Are the loudness wars fake so record companies can destroy the music?

@cleeds  I guess what you are describing is simply not what I experience when it comes to normalization.

With Amazon you can switch it on and off and it changes as you listen.

So if I'm listening to a compressed song and have normalization "off" and the volume set to where the quietest parts are just audible and then turn normalization 'on' then those barely audible quiet bits are no longer audible. In other words, normalization seems to have defeated the benefit of compression. 

On the other hand, if playing a non-compressed song with the quiet parts just barely audible and I turn normalization off or on, almost nothing happens.

So from an experience standpoint I'm having a hard time understanding what you mean when you say normalization has no effect on compression. I understand it does not change the level of compression or the level of the quiet bits _relative_ to the loud bits. But it does decrease the loudness across the entire DR which lowers the volume of the quiet bits and the loud bits together  in which case the quiet bits can become harder to hear. 

@glupson, I'm guessing, but do not know with any certainty, that producers could selectively compress specific portions of the DR and not just across the whole range. I would assume this is how artful DR compression is used with classical pieces that have extremely wide DRs.

I would also think that the effect of DR for the listener would vary with various types of music, recordings and production technique.

glupson

If compressing makes quiet passages easier to hear, what is the disadvantage?

Part of the power and emotion in music is attributable to dynamic range. It’s why composers include such notation in their scores. The nuance of a solo oboe and the thwack of a tympani are two different things. Yet a tympani can also be used to create a gentle roll, which is distinguished (in part) from the thwack by volume difference - dynamic range.

... what is the advantage of not being able to hear quieter passages in uncompressed material?

None at all! That’s why we have compression. But you can hear much deeper into a wide DR recording if you’re listening in a quiet room than you can in a noisy subway car.

Can it be that complaints about the sound are more due to something else than to the dynamic range?

Sometimes. There are many ways to ruin a recording. Overuse of compression is just one of them.

guitarsam,  Please see my answer to the tin foil hat question on my post above.

You’re right about one thing. Music was much better before 1980, or the invention of cds. In fact, when did the cd become competitive? 1995? And still it’s not vinyl. Pity. But on the upside. Vinyl never went out of style for many of us. Thank goodness. You digital heads can do your thing. Me, I’m vinyl through and through. Fully satisfied. So in short there’s no problem. Reason being is there’s been no decent music available since what, 1993? There you go. 

Some say there has been no decent music since 1893.