Vinyl is Back With a Vengeance

[Johnny Vinyl]

Originally Posted by Riff Magnum

CRYSTAL!!!
I think you bring up a really good point about vinyl "forcing" you to listen to music. When i and a select group of my friends were at our vinyl peak back in the late 90's, one of us getting a new slab of wax was an event in itself. Phone calls would be made, beer would be bought, illegal drugs would be procured all leading up to when we all got together in that room and sat down to listen. A listening party. What a novel idea!!

Hi Riff!

Black lights, wicked posters on the walls, some munchies, a few of the "popular" girls would eventually show up.

What a novel idea indeed! If the download crowd could ever figure out a way to spin MP3's, they may develop a passion for what music can provide if you really, really listen!

John

[joe1515]

Originally Posted by John72953

Hi Riff!

What a novel idea indeed! If the download crowd could ever figure out a way to spin MP3's, they may develop a passion for what music can provide if you really, really listen!

John

I agree most kids and adults for that matter do not appreciate music, they just listen to it blasting in their ears or have it on as background music.

Vinyls force you listen to music in the way the artist intended you to hear it. Each side of the vinyl has it's own character. I know I appreciate the music so much more now. Plus so many artist don't translate well and are boring for that matter, but when you spin their vinyl it's like a light went off. It was that way for me with Otis Redding I always knew his music and liked him, but when I dropped the needle on the first song I was hooked. He had so much more soul (no pun intended)

joe

[DougMac]

Originally Posted by franklinpross

Sir, you are correct.
It's a turntables dream. Such an honest sound,,I can't begin to tell you.

Really? $20 at Goodwill? You are on God's favorite list. Boy are you a lucky person. that's my TT. This is good news indeed.

Yes, it's true. I'm so used to seeing the BPC at thrifts that I originally walked past it. Then there was a spark of recognition that drew me back. I took it to the nearest wall outlet and plugged it in, it functioned perfectly.

It needed some cosmetic TLC. It had obviously been stored in a damp environment, not too bad but there was a little corrosion and pitting. Also, the cover was scratched, but thankfully not cracked. A little elbow grease cleaned everything up. Of course, it suffers from the infamous arm lift failure. For $20, I'll live with it. It now sits next to my Technics SP-15 that I use for transcribing 78's. More on that in a second.

Speaking on being on the list, I found a TEAC X1000-R reel to reel at a pawn shop. It would power up, go into FF and FR, but no play. I talked the owner down to $50, my "pig in a poke" price. I took it home, opened it up and did a little research. There was a blown transistor on the motor control board and the drive belt had melted, a common fate. TEAC still sells parts. It was $11 for the belt and $3.50 for the transistor. I'm thinking the failure must have been early, because there was hardly any head wear and cosmetically it was in pristine shape. Oh, there was a scratch on one of the knobs, but another call to TEAC and $6.00 later I had a replacement! So, for less than $75 invested, I have a beautiful and fully functioning TOTL reel to reel!

My last story (sorry) goes back to 78's. I was in an antiques store in Arkansas that I had hesitated entering because they seemed overpriced. I found a table with a stack of 50-60 78's. I was disappointed because the first 5 or so was typical 40's records (Bing Crosby, etc.), all of which I already owned. The sixth record, though was an old pre-war blues record by Ida Cox on the Paramount label. Everything from there down was pre-war blues and jazz, all in great condition! While trying not to hyperventilate, I casually strolled up to the counter and asked the grizzled old man how much they wanted for 78's. He said: "Them black label records are 75 cents, but the blue labels and others are $1.00." I grabbed the entire stack and plunked down the $50 in cash. In the stack was a Black Swan, a very rare label. There was also Blind Lemon Jefferson's "Black Snake Moan".

[ZoetMB]

While I would love vinyl to be "back with a vengeance", since I have a few hundred vinyl albums that I would like to sell (I intend to keep 100), that is most certainly not the case and it's also not the case that vinyl generally sounds better than CD, although I will admit that this perception of quality is subjective.

Vinyl can sound better than CD if you're playing vinyl back on some esoteric system and the vinyl was mastered brilliantly and the CD was mastered poorly, but IMO, that's an unfair comparison. Of course a $5000 turntable and preamp might sound better than a $300 CD player and of course if someone blew the CD mastering or if the original tapes are no longer available (due to tape shredding, say) the CD will sound bad. But generally, any new vinyl that is produced is remastered from the CD source master anyway.

The reality is that in 2008, vinyl album units were 6/10 of 1% of long-form unit sales. It's literally a rounding error. And if you count 10 digital single downloads as the equivalent of an album as the industry does, than the vinyl numbers are even lower. 2009 figures aren't available yet, but even if they double, it's still NOTHING.

The reason why people think vinyl sounds better is because they remember the emotions they felt when they first listened to albums on vinyl. Every time I hear a CD that I think sucks and I think, "this sounded better on vinyl" and I go back to the vinyl, the vinyl sounds worse, many times remarkably worse. Those of us who are old enough to have been around for vinyl also listened to vinyl with better hearing. And that's what we remember.

I copy vinyl to CD-R for a New York City radio personality and if I happen to have the same album on CD and if there's room on the CD-R, I'll also transfer some of the tracks from the CD. They always sound better and it's not only because they're frequently recorded hotter. They have far less distortion, if stereo, they have better separation, they have far lower noise and they have better dynamic range. In an A-B comparison, no one would pick the vinyl.

As for Otis Redding, the Rhino CD boxed set mastered by Bill Inglot ("Otis: The Definitive Otis Redding") sounds really terrific, far better than any of the Otis Redding vinyl albums that I own. This set is out of print, so grab it now if you can still find a copy.

Well before the advent of CD, audiophiles complained like hell about the poor quality of vinyl pressings in the U.S. That was one of the reasons collectors started seeking Japanese and European pressings of Beatles recordings, not just because of the different track configurations. So it really makes me laugh that so-called audiophiles are now seeking those very same bad pressings.

Having said that, are most CDs recorded with too much level compression and loss of dynamic range? Absolutely. But most LPs didn't have a lot of dynamic range either.

Now if we're talking about 45RPM singles, that's something else. 45RPM singles in the U.S. had a distinct sound to them because they were generally mastered incredibly hot, but that distinct sound is largely distortion. (When I was a kid, I always wondered why the records sounded so much better during the fade-out. It was because there was lower distortion at lower levels.) We happen to like that distortion because it's harmonic distortion that creates square waves, and we like the sound of odd-harmonic square waves (like a fuzz guitar) because we find it "pleasing". One of the reasons the Rolling Stones came to the U.S. to record at Chess Records was to try and get that sound. Engineers in the UK, especially at EMI, would never "pin the needle" or aim for tape saturation, but engineers in the US used tape saturation as a creative device. But even in the case of 45s, when mastered properly to CD, single mixes sound pretty good. Bill Inglot was also responsible for the first Motown boxed set and those sound very close to the original singles. Unless you have near-virgin copies of the original singles, they won't sound better.

(For an example of a great sounding single that wasn't recorded too hot, listen to Dion's "Runaround Sue". It still sounds great today.)


As for the way we listened to vinyl, I agree that we listened "closer" and that albums were designed to provide two "arcs" of music: side A and side B. That might not be true for the way CDs are produced today, but that has nothing to do with the technical quality. Don't confuse the quality of the music or production with the quality of the technology.

Disclaimer: I have not yet listened to any of the new 180-gram vinyl that you now see in record stores for absurd prices. One of these days I will pick up one, but I don't expect to be impressed. Perhaps I'll be pleasantly surprised.

[richteer]

Originally Posted by ZoetMB

The reason why people think vinyl sounds better is because they remember the emotions they felt when they first listened to albums on vinyl. Every time I hear a CD that I think sucks and I think, "this sounded better on vinyl" and I go back to the vinyl, the vinyl sounds worse, many times remarkably worse. Those of us who are old enough to have been around for vinyl also listened to vinyl with better hearing. And that's what we remember.

No, the reason why people think that vinyl sounds better is because it does. Not a universal truth, to be sure, but pretty accurate.

Well before the advent of CD, audiophiles complained like hell about the poor quality of vinyl pressings in the U.S. That was one of the reasons collectors started seeking Japanese and European pressings of Beatles recordings, not just because of the different track configurations. So it really makes me laugh that so-called audiophiles are now seeking those very same bad pressings.

Eh? Dynaflex was a scourge, to be sure, but there aren't many audiophiles seeking them out.

Disclaimer: I have not yet listened to any of the new 180-gram vinyl that you now see in record stores for absurd prices. One of these days I will pick up one, but I don't expect to be impressed.

What record-playing gear do you use? It'd have to be pretty, umm, non-optimal, for the 180g records not to sound good.

[DougMac]

Originally Posted by richteer

What record-playing gear do you use? It'd have to be pretty, umm, non-optimal, for the 180g records not to sound good.

Great post ZoetMB. Let's define "non-optimal". Is it a POS vintage rim drive auto changer BIC? Is it a Technics SL-1200 with a cart that costs less than $200? Is it the budget range of the popular esoteric TT's like Linn, Sota, VPI, etc.? Is it anything costing less than $20k?

When does playing vinyl become a fetish?

I love playing vinyl. At well over 2,000 LPs, 3,000 78s and over 1,000 45's I have far more records than CD's. I clean them with a record cleaning machine and play them on my two Technics DD turntables, both well regarded and one, the SP-15, considered a professional turntable. I connect them to a vintage NAD pre-amp that has a legendary phono pre-amp stage. I have some well recorded and mastered LP's that truly sound remarkable. Generally speaking, though, the average LP hardly ever sounds as good as, and almost never better than the average CD.

You can argue that I'm constrained by my modest playback chain and I'll be the first to admit I might be able to get a better sound by investing in some substantially more expensive equipment, but I just can't afford to go OCD on vinyl playback. I'm talking about more than money. I'm more interested in sitting down and listening to the music instead of spending as much, if not more time futzing around with the equipment and the preparation.

Let's consider "the great unwashed". While I think there may have been more hi-fi enthusiasts in the past, they still made up a very small percentage of the general listening public. Most folks listened to vinyl on a portable player or one of those console monstrosities made by Zenith or RCA. I knew very few families when I was growing up that had a component system like we did and it took me a while to realize we were the odd man out. The average man's modern counterpart is listening to a far better quality audio now with their CD's or even (gasp!) MP3's than those who played records.

Finally, since we're on a more Home Theater oriented site, I'll mention the sound from blu-rays. Nothing in my youth of the '50's and '60's comes anywher close to the sound quality available on blu-ray and even DVD's. I've watched a fair number of concerts, both rock and classical, and I'm astounded how good they sound on my mid line Home Theater setup.

For someone who enjoys music of all types, this is a great time. I'll listen to my 78's, 45's, LP's, CD's, SACD's, DVD Audio, DVD's, Blu-Rays and even MP3's and thoroughly enjoy myself. I won't look down my nose at any format and won't spend inordinate amounts of time defending one over the other. I've got to run, there's a song that needs to be heard.

[richteer]

Originally Posted by DougMac

Great post ZoetMB. Let's define "non-optimal". Is it a POS vintage rim drive auto changer BIC? Is it a Technics SL-1200 with a cart that costs less than $200? Is it the budget range of the popular esoteric TT's like Linn, Sota, VPI, etc.? Is it anything costing less than $20k?

When does playing vinyl become a fetish?

I love playing vinyl. At well over 2,000 LPs, 3,000 78s and over 1,000 45's I have far more records than CD's. I clean them with a record cleaning machine and play them on my two Technics DD turntables, both well regarded and one, the SP-15, considered a professional turntable. I connect them to a vintage NAD pre-amp that has a legendary phono pre-amp stage. I have some well recorded and mastered LP's that truly sound remarkable. Generally speaking, though, the average LP hardly ever sounds as good as, and almost never better than the average CD.

You can argue that I'm constrained by my modest playback chain and I'll be the first to admit I might be able to get a better sound by investing in some substantially more expensive equipment, but I just can't afford to go OCD on vinyl playback. I'm talking about more than money. I'm more interested in sitting down and listening to the music instead of spending as much, if not more time futzing around with the equipment and the preparation.

I'd argue that one can get a very satisfactory result from a TT front end by spending, say, $1000 to $2000 for a new TT/arm/cartridge/phono stage, with better results as the budget grows. Obviously, people like me have taken it quite a bit further...! :-)

And I'm with you when it comes to sitting down and listening. I'm not sure of this futzing around to which you refer. Remove record carefully from sleeve, give it a quick clean with a carbon fibre brush, clean stylus, play record. It almost takes longer to type that than do it!

[Al Bundy]

I love vinyl. I wish I had the funds to have a decent collection.

[richteer]

Originally Posted by Timhortons

I love vinyl. I wish I had the funds to have a decent collection.

One record at a time. Even those of us with fairly sizable collections only had a few in the beginnning...

[DougMac]

Originally Posted by Timhortons

I love vinyl. I wish I had the funds to have a decent collection.

I started buying records over 50 years ago, when I was five. I still have those 45's. When I started buying albums when I was eight or so, I'd have to save up my allowance for a month. Santa and birthdays helped augment the collection.

If you have more time and patience than money, start hitting the thrifts and garage sales. Tell friends about your hobby. I've had several nice collections given to me because they knew they'd be taken care of and appreciated.

I work near two thrifts and once a week I stop by to see what they've got. This is where you need patience if you're into rock because good rock records are few and far between. I did pick up a pristine copy of Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here" for 50 cents last month.

Richteer mentioned me talking about futzing. It really isn't needed, but there's another forum I frequent and they're constantly playing with overhang, VTA, tracking weight, azimuth, anti skate, etc. I'm not downplaying the need to set up the turntable properly, there are just some who constantly fiddle with settings trying to improve the sound. Of course, there's nothing wrong with that if it floats your boat, it's just my interests lie elsewhere.

[franklinpross]

Originally Posted by John72953

Hi Riff!

Black lights, wicked posters on the walls, some munchies, a few of the "popular" girls would eventually show up.

What a novel idea indeed! If the download crowd could ever figure out a way to spin MP3's, they may develop a passion for what music can provide if you really, really listen!

John

This is all so awesome. I listened to a disc the other day.. and I was totally
shocked how quickly 24 minutes went by. Suddenly, the music(which was quite blasting) stopped and the room was in a dead silence. I freaked out.
OH SHOOT!!! something broke or a speaker went out. Noooooooooooo.
Not at all. All that happened was that I needed a side change. OMG. Just like the old days. The days of yore. The really really good ole days.

John: I'm flabbergasted to admit that I beat you by nine years. (ouch!!)

[franklinpross]

Originally Posted by DougMac

Yes, it's true. I'm so used to seeing the BPC at thrifts that I originally walked past it. Then there was a spark of recognition that drew me back. I took it to the nearest wall outlet and plugged it in, it functioned perfectly.

It needed some cosmetic TLC. It had obviously been stored in a damp environment, not too bad but there was a little corrosion and pitting. Also, the cover was scratched, but thankfully not cracked. A little elbow grease cleaned everything up. Of course, it suffers from the infamous arm lift failure. For $20, I'll live with it. It now sits next to my Technics SP-15 that I use for transcribing 78's. More on that in a second.

Speaking on being on the list, I found a TEAC X1000-R reel to reel at a pawn shop. It would power up, go into FF and FR, but no play. I talked the owner down to $50, my "pig in a poke" price. I took it home, opened it up and did a little research. There was a blown transistor on the motor control board and the drive belt had melted, a common fate. TEAC still sells parts. It was $11 for the belt and $3.50 for the transistor. I'm thinking the failure must have been early, because there was hardly any head wear and cosmetically it was in pristine shape. Oh, there was a scratch on one of the knobs, but another call to TEAC and $6.00 later I had a replacement! So, for less than $75 invested, I have a beautiful and fully functioning TOTL reel to reel!

My last story (sorry) goes back to 78's. I was in an antiques store in Arkansas that I had hesitated entering because they seemed overpriced. I found a table with a stack of 50-60 78's. I was disappointed because the first 5 or so was typical 40's records (Bing Crosby, etc.), all of which I already owned. The sixth record, though was an old pre-war blues record by Ida Cox on the Paramount label. Everything from there down was pre-war blues and jazz, all in great condition! While trying not to hyperventilate, I casually strolled up to the counter and asked the grizzled old man how much they wanted for 78's. He said: "Them black label records are 75 cents, but the blue labels and others are $1.00." I grabbed the entire stack and plunked down the $50 in cash. In the stack was a Black Swan, a very rare label. There was also Blind Lemon Jefferson's "Black Snake Moan".

GOD'S FAVORITE INDEED!!!!! nice score

[franklinpross]

Having said that, are most CDs recorded with too much level compression and loss of dynamic range? Absolutely. But most LPs didn't have a lot of dynamic range either.
by ZoetMB

Nice, informative piece. There were a lot of Lp's that sounded awesome.
One comes to mind I just listened to again. It was a GEM produced by The Hit Man, David Foster. Come to think of it his work as well as Phil Ramone's were quite outstanding. The LP was Peter Allen's BICOASTAL. The dynamic range
and prescence and all of that were right on the money. Columbia Masterworks
Original Casts recorded at 30 IPS were also unusually splendid. RCA RED LABEL
Classical Lp's still are terrific. One comes to mind. The Gershwin set with
the POPS. It beats the CD by a mile. And also...my hearing today is just a sharp as it was 45 years ago (thank God).The original copy I bought in 1959 of GYPSY in mono destroys the 24bit re-mastered
one done by Sony a few years ago . ...Goddard was good.

[franklinpross]

Originally Posted by Timhortons

I love vinyl. I wish I had the funds to have a decent collection.

I'm so proud I held onto all 3,000 of 'em.

[richteer]

Originally Posted by franklinpross

I'm so proud I held onto all 3,000 of 'em.

Wow, that's about twice as many as me! Being unemployed for most of the last decade kinda put the kibosh on most of my record purchases, alas...

[Johnny Vinyl]

Originally Posted by franklinpross

This is all so awesome. I listened to a disc the other day.. and I was totally
shocked how quickly 24 minutes went by. Suddenly, the music(which was quite blasting) stopped and the room was in a dead silence. I freaked out.
OH SHOOT!!! something broke or a speaker went out. Noooooooooooo.
Not at all. All that happened was that I needed a side change. OMG. Just like the old days. The days of yore. The really really good ole days.

John: I'm flabbergasted to admit that I beat you by nine years. (ouch!!)

John

[ZoetMB]

Originally Posted by DougMac

Great post ZoetMB. Let's define "non-optimal". Is it a POS vintage rim drive auto changer BIC? Is it a Technics SL-1200 with a cart that costs less than $200? Is it the budget range of the popular esoteric TT's like Linn, Sota, VPI, etc.? Is it anything costing less than $20k?

When does playing vinyl become a fetish?

$20K? Frankly, I think that would be insane. The high-end turntables that I see are certainly beautiful examples of craftsmanship, but let's get real: what is the practical function of a turntable in terms of reproducing sound?

The function of a home turntable is to spin the record at a consistent and accurate speed without generating vibration into the tonearm. You don't have to spend the price of a car to do that. Some people think only a belt driven turntable can do that, but I don't sense any vibration from the quartz motor and direct drive of this turntable. This turntable replaced a belt-driven AR Turntable some decades ago - I couldn't stand the lack of torgue.

Anything else is smoke and mirrors, in my subjective opinion. (I'm an ex-recording engineer, just for the record.)

As for the tonearm, the purpose is to put the cartridge in a position so that it can track accurately and not negatively influence the tracking, aside from providing the proper weight, and aside from anti-skating. And also to avoid microphonics and hum.

Having said that, I could be somewhat convinced if I heard a system that sounds "better" and I will admit to not having heard an ultra high-end reference system in quite some time.

I am using a Kenwood turntable (Yes, I know Kenwood was not known for turntables, but this particular turntable attracted my attention because it had a very heavy artifical marble-like base) with a Stanton 681EEE cartridge into an Apt-Holman preamp (with Crown power amps and DCM Time Window speakers.) I am actually looking to replace the Apt, Crown and speakers with a new system, but so far, I haven't actually heard anything that sounds better in a reasonably priced system. (That's another topic.)

I'm not interested in getting into a subectivist vs. objectivist argument. If you (universal "you") have the cash and are happy spending $10K or more on a turntable, arm, cartridge, preamp and stand, more power to you. Or if you think that $800 cables make a difference, great. At least it helps the economy. But let's not make the assumption that money necessarily buys better sound. It only necessarily buys aesthetics, style, uniqueness and pride of ownership.