What brand ear plugs do you recommend? I bought some just last week on amazon (some foam ones from Howard Leight) and it was a toss-up which were good and which were bad according to the reviews and descriptions.
Least with Howard Light it's Greens<Pinks<Oranges. Greens should be more than enough and are 'softer' if you've got a smaller ear canal. All of them work well.
You have to ensure you're putting them in correctly. Read the box. Roll the plug in your fingers, reach your other arm over you head to grab the top of the opposite ear, gently pull on the top of your ear, and insert the plug. You should feel & hear it expand forming a seal.
You can reuse foam ones a couple of times(can even get them corded), but be very, very wary of infections. And always put the same earplug back in the same ear(thus you don't spread anything).
If you aren't singing or don't need to hear your own voice as well, you can also get away with cheaper percussion earplugs like these: https://www.musiciansfriend.com/accessories/vater-earplugs
I would say these are both good enough for the casual musicians / audience members. I would only upgrade back to electric ones if I were buying actual in ear monitors, but I doubt any of my bands will get to that point.
Expensive but also helpful for in person concerts.
The best would be custom molded earplugs, but those are fairly expensive.
Can't recommend that people wear hearing protection enough in general and at least for me etymotic make for a pleasant experience.
Foam earplugs are supposed to me more effective, but apparently harder to wear and sometimes less comfortable.
I also think they make the best earbuds on the market as well.
The amazing thing about them is that they let you go to a live concert and hear all the music properly, without pain.
But your last sentence makes me wonder WTH is going on. Why would so many people want this experience?
First, humans associate louder sound levels with higher quality, up to a point. Frequencies which can't be heard at lower levels become audible at higher levels.
Second, human ears adapt to a reasonably large range of sounds.
Third, sound levels decay with distance, which is why in ear phones use tiny amounts of power (a few milliwatts) and speaker systems for arena concerts can use megawatts. They also decay unevenly by frequency.
A classical Western concert with a full orchestra, unamplified, often has peak levels around 90 dB in the first few rows of seating. An amplified rock concert is trying to provide body-stirring levels of sound for people a hundred meters or more away from the stage.
That's the technical why. The personal why? Loud music literally moves you. It's not something I want every day, but it's fun on occasion.
Thank you.