So, now that Obama's finally sewn things up (YES!), I wanted to head over to YouTube to celebrate by replaying his now-famous "Yes We Can" speech following the New Hampshire primaries. Trouble is, whoever was running sound at the joint had apparently never heard of a compressor/limiter, so the volume is ridiculously varied. You need to listen with one finger constantly on the volume slider if you don't want to blow your speakers (or your eardrums) with fiery rhetoric.
It bugged me the first time I watched it, and it bugged me even more today, so I decided to do something about it. Here's the audio of the entire (13-minute) speech, run through heavy compression:
And here's a shorter version, just over four minutes, from the end where he really gets rollin'.
Yes We Can (Shortened Version)
I figure someone out there might be able to do something with these.
Rock on.