Forgive me, I have been busy lately, but I wanna chime in here. My hearing suffered a great amount of hi freq damage from working on an airplane for 6 years, flying all over the world as a kid in the U.S. Air Force. I cannot withstand a cymbal crash or loud rim shot, it kills me. I am very careful not to subject myself to these situations.
Most times, at home, I crank my amp in the bedroom and play along with the music in the adjoining TV room. (I live alone, so I can do this) I have the pedals just outside the bedroom door, and I'm far away enough that I can play the stereo pretty loud (not gig levels).
To get a REAL idea of gig sound, I mic my cab & play with headphones. The rig is at gig volume, again, I live alone. I play gigs with in-ear-monitors anyway, so this is a very accurate representation of my 'live' sound. When playing through headphones, I can easily compare my tone with the overall mix of the recording I'm practicing with. The dogs hate it, but it gets me much closer to real-life tones. We use a Presonus mixer that has a free iApp to control our individual mixes, so I have my guitar and my vocals cranked, the other vocal mics mixed, and the keys turned down more to hear myself. It's a great tool.
Our key player (who owns the Presonus mixer) saves all our personal settings. Each time we play at the Opera House, our mix is already done. Each time we play at the sports bar, the mixer is dialed in for that cavernous space. It works great, and you control your own volume in your ears. Trust me, my ears still ring, they have forever, but it's much nicer than standing next to a crash cymbal that's being treated like a punching bag.