM Local time: Sep 22, 2006, 08:44 PM #3 of 6
Not being an audiophile in even the slightest sense, I can't find fault with your statement.

I generally don't mind the silence gap in songs, however there are a few songs that I've listened to which have a 10-20 second starting and/or ending silence gap. It does get a bit annoying, but I've grown used to it. I must say, I'm very grateful for these gaps, seeing as if there was no silence in songs, when I play songs in succession it would sound rather...er...frantic?

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.
*AkirA*
Now you're king of the mountain, but it's all garbage!


Member 468

Level 26.17

Mar 2006


Reply With Quote
Old Sep 22, 2006, 06:52 AM #4 of 6
Im only commenting in this thread to mourn the loss of the Chillout Lounge. Farewell sweet prince.

Also, Im with muzza. I think the silence helps give each song closure, instead of feeling like one long track.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?
starslight
if you want blood


Member 275

Level 17.17

Mar 2006


Reply With Quote
Old Sep 22, 2006, 10:03 AM #5 of 6
I agree with Akira. On a lot of albums, tracks blend into one another because the songs are linked thematically. Conversely, a few seconds of silence in the beginning and end can help to establish a track as its own statement or idea. Also, since most albums have songs written in a variety of keys, the silence can help smooth the transition between songs in distant keys by cleansing your ears, so to speak, of the key of the previous song.

But the silence can definitely be a pain when making a mix CD or something like that. I was toying with the idea of making a CD for the GFF CD exchange, and one track I was thinking about using had about eight seconds of silence at the end of it that killed the momentum I was trying to build.

I was speaking idiomatically.
Fatt
When the moon hits your eye...


Member 238

Level 16.01

Mar 2006


Reply With Quote
Old Sep 22, 2006, 10:07 AM Local time: Sep 22, 2006, 10:07 AM #6 of 6
Sometimes songs have one or few seconds of dead air to separate songs, so they don't sound messed up when you shuffle them. Most songs usually should have a pause, so if you shuffle the songs, they have that pause to help differentiate between the songs. Other songs that were never really meant to be played out of order (listen to Paul Oakenfold's Transport), don't have the pause to make the music flow continuously.

Edit: Starslight beat me to it.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?
"I can make a scalpel sing, but that is my gift. The gift is not in my hands, for you see, I can play the notes [on a piano], but I can't make music."

~ Major Charles Emerson Winchester III
4077 M*A*S*H
Reply


Exploding Garrmondo Weiner Interactive Swiss Army Penis > Garrmondo Entertainment > Media Centre > Why is there intro/outro silence in songs?

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -5. The time now is 02:53 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.9
Copyright ©2000 - 2025, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.