Club Worker Says Music Hurt Her Hearing

[The Straight Story]

Club Worker Says Music Hurt Her Hearing

Alexis Clemente knew the music was extraordinarily loud at Lavo, the celebrity playpen in Midtown Manhattan where she worked for two years as a hostess.

She could feel the bass thumping in her throat. Cocktail glasses bounced. Heavy vases shimmied along surfaces to the beat. But it was not until last summer, when the club’s owners, prompted by an article in The New York Times about dangerous noise levels, had employees’ hearing tested, that Ms. Clemente discovered the damage that she said had been wrought.

Ms. Clemente had significant hearing loss in her right ear, most likely caused by noise exposure, an audiologist found. She was told to immediately stop working in loud environments to prevent it from getting worse.

“I was hysterically crying,” Ms. Clemente recalled this week. After the test, she told her supervisors about the results, she said, and asked to be placed at the door, slightly removed from the din. But her employers refused, she said, failed to offer her another position, fired her and canceled her health insurance.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/28/nyregion/ex-hostess-at-lavo-sues-claiming-loud-music-damaged-her-hearing.html?_r=0

We should probably makes laws that say you can only play music loud enough to hear it but not loud enough that you have to talk more loudly than usual to be heard.

[Cleita]

1. I feel her pain. As an ex-bartender, I had plenty of disagreements about how loud

the juke box was. I really feel I lost a lot of my hearing because of it. However, there seems to be no laws with teeth in them to address noise pollution both indoors and outdoors. It should be an OSHA offense as a danger in the workplace.

[RC]

21. Years ago, the VFW in Bismarck ND had a band playing there, that was too loud.

They were told several times to turn it down. The band would, then sneak it back up. Finally management pulled the plug (literally, pulled the plug) fired the band, and shut the place down way early. As in closed for the night. The band was told they would never play there again. That episode apparently did not hurt the VFW business any. I heard they made up for the loss of closing early, on following weekends.
There was a stipulation in the contract about how loud they could play. I can't remember how it was worded anymore. But word got around and for a while, other bars toned it down too. But just for a while.

[hedgehog]

2. Industrial plants give annual hearing tests to prove they

are in compliance with OSHA noise exposure standards. I've never understood why the same standards don't apply at bars and retail outlets. You can always tell a chain which is marketing itself as young and with-it by the thudding bass you can feel 20 feet away from the door!

[MrSlayer]

3. Yeah, there are these things called earplugs.

Why do we need to make yet another nanny government law to deal with this? Management should have a bucket of earplugs in the office, they're quite cheap. Or if they won't, get your own. Again they're cheap and effective. Problem solved and no one has to turn down anything.

[Cirque du So-What]

7. She did wear earplugs

<snip>

Ms. Clemente’s job involved ushering guests downstairs into the pounding club, which sits beneath Lavo’s restaurant, at 39 East 58th Street. To protect her hearing, she wore silicone earplugs. But their efficacy was thwarted by the radio headset she wore in one ear, cranked up over the music, to communicate with other workers and handle logistical issues.

She often complained about the noise, she said, but her employers did not take action until last summer, after The Times recorded and reported volumes averaging 96 decibels, akin to a power mower, in Lavo’s restaurant. Legally, workers should not be exposed to that volume for over three and a half hours without ear protection. And Lavo employees said the volumes at the downstairs club were far worse.

Lavo began offering its employees earplugs and hearing tests, said Ms. Clemente, who declined to give her age. It was then that she discovered her hearing loss. Initially, she said, one of the club’s executives said she could probably work at the door, but she was later told that would not happen. She was also charged retroactively, she said, for additional tests and treatment related to her hearing damage.

more...

but the club owners required her to keep in radio contact, so the earplugs weren't so effective.

The reason we have these 'nanny government laws' is because of reprehensible practices such as this.

[jollyreaper2112]

12. Exactly

Business needs regulation because they won't regulate themselves.

[Cirque du So-What]

16. That phrase

'nanny state' really chaps my backside. I usually see it written on some repug-leaning site, so it's always a surprise to see it on an ostensibly 'democratic' board.

[KittyWampus]

13. We used to regulate noise the same we regulate other types of POLLUTION. Reagan started the deregula

deregulation.

[TorchTheWitch]

23. how do the workers hear the customers with ear plugs?

It's hard enough to hear them without wearing earplugs. You do realize that bar workers need to be able to hear customers in order to serve them, right?

Hey, how about the musicians just turn it down a notch so the workers don't get hearing loss, the customers and workers can hear each other without shouting and the bar can, you know, MAKE MONEY???

[beachmom]

4. It should be standard to give employees earplugs. If you look at musicians

on stage on big tours, they all have earplugs.

Or turn the music down? Maybe?

[KittyWampus]

14. Artificial loudness. In the last few decades music has been engineered to have artificial loudness

It's just a tangental part of the discussion and I hope you don't mind my tacking it to your comment

[CBGLuthier]

5. where my wife works you have to wear ear protection

I wonder why her place was different. if they did not offer hearing protection I would think they would be negligent.

[longship]

6. That's the reason I long ago stopped listening to rock music.

The louder the better?

I think not. Nevertheless, that's the scene. And that's why I despise rock and roll in all its current manifestations, no matter how supposedly good it is perceived by many. IMHO, it's all just very loud noise. Don't get me started about rap, or whatever it's called these days.

But I suppose somebody will inevitably argue that popular music isn't as bad as it sounds.

[Cirque du So-What]

8. I wore earplugs during a Steven Stills concert years ago

The volume was cranked up so high that the high-frequency guitar tones were painful. I just happened to have earplugs in my pocket from my job, so I popped them in and still enjoyed the concert.

[longship]

10. Precisely my point. Rock and Roll as an environmental hazard. nt

on edit: toned it down a smidgen.

[jollyreaper2112]

11. Loud is one thing

But they also make the mix too high. See loudness wars. I'm a big fan of metal but the new stuff is mixed so loud it's grating on the ears and you lose any subtlety in the mix. Everyone tries to stand out against the noise and so it's shit on shit.

It's a relative of that wall of sound approach commercial acts got into where you just get an indistinct sonic mush rather than music.

[KittyWampus]

18. Indeed, it was really enlightening to learn how far engineered music has become and loudness intenti

intentionally pumped up.

[jollyreaper2112]

9. No shit

I can't fucking stand these places. Try to socialize with friends and they go to venues like this. Can't goddamn hear what someone across from me is saying.

My favorite bit is when you complain about this and the troll response is "then don't go to places like that" or "get friends who are shut-ins like you." And we aren't just talking dance clubs, even restaurants will crank shit noise. Any place with live music leaves me functionally deaf, can't make out a word.

Just wait until second-hand noise pollution gets widely linked to hearing damage, just like smoking. This is only going to be the start.

[Smilo]

15. I agree completely

we were at a restaurant with loud music - they seated us near the stage - I tried to ask to be moved but was voted down by the rest of the group. Of course, conversation was non-existent. Even when others complained about the noise level and the speakers were turned down you still couldn't hear yourself think.

[Bake]

22. That's one reason I like acoustic music live.

It generally doesn't have to be loud enough to drown out conversations, but people who want to listen can listen.

Bake

[jorno67]

17. Working in the concert industry has done permanent damage to my ears...

more and more of the younger people use ear plugs but us older types are dumb like that.

[MadHound]

19. DJ for a number of years, have had growing problems with tinnitus,

But you know what, those were some of the funnest years of my life and I would repeat them in a minute.

[snooper2]

20. Loud?

This is loud