How to Protect Your Hearing and Actually Enjoy the Music

Festivals and concerts have to be loud. If you want the people all the way in the back to feel the bass, that means people up front are going to face an onslaught of decibels. This, combined with the rise of personal music devices, led to a rise in hearing loss over the past few decades.

While DJs have begun touting the benefits of earplugs in the booth, their fans seems to be falling on deaf ears, which is alarming since about 16 percent of teens and 15 percent of adults report having some hearing loss. It’s hard to blame fans, though, due to the lack of knowledge and availability. Until recently, the only earplugs one can find were the ugly store-brand kind in pharmacies. These will work fine if you don’t have alternatives available. If you’re worried about fidelity, acoustic earplugs are made to cut the sound evenly across the frequency spectrum, making it sound like someone turned down the volume knob instead of just muffling it.

These earplugs have been around for a while, but haven’t made much headway in the festival scene, but several companies are trying to change that. Earlove, DUBS, DownBeats and a number of other brands are being marketed toward younger people with better colors and carrying cases. Some of them are even partnering with festival brands like DownBeats and Ultra to promote awareness of hearing loss.