Turntables & vinyl: just a fashion thing or a sincere appreciation for the sound?

In my experience - a lot of people around my age and younger have built up sizable collections of vinyl due to their interest in dance music during the late eighties and nineties. As such it seems obvious many of them would likely remain interested in the medium as their musical tastes expand beyond House, Techno, Trance, Hip-Hop, etc. Also as these type of folks increase their income it seems natural they might consider spending more cash on a TT.

I think once you have committed a certain amount of time, effort and cash into a medium it seems natural you might stick with it. For me having nearly 6000 vinyl discs causes me to remain committed to owning turntables. But I cant justify three decks so a "proper" TT is currently a low priority.

I am however quite ambivolent really. I kind of see vinyl as the natural choice for certain music and CD/SACD for others. Recently my attention has been on SACD, more recently due to this forum's evil influence I am taking CD more seriously again.

My ambivolence toward vinyl is as follows:
I love vinyl because:
- you can get lots of music that will never be released on CD/SACD/DVD-A.
- I love the vinyl sound
- I love the object that is a LP or EP.
- I love the prospect of eventually owning a serious turntable.

I dont love vinyl because:
- just as you have relaxed into a LP you have to get up to turn it over (not a problem if you are mixing EPs as you are always on your feet).
- 5000+ discs take up a hell of a lot of storage and are a nightmare when moving house.
- Vinyl discs are troublesome to keep clean.

I am still in two minds which medium to choose when buying certain music. Whilst you can pick up cheap vinyl you can pick up loads of cheap CDs these days via eBay and others. The choice is no easier now and I think I will remain multi-Media. Obviously this makes hi-fi an issue due to the expense of building a two or three source system.

 

Beautifully articulated. I must say for me there is nothing like visiting a specialist record shop, two or three hours listening and chatting and coming away with a bag of treasure. I would often leave the bag undisturbed for a couple of days before going back through the contents just to extend the anticipation.

 

Hi,

Vinyl is something that, I hope, won't go away.

I have been buying records since the mid 70s & listening to vinyl since I was was born, so it's a hard habit to break. One of the attractions to me has been the size of the records. It looked like you got more for your money. When I first started to buy records it was an event. I had to save up a bit of pocket money to get them. I still remember the buying my first record. Showaddywaddy 'Sweet Sweet Music' on 7" single on the Bell label. I still have it & it still plays very well.

I've always enjoyed, when I was a kid & teenager, going round the record shops looking at the album sleeves. I would read the sleeve notes & wonder what the albums would sound like. I would buy when I could afford it. I would rush home with my purchase and saviour the moment of taking it out of the sleeve & popping the record on the record player. It all added to the enjoyment of the music.

There are various reasons why there is still interest in vinyl. Here are some of my thoughts.

The rise of dance music did help in the 90s. As De La Soul said, 'everyone wants to become a DJ.' This rise of culture lead to dance events springing up everywhere. The 12" was king. Technics SL1200/1210s ruled. For a time, they out sold guitars. A lot of people jumped on this bandwagon. The DJ was the new rock star. Being a DJ since 1989, I have had a high status with some people. In the 80s & early 90s, the dance scene went for being fairly underground to very much overground & mass market. Dance music was everywhere & so were 12" mixes. As vinyl albums were in decline, 12" single sales were rising. Certain songs and mixes were only avaliable on 12" single.
Dance music & 12" single sales have declined in the last few years but the seeds were already sown for a vinyl buying culture.


Another area for the rise of vinyl has been the rise in Hip Hop & turntablism. From the early days, hip hop rap crews consisted of MCs & a DJ. The Dj would play the tunes for the MCs to rap over. The DJ skills soon increased & it became a art form. The rise of hip hop meant that anyone who could 'cut' & 'scratch' was king. This rise lead to people buying 12" & 7" singles just to hear the latest tunes or to find the samples that were used. Soon people also had a go thenselves. The rise in Hip Hop meant that labels sprang up releasing new & old tunes to meet the demand. This lead to hip hop crossing over to the mainstream & influencing pop & rock culture.

The interest in Dance & Hip Hop has lead to big interest in Vinyl & big sales of decks like the Technics.


Another reason for vinyl being around is that there are loads of people who still own records. A lot of these people have not bought a record in years but won't sell their collections. They still want to play them. Some only every now & again, some quite often. Due to this, there is a need for new record players to replace old ones that wear out. Sales of decks like Project Debut have been excellent. Sales of Rega 2 & 3 are good. The demand of quality cheap decks has lead to a good 2nd hand market & companies like Rega & Goldring bringing out sub £200 decks. This also can lead to sales of more expensive decks.

The fact that there are many millions of pieces of vinyl in the world has help the rise & interest of vinyl. This means you can pick up music on the cheap. Due to people having a big interest in music, the various collector scenes have kept the interest strong. For example prices for rare Northern Soul & Funk vinyl can be massive.

A lot of young people who haven't grown up with vinyl have become interested in it form a retro angle. They find that a record deck can be had for little money & 2nd hand records can be cheap. This has lead to a demand in new 7" vinyl. This demand has lead to a good collecting scene for 7" singles. A number of artists have released singles to boost their sales. Sales have risen yet again for 7" singles. This interest has lead to elements of the young market buying albums on vinyl.

There has been a fair bit of media coverage with regards the death & rise of vinyl over the last 20 years. This has help to keep it in the public interest. This has lead to people going to see what the fuss is all about. Some of these people end up buying vinyl & record players.


There are a number of people who have always prefered vinyl & bought it new & old. Some of these people have spent money on record decks to get a better preformance. For a number of people, both hifi & non hifi buffs, the sound quality is the key.

Nowadays, a lot of albums are released on vinyl so choice is still good. The downside is the price of new stuff can be high.

I have always found that you can get top notch sound quality from vinyl & you can pick up loads of stuff. This has given me plenty of entertainment & enjoyment. I love the stuff. I have loads of records. It's great buying them.

I see no reason to stop.

SCIDB

 

Chaps,

Lot's of excellent comments there and like Uncle Ants, I've never bought into the "vinyl is superior to CD" trail of thoughts. What I know however, is that there are certain older analogue recordings e.g. jazz and acoustic/vocals (especially females) that just don't sound right on a lot of CD players. That was my reason for buying a TT in the first place as it was the medium that could get me the closest to the live jazz perfomances and which I love so much and regularly attend.

One LP I use to demonstrate my point is the original 1959 recording of Live At The Carnegie Hall (Harry Belafonte). I have listened to the modern CD versions several times on several good CD players but I never got the feel of the live event. Play the LP which is now 45 years old (given to me by my neighbour) and one is placed amongst the audience and Harry's voice gains a certain liquidity that I have not heard on many CD players. The modern Classic Records pressing is said to be a sonic improvement on the 1959 original but at EUR 60.00 a pop, I'll pass on that one. So for me, TTs are not a fashion thing but fulfil the needs of the music lover in me. Having said that, I do use a Michell deck so it could be argued by some that I bought the deck for it's looks not it's sound but who cares especially when the music sounds so good.



Enjoy the music,

Lawrie.

 

My guess, apart from those that never left vinyl cause they dont like to change...

Most people like to be different, some tune their cars, some climb mountains, some have TTs... :JPS:

I have to admit a TT does call more attention that most speakers, and defenetelly any regular CDP...

 

I started off with vinyl - I didn't actually have any choice in the matter at the time. I remember saving my pocket money, getting the bus into town and spending all of it on one album. In those days, a 12" record was almost a fifth of my entire body height... so carting it around town and home again on the bus was something that was an effort.

I also believe that certain bands, and possibly even whole musical genres, owe a large part of their popularity to vinyl record covers. They went hand in hand with presentation of a band.

When I was 12 years old, Kiss seemed like superheroes to me. I loved flashing the cover of the solo albums, Dressed To Kill, Dynasty and Destroyer around town... people could see I was into something different, something they didn't know about and probably didn't like the look of. Some record covers were plain scary to adults... and at 12 years old, that counts for an awful lot

You can't create an impact with a CD cover. Sorry, you but you can't. I re-bought most of the Kiss catalogue on CD and the covers look crap, they lose all the magic, completely. You bend or rip a CD cover and put it back in the jewel case, it just looks like a worthless, ruined CD. You pick up a bent, cracked and worn vinyl album cover from 20 years ago and it's like your favourite and most comfortable pair of jeans, or boots - it just works better when it's had the 'newness' knocked out of it.

I also recall trips to London to 'Shades' near Picadilly Circus. Me and my mates would trawl all the latest US rock imports and want to be the first, if not the only, person to own them back in our hometown. Since CD and the Internet arrived, anyone can buy anything, from anywhere, from their armchair - there's no effort necesssary and by definition that devalues the experience.

Track listings were also a minor art form with vinyl. As a distinct work of two parts, the psychology of putting the album together was different. You also had a defined 'break time', a good album would inspire you to wait til the end of side one before taking a pee, rather than hitting 'stop' at any point on a remote control when you felt the urge.

I bought into CD though, in a big way. Still kept the vinyl though.

This thread interests me because, for the first time in about 15 years I'm considering buying a TT. I see all those old records and the fact that the likes of Pro-ject are offering me a chance to replay them to a respectable level for less than £200 notes and just think 'I've got every other item of equipment going, why the hell don't I shell out for one of those?'

In fact, by the end of this week, I think I damn well will do - 80s obscure US rock bands, I look forward to reacquainting myself with you

And y'know what? I don't much care how it sounds, I just wanna hear the tunes again. So, for me at least, it's partly the nostalgia, partly the sound (or more correctly, the music itself) and also the availability of inexpensive, easy to use equipment that (hopefully) performs to an acceptable level.

 

I remember having to hide my copies of Never mind the bollocks, Anarchy and God save the Queen under the carpet under my bed so my mum wouldn't find them and throw them out…

Tony.

 

What CD player did you buy??? I've got a 1985 Technics SL-P2 that doesn't actually sound that bad, and a 1988 Toshiba that is bass-shy but does trance OK (both freebies). But I digress...

In the early 80s, I only had tape; my parents' record "deck" (more like DESTROYER!) was a POS of the worst order - with probably the original 1960s stylus! So I had about 4 pre-recorded cassettes until 1987 when I got my own twin tape stereo...

My first own turntable was bought on the same day as my first CD player - as part of a Sony D305 midi. I stuck on a battered Elton John live LP my mate (who had sadly died of a heart attack the year before, so I'd kept the record even though it looked shafted) had given me. And was totally gobsmacked at how bloody excellent it sounded! Dynamics, life and energy; compared to the Doors' Light my fire CD single (itself not bad) and Buddy theatre soundtrack (saw the show, got given the CD as part of the same birthday present!) it was no contest.

I have to admit, I only bought new vinyl at the time to save money when I'd spent too much down the pub, so I have gems like Charley by the Prodigy, Love your money by Daisy Chainsaw, and, err, dIRE sTRAITS' On every street on vinyl. However, the vinyl still sounded better than the CD player - especially since the CD was so crap it had to spend 5 months of the first 12 on the repair bench!

When I got into seperates, I bought a £40 Goodmans from Richer as a stopgap, which sounded roughly equivalent to the Pioneer PDS703 I had at the time for CD. When I upgraded to a Rega 3 in 1998, I never looked back.

Here's the thing - my Rega 3, new motor upgrade, Flutter Buster and Ortofon 540 all in has cost me £470 all in over 5 years. My new Naim CD5 (now running in well) cost £1195, and is still bested almost all the time by the turntable.

Things like Astral Projection, the Loved Up soundtrack, and even dIRE sTRAITS, sound far superior on the Rega. I can live with crackles and pops.

However - I agree with Ilockyer here - in 2003/4, it's frankly very depressing when White Stripes' Elephant sounds easily 50% better on vinyl than CD - something's rotten in Denmark!

I did a test on a non-audiophool female mate when in college (a year after I got the midi system). We stuck on Duran Duran's Rio (the track) on vinyl and CD, synched them up, and I asked her which one made her want to dance more - yep, the vinyl; the drums sounded so much more real - the drummer wasn't on a comedown like on the CD version....

The sleeves, tactileness and ritual are all part of the fun. Plus if you stick your sleeve up against the rack while the record plays - hey presto - instant art!

As Pearl Jam say in the sleeve for Vitalogy (which came out on vinyl 4 days before the CD, so I bought both!):
"A CD is like bad acid - not for sale or consumption
Viva la vinyl"

Nuff said.

PS - I agree re the dance phenomenon - without that, vinyl would have been killed whether Joe Public wanted it dead or not. I hope MP3 goes the same way as cassette...

 

I just love the entire vynil culture, the fact you can get dirt cheap records, the fact the records feel special to hold. I have written about my passion for vinyl here.

http://www.robertson-i.co.uk/articleselect.asp?id=m4

 

Dom
it was some pioneer thing with a 6 disc cartridge
god awful thin sound, but my mate still uses it

 

I have a theroy about the resurgence of vinyl.

When a piece of vinyl is sold in the shop, the manfuacturer of that vinyl can resonably be assured that it won't be copied, put on the web and distributed to millions of people for free.

New vinyl in general costs a fair bit more than CD, this may be becuase of the lack of pressing facilities, but also I feel to reep back a bit of money from copying. After all its not just small independents selling vinyl, and it seems to me those doing well (warp, ninja etc) sell at least 50% of their cataluoge on vinyl.

A fair a mount to be learned there.

For me the vinyl medium simply sounds better than CD, I have the fortune of borrowing an Aro for a few weeks, and frankly I can't see how i'll every listen seriously to CD again.

 

Aro

Naim's finest product, among many.

Spot on, Gary. CD is perfectly acceptable, until you put a record on. I often have CD-only nights because once vinyl breaks the spell, then there's no going back until tomorrow.

 

Re: Aro

couldnt of put it better..............

 

I am sitting here with a brand new copy of quantics album on vinyl playing on my headphones... bliss...

Lifted this from simply vinyl

One of the many fascinating aspects of Simply Vinyl is that we are reviving a part of the music industry which has been willfully neglected and run down over the last ten years. Namely, the manufacturing of real vinyl records.

Since the dawn of the CD age the vinyl record manufacturing industry has been slowly eroded, regularly rationalised, severely downsized and almost killed off by the growth and convenience of those ugly little 5" blighters. Even the art of Mastering and making Laquers for full length vinyl records is slowly dying out. Everything these days seems to be based on the premise that digital technology is less stress and more efficient. One of the net results of all this is that most of the old boys that knew all about pressing and manufacturing vinyl records have either been made redundant, been sacked or just plain died. These were the guys who really knew their stuff. Things like getting the temperature right in the acid bath where they dip the metalwork or, making sure that the right amount of vinyl pellets are being poured into the mould etc, etc. Needless to say, the manufacturing of vinyl records in this day and age can be a very hit-and-miss scenario. Vinyl is not exactly a nice clean easy affair. In fact, it's a filthy, messy unseemly process and it seems nobody wants to get their hands dirty in this super clean antiseptic sterile age. Except, of course, for us here at Simply Vinyl.


Good work fellas...!

 

Hey Ju,

That sounds like a cue to me to start an interesting discussion thread over in the music area of the forum... How about it? I'd be interested in hearing some suggestions from you for obscure US rock acts from the 80's.

Gone are the days of the rock shows on Radio 1 with Tommy Vance and Alan "Fluff" Freeman. They use to throw quite a few US acts into the mix for good measure, although at the time I wasn't in the position to have a decent dispossable income to splash out and search out the records they played that I liked. Hence why I never bothered writing down the song/act names which have since been lost in the mists of time. :MILD:

 

Some people say that a CD recording of a turntable playing a record sounds exactly the same as the turntable playing the record. Has anyone tried this?

 

Wouldn't surprise me. I've heard a number of very good (and expensive) TT setups and, yes, they do sound very good but no better than good CD setups.

However, here's a technical question about vinyl: since it's now making a comeback has anyone thought about maybe throwing some post WWII technology at it? eg. is vinyl necessarily the best material out of which to make LPs? Why?

Michael.

 

Not IME, but a CD recording of vinyl can sound a lot better than some digital masters I've heard.

-- Ian

 

(Puts on polymer chemist hat).

Mike, the reasons for the use of the poly(vinyl chloride - vinyl acetate) copolymer are that it has a reasonably low melting temperature (makes moulding easy), it's very easily mouldable (so tiny variations on a stamper are faithfully copied), it's essentially unbreakable (drop an old shellac record to see what I mean) and, most importantly, it's dirt-cheap. I can think of no other polymer that fills the bill so well.

Not to say that there aren't other possibilities - for example, records could be moulded from acrylics, but that would be more expensive. It would be possible to produce a crosslinked polymeric record (where the polymer forms an infinite molecular network), but again special materials, special equipment and special techniques = more expense.

I guess the question then is, does it have to be a polymeric material (plastic) at all? Again, no, but other materials come much more expensively, not in the materials but in the processing. Low-melting alloys would be possible, but the manufacture would be expensive and the stylus wear would go up enormously.

What it comes down to is that the industry either invests in new record-making technology or it develops a new and better material to work with the existing stamper technology. Given that the latter option is the more viable, at the moment (and this may be ignorance talking), I can't see a replacement for vinyl - its many advantages outweigh its disadvantages.

 

Well, with CDRs mastered from MDs (using a Pioneer PDR609/Sony JB40, I've noticed the tracks sourced from vinyl still pace better; that's using analog recording even with CDs. Certainly, Incantation's "Chacherpaya" and GnR's "Night train" are two tracks on a comp I did one person, that pace really well, while the tracks on there from CD sound a bit flat. Mind you, the CD copy also faithfully reproduced the end-of-side wear on a Bowie track as well...