I have a muzzle brake on my Savage 7MM Rem. Mag, and like the reduced recoil, but the sound is incredible. In fact, two years ago, I was at the range late one afternoon (heading towards evening) zeroing in this rifle. No one was around, and every five shots I would walk the 100 yds to my target to check my groupings (this was before I bought a spotting scope). After doing this for about an hour, I went back to the bench, settled in, adjusted my scope per my last group, and fired away. What I realized instantaneously was that I had forgotten to put on my ear protection, which I never had done before primarily because when I would normally shoot, there were other people at the range and I would be mentally reminded to place my hearing protection back on. Anyway, the pain after that shot was unbelievable. The entire right side of my face went numb (I shoot left-handed) and it felt like someone had jamed an icepick in my ear. As a result of just that single shot, I have suffered a small degree of permanent, irreversible hearing damage in that ear. So the moral of the story, alway be conscious of what you are doing, and if you use a muzzle brake, wear hearing protection, even in the field.