diff --git a/libavcodec/aaccoder_twoloop.h b/libavcodec/aaccoder_twoloop.h
index e53257fbaa..5e64d48024 100644
--- a/libavcodec/aaccoder_twoloop.h
+++ b/libavcodec/aaccoder_twoloop.h
@@ -693,6 +693,9 @@ static void search_for_quantizers_twoloop(AVCodecContext *avctx,
                 if (prev != -1) {
                     int sfdiff = sce->sf_idx[w*16+g] - prev + SCALE_DIFF_ZERO;
                     av_assert1(sfdiff >= 0 && sfdiff <= 2*SCALE_MAX_DIFF);
+                } else if (sce->zeroes[0]) {
+                    /** Set global gain to something useful */
+                    sce->sf_idx[0] = sce->sf_idx[w*16+g];
                 }
                 prev = sce->sf_idx[w*16+g];
             }