diff --git a/deep_speech_2/data_utils/featurizer/audio_featurizer.py b/deep_speech_2/data_utils/featurizer/audio_featurizer.py
index 12f8784a9921e9bd78735db3edda3898c54ee908..f594de7d9794354ed4a5afca25d70e85d658a828 100644
--- a/deep_speech_2/data_utils/featurizer/audio_featurizer.py
+++ b/deep_speech_2/data_utils/featurizer/audio_featurizer.py
@@ -141,7 +141,8 @@ class AudioFeaturizer(object):
         # window weighting, squared Fast Fourier Transform (fft), scaling
         weighting = np.hanning(window_size)[:, None]
         fft = np.fft.rfft(windows * weighting, axis=0)
-        fft = np.absolute(fft)**2
+        fft = np.absolute(fft)
+        fft = fft**2
         scale = np.sum(weighting**2) * sample_rate
         fft[1:-1, :] *= (2.0 / scale)
         fft[(0, -1), :] /= scale