Yeah, I know Ross.
This constant chase of making everything sound
loud and robbing it from dynamic range is highly annoying and way too many recordings suffer from it these days. The whole problem is commonly called "The loudness war". I'm surprised you haven't heard the expression.
About loudness war:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_warVideos to demonstrate:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMNJEC1G-fE&feature=relatedhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UjQc0dM4H4&feature=relatedThe latest Whitesnake recordings are just a few examples of this problem, but very good examples. Horrible mastering.
Figge