The answer isn't yes or no. It's a little more complicated.
Volume leveling makes the average or "middle" volume of all tracks approximately the same. So "yes" this is what it does. But the perceived volume of songs depends on not only the middle volume, but the variations in volume also.
Take a look at the first track on Rumors in my screen shot. "Second Hand News" has a dynamic range of 13 on the CD based track. The DVD-A based track has a DR of 9. What this means is, there is less variation in volume on the one with a DR of 9. The song is more saturated with sound. There is less space in between the music. It's more dynamically compressed. This makes it sound louder. The middle level might be the same for both of these tracks when you play them back to back. But the DVD-A track (DR =9) will have more total energy. If you look at the waveform in Audacity or another waveform viewer, you'll see that it is more dense and more "filled in". So it sounds louder.
I'm not sure if you could compensate for that or not using playback level. I do know that, generally speaking, less dynamic range means that it sounds worse to me overall. Not every single time. It's not a hard and fast rule. Just generally speaking, more dynamic range is better. ...and doesn't sound as loud.
Brian.
Thanks, I understand and don't like the loudness wars. I remember looking at a Pat Benatar (remaster) album waveforms and comparing it to the original release. The new and improved remastered album sounded horrible due to the almost total lack of dynamic range.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EBU_R_128This site says:
Adoption and aftermath
The recommendation encourages the use of a wider dynamic range in production but does not restrict the use of dynamic range compression. In essence, it ties the use of compression to artistic and aesthetic decisions, rather than the necessity of obtaining a louder mix.[5] With the adoption of normalisation by broadcasters since the introduction of EBU R 128, reducing dynamic range in production does not render the program louder in broadcast.[12] Widespread adoption of ITU-R BS.1770 and EBU R 128, combined with the prevailing of streaming over physical media distribution in the 2010s, arguably put an end to the loudness war.[9]
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And reading some technical articles on R128 implies it should handle differing dynamic ranges...
MediaCenter is my only use of R128 volume leveling, but I can tell you, it barely works and I sometimes go into options to check I actually have it turned on.
So either R128 barely works, or the MC implementation is not correct.