Making music is not all Chris Martin, Plan B and Gary Numan have in common, they all suffer from tinnitus. That ringing sensation felt in the ears after being around a loud noise for too long that usually disappears after a while, but for these musicians and so many others like them it’s there for life.
Action On Hearing Loss’s recent Loud Music campaign launch has lead to musicians such as Coldplay’s Chris Martin coming forward and admitting to having long term hearing damage due to the exposure to loud music received on stage.
Action on Hearing Loss Campaign Poster
Over 10 million people in the UK are currently suffering from some form of hearing loss and the pressure is being put on for something to be done about it.
In most gigs, festivals and events ear protection is not provided and it is up to the audience members to sort themselves out, should they choose to. The fact that using ear protection is left up to the audience’s choice and barely highlighted by promoters as a risk means that most people simply don’t think about it. A lot of people who attend gigs will go in, have a great time while standing incredibly close to one of the speakers and then leave complaining of ringing ears.
Keith Horton, Senior Environmental Health Officer at Mendip District Council monitors the noise and safety levels of Glastonbury Festival and other local gigs and events. He compares the speakers used at gigs and festivals to ones found in everyday life.
“One of the big festival speakers, it’s 650 kilowatts of sound power, your car stereo is tops going to be about 30. So you look at that, it’s about 200 cars. It’s enormous, absolutely enormous.”
This puts into perspective just how much power is in those speakers and how much potential damage they could give.
A gig’s sound system should average at around 109 decibels throughout the event and can peak at up to 140 decibels. This is the same sound level as a gunshot and if it’s heard for too long, it can cause serious damage to hearing. Even the average sound level of 109db can’t be heard for more than a minute at a time without becoming painful to listen to.
So, bearing in mind that the ‘safe’ sound levels will still damage hearing after just a minute of exposure why don’t more people wear protection to gigs?
The loud music campaign has highlighted a nationwide noise and safety unawareness, the charity have asked the public to take more concern with their safety around loud sounds and have asked venues to help promote safety awareness.
That ringing sound that comes after a loud gig can be the first signs of hearing damage and yet most people will wave it off and hope it goes away like it does every other time.
Tom Dumbleton, a 21-year-old student from Surrey suffered from a perforated eardrum at a Mogwai gig in 2008 “I did notice the music was particularly loud, but didn’t really think too much of it. The loud / quiet element of the music is a major factor in the bands music so you just assume everything is fine, and the music levels are safe.”
Even after this incident and now suffering from tinnitus, Dumbleton still says that he wouldn’t wear earplugs to a gig. “I have never and will never wear earplugs to a gig. Sort of really defeats the point of seeing live music – and the earplugs distort / muffle the sound you hear anyway.”
The assumption that the sound levels are safe can be a dangerous one, as Dumbleton’s story shows although venues do monitor their safety levels carefully. Julian Munday works at the box office in the Princess Pavilion and says that they always have somebody monitoring the sound. “Our sound technicians monitor the sound levels via a meter on some of the mics.”
“you just assume everything is fine, and the music levels are safe”
The question is, is this enough to make sure that everybody’s ears are beign looked after?
Aintree Hospital’s audiology department states that tinnitus can occur at any age with the most common cause being exposure to loud noises. There is no definitive cure for the symptom but there are many ways of lessening the noise that might be heard.
Horton suggests that people invest in a decent pair of earplugs to take the edge off louder gigs and make them more comfortable to listen to however a recent Facebook poll found that seven out of ten people would never wear earplugs to a gig.
BA Film student Ben Philpott says that even the backing of top musicians such as Plan B and Chris Martin won’t change the public’s opinion on earplugs.
“Plan B’s main fan base aren’t the sort of people who go to louder shows, he’s not going to reach the right crowd with his message.”
Philpott’s opinions are backed up by the results of the Facebook poll, the majority of people believe that it is unfashionable or uncool to be seen wearing earplugs or even that they won’t be able to hear anything if they use them.
Earplugs
Horton points out that most people don’t use their ear protection correctly. “If the hearing protection is in right, you can’t see it sticking out. You can see it if you look. If you’re actually putting your hearing protection in right nobody would know. People re-use them, that’s the trouble, the sponge ones that you put in, you really should use them once then throw them away.”
If people don’t know how to use earplugs, who is going to educate them? Is this another thing that the venues are going to be looked to for?
Venues are not required to protect their audience’s hearing at an event. The staff at the venue are looked after under the Health and Safety to Work Act. This means that they are provided with hearing protection at all times but the act does not cover the audience simply because they choose to be there and can choose to leave at any point should they feel it is getting too loud. The public are protected under licensing acts rather than health and safety and this is where the peak sound condition comes from.
Horton compares event venues to supermarkets in how the general public’s safety is looked after; “When you walk into Tesco, you as a shopper are entitled to walk into a safe Tesco, in the same way the workers are entitled to work in a safe Tesco.”
So the members of the public that attend a festival or a gig are entitled to be safe during the event but the way this is processed legally is different and not quite as detailed as it is for those working at the event who have to be there for the duration.
If it is an entitlement to be in a safe environment, is the peak noise condition enough?
Tickets prices for gigs and festivals are constantly on the rise and are people really getting anything more for their money than they were 10, 15 years ago? Ok, the sound quality might have got a bit better and the on-stage technology may have advanced but surely not enough to qualify some of the prices seen on some recent tickets (£65 for one Radiohead ticket). The most safety that comes with that is a small warning on the actual ticket saying that the gig might be a bit loud and possibly some sound warnings inside the actual venue.
Earplugs aren’t expensive so surely the price of a ticket could purchase a person some earplugs too. Not so according to Horton who thinks about the realistic costs to the venues potentially buying in thousands of earplugs every night. “I mean, its not a lot for you to buy them, 30p a time you can get them for and if you’re got to give them out to 100,000 people, that’s a lot of money. Its one of the little things that all adds up, you know.”
The 30p quoted by Keith Horton might seem very cheap but it will only get a very basic disposable pair of earplugs. For a higher cost one can scour the internet for a better quality pair that will survive several uses and won’t muffle the sound, but will just cut off the damaging noise.
The main problem for the venues is that the general attitude of the public seems to be one of carelessness when it comes to loud music. Why should they invest in safety items when the public themselves say that they won’t use them? If there is going to be a change, it will first need to come from the people who attend the gigs who need to show that they care that the music is too loud and they want to protect their hearing.
Emma Roberts 