I really think my left ear is better than my right...

[TheDriller]

Great topic!

this applies to what i have been experiencing, I "think" i have a slightly weaker left ear,
but that is because of a slight fluid build-up behind that ear, which i am currently taking medication for.

if i "blow out" my ears (by holding my nose and blowing hard) it equalises for a while and its all even but it eventually returns.

some things i notice:

-capsules in consumer headphones are rarely well matched

-sometimes cheap interfaces like mine output an unbalanced stereo signal, especially at lower volume knob settings. i notice with my (cheap) interface that the stereo field shifts back and forth at different points on the volume knob.

-the way the brain processes each ear is actually different anyway. Your senses are not symmetrical. in a lot of cases, the brain seems to favour information coming from the side of your writing hand. DaveBlack, which hand do you write with?

- it gets really annoying when listening to music that has been mixed in an un-balanced way. i notice that a lot of the time mixers seem to prefer the right-hand side of the stereo field over the left,
leading to very "right handed" mixes, even when taking into consideration all the other factors that can affect the stereo field.

-unless your listening environment is well treated, the stereo field is going to be a a little unbalanced anyway.

-many times the volume controls of the amps in your monitors may not match exactly, one may need to be turned up a hair louder than the other for them to actually output the same volume.

- if in doubt, talk to a doctor

-make sure your monitors and head are set up symetrically in the room, get out the measuring tape and start drawing marks on the walls and desk to place things perfectly,
I have a line drawn straight down the centre of my desk across which everything is measure out perfectly, and i can make sure my head is in the right position by lining it up along that line.

 

[DaveBlack]

Hey man, great post...I never accounted for a lot of that. It just goes to show you how much trust we place in the hands of technology. I'm right handed and I actually thought about that because I could be wrong but I thought that anything auditory or visual was processed in reverse. So right handed = better left ear. But when I started putting the left channel of my headphones over my right ear and still noticed a "lack" of higher frequencies, I started getting nervous.

 

[abt]

I've never been a loud music listener or have done anything that would be detrimental to my hearing but the more I mix and the better I get at it, whether its through headphones or regular monitors, I'm starting to notice I either subconciously favor my left ear or I have some kind of damage to my right. Anyone have a problem like this? I wanna see if I can find a good hearing test online.

This is completely normal. Everyone has a dominant hand, ear, eye, etc. If you favour one ear over the other don't worry about it. If you notice a significant difference in what you hear, eg no where near as loud or no top end, etc, then you should see someone to have them checked.

 

[Skinny Viking]

No way! Colonial Point apartments!?!?! Im in K4 haha. I used to live more near the firehouse on street road too in the arbor lane apartments but they kicked us out when they found out I had a dog. Don't go back to philly unless you work there. you'll get murdered in taxes. I couldn't believe how much more I was getting in my check simply by not living or working in the city.

I've derailed my own thread lol.

Hahahaha ... yup! Colonial Point ... funny thing is, I lived in K-9

I used to live there back in about 98 or so with my buddy until the new neighbor who moved beneath us decided to go completely monkey-shit crazy one night and unloaded his .357 into his ceiling, which happened to be the floor of my fuckin bedroom! Thats a long story but this dude, man, all I can say is his cheese slid right off his cracker

He must have been lonely or something cause it was Valentines evening and my girlfriend at the time was ... very vocal

But yeah I know the firehouse, I have to drive by it all the time to go to work and there's a club we play (Sweeney's) all the time right around the corner

 

[DaveBlack]

He must have been lonely or something cause it was Valentines evening and my girlfriend at the time was ... very vocal

I know the feeling, the fuckin walls in that place are paper thin. The giant black man below me is not pleased with my musical endeavors. But after being there for a year we've finally reached a compromise. I have to hear him fuck hookers at 2 in the morning every sunday so he has to deal with my recording and mixing.

ABT - Like i said there's a lack of top end but its not extremely bad, it's just as if the left ear is a little clearer...More presence area I guess.

 

[Wolfeman]

My left ear is better than my right, at least in frequencies from 500hz and up. I had a firework go off next to my right ear when I was 12, and never noticed any side effects from it until I started getting into mixing. I find myself having to turn up the right side monitor a slight bit more to get the stereo imaging correct. I have recently had some hearing tests done, and sure enough my right ear doesnt take in 500hz and up very well. Funny thing is the doc said even with that problem, my hearing is still better than 90% of Americans. Go figure.

 

[muckypup1]

After seeing decapitated live I've been getting a slight ringing in both my ears I've always had very mild ringing after listening to headphones at 50 watts when I was younger... But its got a bit worse after seeing them live.

 

[DaveBlack]

that's a scary one. I had a friend who woke up one morning with a constant ringing in his ear and after a week he decided to see a doctor and he ended up needing surgery and now he has a permanent loss in one ear. They said it was a result of him sleeping with headphones on at night.

 

[abt]

I know the feeling, the fuckin walls in that place are paper thin. The giant black man below me is not pleased with my musical endeavors. But after being there for a year we've finally reached a compromise. I have to hear him fuck hookers at 2 in the morning every sunday so he has to deal with my recording and mixing.

You'd better sleep with your good ear on the pillow!

ABT - Like i said there's a lack of top end but its not extremely bad, it's just as if the left ear is a little clearer...More presence area I guess.

Doesn't sound that unusual, it never hurts to get them checked every year or so. It is better to pick up a problem early.

After seeing decapitated live I've been getting a slight ringing in both my ears I've always had very mild ringing after listening to headphones at 50 watts when I was younger... But its got a bit worse after seeing them live.

Yep, that's exactly what you want to avoid. Years ago I got pushed into a monitor stack at a concert which blew my left ear out, it took about a week to stop ringing. For years now I've carried ear plugs with me and put them in when ever it gets loud. The problem with ear damage is that it is irreparable.

Most peoples ears ring a little, if I start to think about it them I can hear it really badly.

 

[Melb_shredder]

WOW! I love you guys lol!

I've had this exact same problem where I notice my right is a little weaker than my left.. Not worse per se but yeah, just different, like i have better presence in the left but both have great attention to detail in all the audio I listen to!

Makes me feel a little calmer, although I will get my ears checked soon and possibly syringed is it?? When you get the gunk out, i feel it may be an issue after playing so often with ear plugs iN!

 

[abt]

... possibly syringed is it?? When you get the gunk out

Only do this if your ears are really full of wax otherwise leave them alone. You ears should find their own natural balance.

On the topic of ear syringing, this is the process of pushing water into the ear to wash away wax, not sucking it out. I've heard a few people confused about this over the years. Never suck anything out of your ear, this includes ear candling.

If your going to do it I recommend the Audiclean spray, it's the safest way to do it because the solution is sterile and the pressure is controlled.

 

[GarethSE]

my left side is worse than my right

and im truly fucked, its bad enough when i used to play metal, but now aside from doing vocals here and there, my main genre is drone doom which revolves around the love of amps feedbacking when they're cranked to ten, i am truly, truly fucked.

 

[digitaldeath]

Using an eyedropper to drip olive oil into your ears works wonders for softening ear wax and getting that crap out.
Also note that if you get the flu, your sinuses affect your hearing, couple this with excessive wax buildup and you'll be fucked pretty quickly.
Also, isn't it true that city folk will have more ear wax when compared to people from the country?! Due to the excessive city noises, your ears produce more wax to protect your ears!

 

[Limak]

Anyway, I had the exact same "problem" you are describing. It almost drove me nuts, I couldn't even listen to music without constantly flipping the stereo channels or muting the channels back and forth, trying to figure out what was going on. After going to different hearing tests, it turned out I have excellent (and equal) hearing in both of my ears. I still kinda notice the difference, but at least now I know there's nothing wrong with my ears and it's probably just the way my brain works.

This is why i LOVE this forum. When I thought I'm like the only guy on earth who is doing this panning thingy cause I am definetly hearing stuff differently in one ear and it was driving me fucking NUTS suddenly I open this thread and enquire that it's normal to some degree and other ppl have it too. Damn does this forum kicks asses. Anyway that's basically my story also, since I'm headphones user for the most time lately it's even more noticeable for me, I keep(well I did before I found this thread) switching over headphone sides or panning stuff max left then max right to compare now and then. I noticed my ,,better,, ear is better at high mids and the ,,worse,, one is better at low mids/lows. Highs are about same for both, cause of this I am constantly under impression that sound volume in my right ear is tad lower which drove me nuts.

 

[TheDriller]

For anyone with Fluid behind their ears, or general "sticky" sinuses/ears,

something to consider is to consume less dairy products.
milk is aweful for making you produce more mucus.

 

[Suicide_As_Alibi]

The ear thing most people are talking about is completely normal. We have a dominant ear as it helps us focus on specific things which may be important - like so many things, it's a leftover from our hunting days.

Everyone's right ear is faster at processing sound than their left, because sound is processed in the right hemisphere of our brains. If your right ear is dominant, you tend to learn quicker and be better with speech. If your left ear is dominant, everything has to travel that bit further, which means your slower to distinguish close consonant sounds like 'B' and 'P'. I don't know quite how that affects audio engineering. Strangely enough, women tend to favour their dominant ear less (hence being able to hold two conversations at once etc.), yet they're still a tiny minority in audio engineering - so maybe it helps being able to focus on one thing at a time more easily.

On a similar note, when listening to polyrhythms most people focus on whichever rhythm they find most 'natural' and ignore the rest.

The human body does lots of weird stuff like this without us noticing. We only breathe through one nostril most of the time, it switches every hour or so, and depending which one we're using we're either more thoughtful or more proactive.

For anyone with Fluid behind their ears, or general "sticky" sinuses/ears,

something to consider is to consume less dairy products.
milk is aweful for making you produce more mucus.

Actually that's a commonly held belief that's completely untrue. The lactose in milk (and other dairy products) is a complex sugar that coats your mouth and throat when you drink it, which gives the false impression of increased mucus. If you search on Google for "milk and mucus" you can read lots of boring research about it It really is crappy for vocals though, so singers should still steer clear of it prior to performing.

Steve

 

[TheDriller]

The ear thing most people are talking about is completely normal. We have a dominant ear as it helps us focus on specific things which may be important - like so many things, it's a leftover from our hunting days.

Everyone's right ear is faster at processing sound than their left, because sound is processed in the right hemisphere of our brains. If your right ear is dominant, you tend to learn quicker and be better with speech. If your left ear is dominant, everything has to travel that bit further, which means your slower to distinguish close consonant sounds like 'B' and 'P'. I don't know quite how that affects audio engineering. Strangely enough, women tend to favour their dominant ear less (hence being able to hold two conversations at once etc.), yet they're still a tiny minority in audio engineering - so maybe it helps being able to focus on one thing at a time more easily.

On a similar note, when listening to polyrhythms most people focus on whichever rhythm they find most 'natural' and ignore the rest.

The human body does lots of weird stuff like this without us noticing. We only breathe through one nostril most of the time, it switches every hour or so, and depending which one we're using we're either more thoughtful or more proactive.




Actually that's a commonly held belief that's completely untrue. The lactose in milk (and other dairy products) is a complex sugar that coats your mouth and throat when you drink it, which gives the false impression of increased mucus. If you search on Google for "milk and mucus" you can read lots of boring research about it It really is crappy for vocals though, so singers should still steer clear of it prior to performing.

Steve

Great post!!!

thanks for clearing that up

 

[PhilR]

I have mild tinnitus in my left ear which I think is in part because it's always been my more sensitive ear. I started noticing a few years back that stereo imaging was skewed to my left. I thought I might either have damaged my right ear or had a bad wax buildup but a doctor confirmed my ear canal was clear and I don't suffer ringing on that side so I can only assume it was always that way. I've started getting serious about ear protection now I'm playing drums in a band again though, I'm hitting the age when I won't many more chances.

I think my right ear canal is a bit odd anyway. Any kind of "in ear" product such as Etymotic earplugs or Sony earbuds just won't stay in, they always get squeezed out. So if I wear headphones they pretty much have to be full-sized.

 

[reg3n]

i dunno if i should say 'ow too bad...' or 'fuck yeah! i'm not the only half-deaf here!' i feel exactly the same when mixing, then i go into my headphones.. and notice it a LOT more, switch headphones L/R and R/L... and DAMN it's exactly the same, but i've recently got one of those professional tests for driving and i asked the girl that did it about this, and she said i have the same like... 'range' on both ears... so......... ¯\(º_o)/¯