Loud Masters

[cakewalkgg]

Im confused a bit on the DB levels for mastering.. I understand how to limit my masters and I can achieve pretty loud masters but I a bit confused about this.. I dropped an MP3 of a Slipknot song "psychosocial" (one of the loudest songs Ive heard) into my host software Reaper. The wave is pretty much a black bar.. its clearly squashed heavily..With my master fader at 0db, the playback of the file is constatnly over 0db in Reaper. If it were one of my masters Id think it was clipping.. but it sounds fine (if you like slkipknot)..

So my question is.. are they achieving volume over 0db in these masters? Or is that technically even possible? or am I just doing something wierd and getting myself confused.

[MatsonMusicBox]

it is physically impossible to go over 0 dB in digital recording. "Solid Black Bars" mean a level of compression that always sounds like crap.

Originally Posted by cakewalkgg

Im confused a bit on the DB levels for mastering.. I understand how to limit my masters and I can achieve pretty loud masters but I a bit confused about this.. I dropped an MP3 of a Slipknot song "psychosocial" (one of the loudest songs Ive heard) into my host software Reaper. The wave is pretty much a black bar.. its clearly squashed heavily..With my master fader at 0db, the playback of the file is constatnly over 0db in Reaper. If it were one of my masters Id think it was clipping.. but it sounds fine (if you like slkipknot)..

So my question is.. are they achieving volume over 0db in these masters? Or is that technically even possible? or am I just doing something wierd and getting myself confused.