How Vinyl Got It's Groove Back

[Don Richard]

The very low and inconsistant quality of vinyl is why CD's were invented.

Very true. Vinyl is no match for CDs in terms of quality. The convenience aspects of CDs are a further advantage of that medium.

[jbsl]

I think another problem is most people just want to hear their music and are not worried about it sounding great. They just want to be able to hit play on their whatever device and have their music available anywhere they are.

That is why SACD, DVD A, and HDCD failed. People could not put it in their cd player or download it to their IPod plus they would have to replace equipment. After people made it clear they did not want to mess with SACD, DVD A, and HDCD the music industry realized that they did not have to worry about sound quality since the majority of their customers do not care about it.

Vinyl has been kept alive by the audiophiles over the last 18 years. What has changed in the last 2-3 years is there are more audiophiles and audio enthusiast that are going back to vinyl or are discovering it and of course that helps the vinyl industry.

[fini]

I think another problem is most people just want to hear their music and are not worried about it sounding great. They just want to be able to hit play on their whatever device and have their music available anywhere they are.

Hey, do you know my wife and daughters? You hit the nail on the head, jbsl. They'd be happy with music played over our old TV.

[Mallette]

The very low and inconsistant quality of vinyl is why CD's were invented.

Very true. Vinyl is no match for CDs in terms of quality. The convenience aspects of CDs are a further advantage of that medium.

Then why do I only have about three CD's, 2 of which are my own location recordings, that are comparable to my LP's? Remember, I started with the firm belief that LP's were dead about 1982 until I compared and experimented.

I still agree that IN THEORY the CD is a superior medium. In practice, they rarely meet their potential.

Dave

[darkside]

Right, and that's a result of what Harry said about the bottom line. In this microcosm of audio, our debating LPs and CDs has brought to light the problem with basically everything these days. People want to make more money (isn't greed one of the seven deadly sins?) so they skimp out on manufacturing, labor, design/engineering, QC, basically everything in many cases. Which in turn means outsourcing and crappy products. And no one does anything about it. So here we are, going back to old stuff that was made right, before money was the top priority.

[fenderbender]

Ahhhh....Money has always been the driving factor

Honesty is the best policy - when there is money in it.

Mark Twain

Goes back to the beginning of time.....single celled organisms arguing over how the slime used to ooze better!!!

[Don Richard]

I still agree that IN THEORY the CD is a superior medium. In practice, they rarely meet their potential.

Around the time that CDs were first introduced I had an opportunity to compare a CD to a record to the master tape from a group popular at he time. The CD was nearly identical to the master tape and the record approached neither.

I really did not want that to be the case because I was heavily invested in vinyl, turntables and cartridges. But reality spoke, and I chose not to ignore it.

Some appear to like the distortion and noise inherent with vinyl, preferring it to clean, dynamic, undistorted sound. To each his own.

[JJkizak]

Don Richard:

Ditto. I had an album by the "Judds", and an identical CD and A/B'd them to death and found that the drum cymbals on the record were dull and muffled compared to the CD. The lack of all noise on the CD would probably get some people being agitated and uncomfortable while desparately trying to listen for some tiny bit of noise, something I gave up after switching from vinyl to CDs. This did allow for a greater spectrum of listening for other more musical related stuff instead of rumble, wooooooow, flutter, hum, ham radio interference, floor vibration, speaker vibration, inaudible low frequency woofer excursion, pops, scratches, record surface noise, and mechanical tracking distortion due to huge velocities in the tracks that only $4000.00 cartriges could navigate.

JJK

[Mallette]

I still agree that IN THEORY the CD is a superior medium. In practice, they rarely meet their potential.

Around the time that CDs were first introduced I had an opportunity to compare a CD to a record to the master tape from a group popular at he time. The CD was nearly identical to the master tape and the record approached neither.

I really did not want that to be the case because I was heavily invested in vinyl, turntables and cartridges. But reality spoke, and I chose not to ignore it.

Some appear to like the distortion and noise inherent with vinyl, preferring it to clean, dynamic, undistorted sound. To each his own.

You need to bear in mind two things, one for sure, the other quite possibly:

1. I said that "in theory" CD was superior. The LP cannot have the dynamic range or dead silence that the CD is capable of. I have proven to my own satisfaction that a master recording transfered directly to disc without anything in the chain but a top notch DAC is comparable or better than LP. But only a bare handful of the available CD meet this standard. Making CD's is too easy so little care seems to be applied. Direct to disc or any high quality LP requires exacting and unforgiving standards to work at all, which is why I think the ratio of silk purse to sow's ear is so much better for LP's than CD's.

2. Remember that in the test you experienced the whole point was to prove the superiority of the new medium. You don't trot out a "Digital Fox" or similar to make such a comparison. It is, after all, marketing.

The fact that the majority of CD's are not satisfying experiences compared to LP's does not prove or even suggest (at least to those of us who have experimented) that LP's are the superior medium. It DOES suggest that after 100 years the engineers of LP's have mastered the medium, and that digital engineers could learn from that experience if they just tried.

JMHO

Dave

[garymd]

This did allow for a greater spectrum of listening for other more musical related stuff instead of rumble, wooooooow, flutter, hum, ham radio interference, floor vibration, speaker vibration, inaudible low frequency woofer excursion, pops, scratches, record surface noise, and mechanical tracking distortion due to huge velocities in the tracks that only $4000.00 cartriges could navigate.

That must have been some killer vinyl setup! Ham radio interference? LMAO!

[Don Richard]

2. Remember that in the test you experienced the whole point was to prove the superiority of the new medium. You don't trot out a "Digital Fox" or similar to make such a comparison. It is, after all, marketing.

The test to which I referred happened in my home on my equipment. A friend who was a concert promoter had an engineer copy the studio safety tape on to 7 1/2 ips RTR. My RTR was a Sony, turntable was a modded AR, cartridge was a Dynavector MC. I even tried copying the vinyl to tape to see if that improved anything, to no avail. The best that I could do to make the vinyl approach the CD was to use a Phase Linear autocorrelator for noise reduction followed by a DBX linear compressor/expander. That made the vinyl sound quiet and more dynamic, but wierdly electronic.

Too much sonic destruction has to occur to put the dynamic range of most music onto vinyl. Someone mastering vinyl has to use compression or gain riding simply to get all of the information onto that medium. A pet peeve regarding vinyl was beginning a cut with a strong, heavy bass line, then dialing the bass down 6 dB or so as the song progressed so that a side could contain 25 minutes of music.

The quality of commercial vinyl in the late '70s and early '80s was so bad, and the hassle of playing it so great that cassette tapes were outselling records during that time. The CD didn't kill vinyl. It's own limitations did that.

[Mallette]

This did allow for a greater spectrum of listening for other more musical related stuff instead of rumble, wooooooow, flutter, hum, ham radio interference, floor vibration, speaker vibration, inaudible low frequency woofer excursion, pops, scratches, record surface noise, and mechanical tracking distortion due to huge velocities in the tracks that only $4000.00 cartriges could navigate.

That must have been some killer vinyl setup! Ham radio interference? LMAO!

I wasn't LMAO, more like scratching my head...

Pops and scratches and surface, yes, if you don't take care of your records or use DBX to restore the dynamic range. The rest of it is outside my experience. At least a scratched record PLAYS. Scratch of a piece of CD of any significant size and you get nothing...it's toast. The data is hardly 100% redundant.

Dave

[Mallette]

>The quality of commercial vinyl in the late '70s and early '80s was so bad, and the hassle of playing it so great that cassette tapes were outselling records during that time. The CD didn't kill vinyl. It's own limitations did that.

On the quality of many LP's in the 70's and 80's, agreed. Dyanwarp, recycled materials, et al. Cassettes outsold records because then as now almost nobody cared about quality and you couldn't play an LP in your car. As to the reports of LP death, they are greatly exagerated.

I cannot question what you hear and I never do that. However, my own experience differs. I find my digital transfers from LP at 24/88.2 to be functionally identical. My transfers to RR from the 70's done also with DBX and the only difference in process being the end medium also still sound great and functionally identical to the LP. Of course, some of the LP's I made them from and still have exhibit signs of wear and tear. That is why I made the tapes. Now, I've digitized the tapes to 24/88.2. Third generation, and still identical.

Downsampling I've done to CD of "Dark Side of the Moon" sounds better than the CD re-release. Makes my point (at least to myself). The commercial folks don't seem to be able to use the medium to it's best for some reason.

[fenderbender]

I also need to mention that there is a literal treasure trove of music on vinyl that has never made it CD......I'm sick to death of POP and "commercially viable" music

Especially when it comes to Jazz, only Big names get some of there stuff on CD and the older stuff that makes it, usually sounds like someone took a old record and burnt it to CD without regard to the final product. I have a CD copy of probably the best known Miles Davis "Kinda Blue" ya think someone would have put in a little effort....Sounds like a kazoo band compared to the vinyl I have.....

true if the vinyl was not taken care of it's painful to listen to.....but I'll put up with a few pops if it means that I can enjoy great performances that would otherwise be lost.

[Mallette]

I have records dating back to near 1900 not available any other way. I have delta blues, jazz, and other materials of all kinds I consider priceless. My original recording of "Rhapsody in Blue" with George at the piano and the Paul Whiteman band is by far the finest performance of that abused work ever.

Those restricted to digital deny themselves the vast majority of great recorded music. To my knowledge, there have been no Kid Orys, Bix Biederbeckes, Louis Armstrongs, Enrico Carusos, Harry James, Toscaninis,etc, etc. since 1981. I'd starve to death if I did not have all this to feast on.

Dave

[oldbuckster]

Nothing, I mean nothing, can sound like LIVE music, everything else is Re-production, Vinyl, tapes, CD's, re-production. Let's just listen to the music, and not worry what re-produces the sound best ................. Ice Cream is Ice Cream, what flavor do you like ? ........... The whole recording industry is dying a slow death, lower and lower sales every year ...............

[Mallette]

Heck, Buckster, just how do you propose to hear the aforementioned Gershwin/Whiteman performance live? Your statement is true only when live is an option. I'd certainly rather hear that recording than the Dallas Symphony's performance which I DID hear...and that was actually a fine performance based on the original score. It was not as exciting, however, as the composer himself and the Whiteman band.

Now a TIME MACHINE would be very cool indeed. Until then, we'll have to either do without the finest performers no longer with us or listen directly to their legacy, warts and all.

I can handle that.

Dave

[oldbuckster]

Music is played everywhere, even Classical ................ I'm sure your computer will guide you in the right direction. I have SPAC and Tanglewood right here within driving distance. I'm sure most people aren't near as knowledgable about music as you are ......... my point was, we spend too much time discussing what form of media re-produces music the best, instead of listening to said media. To me, Arthur Fiedler was the best conductor of the Boston Pop's, saw him live, but of course is no longer with us, and the only way to hear him now is through re-production. Your view is correct, warts and all .....

[garymd]

Music is played everywhere, even Classical ................ I'm sure your computer will guide you in the right direction. I have SPAC and Tanglewood right here within driving distance. I'm sure most people aren't near as knowledgable about music as you are ......... my point was, we spend too much time discussing what form of media re-produces music the best, instead of listening to said media. To me, Arthur Fiedler was the best conductor of the Boston Pop's, saw him live, but of course is no longer with us, and the only way to hear him now is through re-production. Your view is correct, warts and all .....

OB,

Isn't that part of why we're all here? Most of us are on this forum because we're audio-geeks who care about sound quality. There certainly are better music forums than this if that's all you wish to discuss.

[oldenough]

Just a little story about our b-b-q for the kids this week-end. We hosted a party for our two boys, and any of their friends they wanted to bring. All of the kids were in there early twenties. Told them to just bring their own beverages and music.... no problem with the beverages...but no music! one kid had a couple of Cd's hanging from his rear view mirror...Will Smith and P. Diddy, So long story short and two forty foot runs of speaker cables later the kg4's are out of storage... on the deck... and were rocking. Well the best I can do for B-B-Q sunny day music is Jimmy Buffet...mixes real well with Corona and lime. We move on to some Dylan, Beatles, Stones etc. After a while one of the friends asks me "you got any Floyd"..sure do c'mon in and pick what you want. This guy's face was really something to see when he claps his eyes on the racks of 4000 Lp's. I swear to you he had never even seen a record. We spend the next thirty minutes going thru albums and chatting and he simply can't believe he is listening to this archaic medium. He truly was enjoying the experience as was I. In fact no-one outside except my wife and our boys knew that we were playing records, but then thats certainly nothing new, thats 90% of our listening. The best part of it for me...the young man leaves with an old Dual t/t, a luxman receiver, a pair of mission bookshelf speakers (on loan) and a couple of boxes of my doubles albums that were going to Goodwill and a BIG smile on his face. You know what? I think this is some-one I'm going to be seeing a lot of.[] I just hope he dos'nt become an audiofool and just enjoys the music.