Foam earplugs firmly in place, Charles Sielicki was ready for Tool earlier this month at Great Woods Center for the Performing Arts in Mansfield, Mass. Between acts at Lollapalooza, the 39-year-old sitting in the second tier of seats in the shed, took out the plugs but said he'd be sure to reinsert them "just before the bands start."
For Sielicki, who goes to about five concerts a summer, the turning point was an Aerosmith show two years ago. Since then, he said, he always wears earplugs. "I like the foam ones. They take the highs out."Noah Schaffer, 18, goes to several shows a week. He has been using earplugs for nine months. He takes silicon plugs and breaks them in half. For particularly loud shows, he uses the whole thing.
"Generally, with kids my age, they have no interest in earplugs. People, shall we say middle-aged, they're pretty plugged up," he said. "It's like there's a generation gap in volume."
Dan Elliott, 27, who was buying foam plugs at the Better Than Ezra show at Paradise Rock Club in Boston, said, "I try to always have them and usually bring my own. I hate going home after a show and lying in bed with my ears ringing. I don't like the thought of going deaf."
Fans aren't the only ones protecting their hearing. More musicians, too, have been turning to earplugs.
Anne Preven, singer for Ed-na-swap, just began using custom-made musicians' plugs after she started noticing a ringing in her ears after shows. "Being a singer, you stand right in front of the drums. I want to be able to hear in 15 years."
She knew about the special plugs because two of the band members from Better Than Ezra, the group Ednaswap is touring with, use them.
Though the majority of musicians and concertgoers play and listen to music unprotected, many more than before have started to practice safe sound.
"It's no longer the wild world of rock 'n' roll," said Mahmod Shaikh, publicist for the Middle East in Cambridge, Mass., one of the area's busiest live-music venues. "Earplugs are becoming like knee pads when roller blading." The club, which sells foam earplugs for $1 a pair, has seen sales steadily rising.
Paradise recently started selling earplugs because "people were going next door to Store 24 and buying them," said manager Arty Medeiros, who has "seen people take bar napkins and stuff them in their ears." The foam plugs at Paradise, which sell for $1, are decorated with Day-Glo swirls. Lupo's in Providence, R.I., another busy live-music club, goes through about 1,000 pairs of foam plugs every three months, said manager Karen Hill.
At Great Woods, general manager Bruce Montgomery said the facility started selling earplugs five years ago after concertgoers started to request them. There, the foam variety sells for $2 a pair.
Still, despite the rising numbers of earplugs being sold, many people go without.
Ann Dix, an audiologist at Audiology Servies Inc. in Belmont, Mass., recently completed her master's thesis on attitudes of the public and rock musicians about hearing protection. A survey she did on the Internet and at the Berklee College of Music showed "there's a very large awareness of the problem, but only half do anything about it."
So if musicians and fans are starting to protect their hearing, why not just turn down the volume? At Great Woods, that often has been the case over the past few years, Montgomery said. But venues generally follow bands' instructions on volume, so it varies from group to group.
In Dix's survey, "a lot of people, as you would expect, said that having the music loud is important for rock 'n' roll because that's what it's all about," she said. When she asked them to describe how loud music felt, terms such as "a feeling of power and emotional rush" were common, along with the enjoyment of "feeling it in your chest."
Although ear specialists disagree on whether occasional or frequent exposure to loud music at concerts results in permanently damaged hearing, "it clearly has a short-term effect," said Sandeep Kathju, a frequent concertgoer and an otolaryngologist in residency at Massachusetts Ear & Eye Infirmary. "For a brief period of time, there is decreased hearing and ringing in the ears. For most people, that resolves fairly quickly." Experts do agree that the longer the time of exposure and the higher sound frequency (more treble, less bass) the more likely it is that damage will occur.
Sometimes, though, it can happen with one exposure. Earlier this month, singer Barry Manilow agreed to donate $5,000 to the American Tinnitus Association, an ear-disorder group in Portland, Ore., to settle a suit by a concertgoer in Tucson, Ariz., who claimed that a 1993 Manilow concert permanently damaged his hearing. Manilow and loud music may seem incongruous, but Tinnitus Association spokeswoman Corky Stewart said the suit proves that "music doesn't have to be heavy metal" to be dangerous.
Live music isn't the only threat to hearing. Dance clubs, Walk-mans and car stereos can be at high-decibel levels as well, though a booming bass isn't as dangerous as high-frequency sounds.
Kirsty Little, dancing to the chest-vibrating house mix at Avalon in Boston on a recent Saturday night, said she never wears earplugs although her ears often ring for two hours after a night out dancing.
"I never really thought about it, but maybe that's why I can't hear after I go outside," said the 21-year-old visitor from England.
Over the past several years, more musicians have spoken out about hearing loss, a change that health officials say has had a large impact on earplug use. Pete Towns-hend, John Lee Hooker, members of Metallica, Aerosmith drummer Joey Kramer and Lee Ren-al-do of Sonic Youth have had hearing losses; Renaldo discussed his problem with Roger Miller, former guitarist for Boston's Mission of Burma. The popular avant-garde rockers disbanded in 1983 after Miller, who lives in Quincy, developed tinnitus, a frequent ringing in the ear.
Only after he started having problems did he use earplugs. "When we used to wear plugs, we didn't know anybody else who wore them. I was like an oddity. Now it's common," said Miller, who stills records and performs. "I've been able to keep playing by turning the volume down. And I don't go to shows unless I really, really want to see it very badly."
Miller wears custom earplugs "that are a solid wall of 40 Db," which means they reduce the volume by 40 decibels.
The sound level at rock concerts can stay between 110 and 120 decibels, according to information supplied by HEAR, Hearing Ed-u-ca-tion-al and Awareness for Rockers. Even an orchestra can surpass the 110-decibel level momentarily, but that is offset by the many soft passages in classical music. Around 85 decibels is considered by audiologists to be an acceptable level of hearing, but much music goes above that. For instance, a Walkman turned up halfway rates at 94. In the non-music world, the dial tone of a telephone is about 80 decibels, and normal conversation that can be heard 3 to 5 feet away is 60.
Varying degrees of protection are available, both in stores and through audiologists.
The cheap, over-the-counter earplugs are the most popular, with foam, silicon and rubber plugs being the most common.
Kathju, who didn't wear plugs at all until he joined the medical ranks, generally uses rubber ones, and said he's been known to stuff cotton in his ears when unprepared.
Mike Barry, store manager at the E.U. Wurlitzer Music & Sound in Boston and singer with the band Pooka Stew, said the New England chain of eight music stores this year has sold 20 to 30 percent more foam plugs, which cost 99 cents for two pairs, and 40 percent more of the expensive rubber variety, which cost $11.99. Barry wears foam plugs during rehearsal.
"The buzz about ear protection is much stronger than it was," he says. "We've thought of handing them out at shows. Our previous sound man mixed us very loud. I don't particularly like music that loud."
One band, Texans Buick Mac-Kane, which played Mama Kin recently, handed out packaged earplugs with the slogan: "If It's Too Loud . . . it's Buick MacKane." The band Dinosaur Jr. also puts its logo on earplug boxes to hand out at shows.
The Cadillac of earplugs, the ones singer Prevens wears, are commonly called musicians' plugs and must be custom fitted. Many on the market are made by Wes-tone Laboratories in Colorado Springs, Colo. They cost from $100 to $150 because an audiologist must make molds of your inner ears before sending the cast off to a lab. The plugs come with tiny removable speakers that reduce sound levels without distorting the music. Westone general manager Ed Lockwood said custom earplug sales have risen about 20 percent a year in the past five years, an increase he attributes to more education and awareness.
One convert to the high-end plugs is John DeChristopher, director of artist relations for Avedis Zildjian Norwell, which makes cymbals and drums. DeChristopher's job takes him to about 100 concerts a year.
"When I would leave Great Woods, or the Centrum, the buzzing that usually went away in 20 minutes was taking longer to go away," said DeChristopher, who also has played drums in bands. "I'm very thankful that I have no permanent loss."
"I've become dependent on them now," DeChristopher, 36, said of the specialty plugs. "I'd never found any earplugs that were comfortable and didn't impair everything. Also, the foam ones after a while start to fall out.
When he takes his children, ages 8 and 10, to shows, they always wear earplugs. "They understand it's like a seat belt, that they have to wear them. It's not even an option not to."
Many in the hearing and earplug fields credit the nonprofit San Francisco organization HEAR with drawing attention to music volume and protection. The group sponsors hearing clinics and distributes free earplugs at summer festivals, dance clubs, and raves.
"Now at raves it's kind of cool to have colored earplugs sticking out of your ears," said HEAR director and former rocker Kathy Peck, who said her group is planning more outreach into schools nationwide.
At the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, the Center for Language, Speech and Hearing holds an annual noise awareness day, where they offer free hearing screenings and give away earplugs, said audiologist Tomma Henckel. The center also gives music clubs earplugs to hand out to patrons.
A soon-to-be published science book called "Active Physics," which was used on a trial basis by a teacher at North Quincy (Mass.) High School, includes a chapter on hearing, music and the use of earplugs as a way to teach the physics of sound.
Says Peck, "We try to tell kids that your most important musical instruments are your ears."
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ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Some simple ways to protect your hearing
Over-the-counter earplugs can be purchased at most drugstores and music stores. They range from the conventional foam variety to rubber, silicone and wax, and cost $1 to $15. Custom-fitted plugs, which maintain a clearer sound, cost about $100 to $150 and must be purchased through an audiologist.
Warning signs that music may be damaging your ears after exposure to loud music:
- Ringing or buzzing in the ears.
- Slight muffling of sounds.
- Difficulty in understanding speech.
- Difficulty in hearing conversation in groups when there is background noise.
HEAR, Hearing Education and Awareness for Rockers, suggests this self-test:
Before exposure to loud music, set the volume on your car radio so that you can barely hear the words. Then later, after the exposure, turn on the radio again at that setting and listen. Can you still hear and understand the words? If not, you're experiencing a slight hearing loss.
Health professionals suggest the following precautions:
- Have your hearing evaluated at least once a year by an audiologist or physician.
- Give your ears a rest for 24 hours after exposure to dangerous levels of noise.
- Turn down the volume.
- Wear earplugs.
For more information, contact HEAR at 415-431-3277 or online at (http://www.hearnet.com).