The Vinyl Revival - So wrong on so many levels
The vinyl revival - So vinyl is becoming popular again. But what about the scratches? The surface noise? The distortion? The rumble? The mistracking? The list of reasons not to listen to vinyl goes on and on. Like a broken record.
Comments
Here's a great comment from YouTube from viewer Rob Parsons, unedited and verbatim. Thanks Rob...
"I've been playing (keyboard/Synth) and listening to music since the late 1950's onwards, I worked in the record industry, Warner Bros and others, I did every job in the industry except cut and press vinyl, I also ran a string of record shops and lastly I recorded on a private independent label and with IC records in Germany. I am also a qualified Network Engineer, Cisco Instructor, Microsoft Instructor, Computing Instructor, I have also done programming, Machine code, Basic, Cobol, C+, C++ and some others I can't recall. So I think it is fair to say I have a reasonable understanding of Music/Recording/Digital Computing/Music Industry.
Digital sounded great to me, at first, as my use and experience grew however I've concluded that the sound digital recordings produce is in fact inferior to analogue.
When you digitise an analogue signal it changes at a fundamental level, so much so that I hear them as totally different sounding pieces, the most obvious place this is noticeable is in the studio recording process.
When you record an analogue sound digitally the first thing that happens is large information loss during conversion to a binary imitation of the original sound. If you wish to slow down a recording of a particular individual track (say slow down a string section) to obtain an effect, once you get past a slow down of 2 or 3 whole notes digital fails, this is because it is an imitation of the original with large amounts of original information missing, this totally changes the sound, in analogue it's just the same sound slower (or faster if your are speeding it up), in digital it is a totally different sound that has almost no relationship to the original, digital simply can't do it. This is because digital gives you a synthetic interpretation not an original copy (like tape, much closer to a full capture) of the sound.
Another place the inferior aspects of digital is noticeable is in synthesis (synthesisers), so not a sampled instrument but a new sound from nothing, this takes many, many times longer to produce digitally (often you give up because of time taken or it just can't do it) and the end product is 90% of the time inferior to an analogue synthesiser. This is why there is a big swing to analogue synthesisers that has seen the rebirth of MOOG and have Korg make analogue and make reproductions such as the ARP Odyssey.
When you record with analogue you capture much closer too all the sound produced (the faster the tape runs the better), with digital it takes a tiny sample point converts it to binary (so straight away you do not have an original capture but a synthetic interpretation) and then there is a gap between samples (very small but still a gap), that it does not capture the original at all, it makes up the missing information in this gap with an algorithm that tries to imitate what is missing by comparing the sample points that surround the missing/blank spot.
When I played students (15yrs-18yrs) analogue recordings of music they knew and had only heard digitally (CD) quite a few were taken aback, they said things such as, I can hear sounds in the music I never heard before or it feels more full/richer and it feels warmer.
You are caught up in the technical aspects so much that you no longer hear the music, you have trained your mind to be alert and sensitive to noise, distortion, rumble etc., etc. You no longer hear the music unless everything is stripped from it to the point of cold, clinical, artificial sound. If that's what you want that's ok but it's not what I want from music.
This clinical approach has lead to the current situation where the next generation don't listen to music at all, some have even expressed hatred for it, they cannot relate to it, this is (I believe), because it has been stripped of essential information which gives music it's connection to the deeper effects it has on the listener, it is sound stripped of it's audio emotive content.
I can't see digital being able to equal or surpass analogue until they can do at least 512bit samples but there is still the problem of it being an imitation of the original not a copy/capture of the original. This is the thoughts of 60+ years of exp.
Cheers."
Read more comments on YouTube...
More revivals...
- The cassette revival
- The vinyl revival
- The CD revival
- The cassette, vinyl, and CD revivals revisited
- The analogue tape revival part 1
- The analogue tape revival part 2
- The analogue tape revival part 3
- The analogue tape revival part 4
- The analogue tape revival part 5
Credits
- Van Der Molen clipping from Tape Recorder magazine
- Philips CD100 pic
- HMV 101 78 rpm player
- EMT 948
- Shure V15 from Shure promotional brochure
- SME 3009
- Protractor
- Garrard 401
- Neumann acceleration limiter
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David Mellor
David Mellor is CEO and Course Director of Audio Masterclass. David has designed courses in audio education and training since 1986 and is the publisher and principal writer of Adventures In Audio.
@jagmarc replies to @AudioMasterclass: I suppose that may mean then "Linear Tracking" turntables are incorrectly aligned everywhere except for at two points.
@mycosys replies to @AudioMasterclass: @jagmarc No, the point of a linear tracking arm is the tonearm is always aligned perfectly perpendicular to the groove. sadly they cost a bomb to make well and are hard to make follow the record perfectly, but just about every record lathe uses one. But it will then ofc be misaligned slightly everywhere as theres no way your hand set angle is gonna exactly match the cutting lathe lol.
@skevosmavros replies to @AudioMasterclass: Two points? You mean one point per side of the record? I think I assumed that.
Also, given that 99% of people listened to records using record players that had rotating tone arms, why weren't the mastering lathes designed to slightly rotate their cutting stylus in some standardised way so that it came close to the way home tone arms operated?
@nolaserv replies to @AudioMasterclass: Mr. Masterclass, I hope you get to read this before my post gets buried. To get right to it, do you realize what digitizing an analog signal does? First process, the signal HAS to start as analog. Then to digitize, (no matter how many times you sample it, unless you are almost back to analog, defeating the purpose) it causes detrimental losses. THEN the signal HAS to be converted BACK to analog or your system will sound something like a fax machine and will probably ruin your speakers IN WHICH MORE LOSSES are imposed. Well ok, you say the losses can be premped or reinserted digitally? That is not true audio my friend. It is a REPRESENTATION of audio or synthesization. Get the wrong number on your cell phone and you can hear what that's all about. Ok, so most people say the ADA conversions happen so fast that you don't hear them? Ok then now getting into turntable and CD comparisons. My first CD player was a present to me. An early version made by Phillips and right off the bat I could hear the difference when I connected it to the aux port of my Marantz 2270 receiver. At that point they were still selling LP's so I kept buying them until vinyl was being phased out. So I bought the top of the line Pioneer CD player with a 6 CD changer/remote and loaded them up with the same albums I was going to execute on my turntable. I compared the LP's on my Pioneer PL-516 TURNTABLE with 1.5 grams tracking, anti skate adjust as per specs recommendations, + -- pitch control strobe setting (so no drag surface noise etc.) with my top of the line Pioneer CD player, (equalizations set the same...Marantz 2270 has 3 EQ settings...Bass, Mid, Treb) cranked them both on at the same time and switched my phono and aux selector switch back and forth to hear the difference with my OWN ears. The sound level or volume was pretty much the same (didn't have a watt meter to compare the output levels but pretty sure that the inputs from the phono and the aux have to be ballpark closely match). All in all, the turntable (analog) had a much brighter sound. For some, they might like a duller type sound. Maybe it's all in the individual's preference. Now, I will have to say that some of my albums were not recorded properly and I do hear surface noise at quiet points in the recordings but honestly not for the most part. When I overdrive my amp to concert level past 70 RMS per channel (my amps specs) then yes, all kinds of noise and distortion will start falling into place. Also the 70 W RMS was into 8 ohm speakers. I had Klipsch's (4 ohms) so I had a little more efficiency. I don't know what they rate amps these days but the RMS value is (Root Mean Square or DC equivalent or continuous level). In other words, if your amp is rated at 70 watts PEAK per channel, that would be a lower rating. Take 0.707 multiplied by your peak rating will give the the RMS value. Back to LP's. Most of my albums are from the 1970's to mid to late 1980's. NONE OF THEM ARE REMASTERED..REPEAT<. If they are remastered from the original analog recording WITHOUT ANY digital implications, then your remastered vinyl is a GENUINE replication. If your vinyl is a digitally remastered recording, IT IS A FRAUD! If that is the case, go out and buy a CD and save youself some money. I will say that CD's are OK with me but I really have to compensate the equalization to make them to my liking. Also back to my albums. Some of my oldest albums that I played 100 times back in the day still sound brand new. Where as some that I hardly played, sound like dust noise no matter how much I try to clean them. I always kept my albums in the paper jackets and and sleeves. Handled them by the edges and took care of them. Yes, only a few have pops and scratches from when I was living in an apartment and my turntable was next to wall by the public stairway on the second floor. Oh well, didn't fit anywhere else lol. I'll try to end this fast why I think cassette were better for me anyway. I had a Sony home unit with 4 biases and 4 EQ's on it for recording metal tapes (the sales people sold me that just like they sold you to digital audio... OH!!! WHAT A GREAT SOUND!) that would have sounded better recorded on Scotch paper transparent tape. TINNY AS HELL! The metal bias was not worth a flying fart but the older TDK or Maxell chromium oxide blanks had an unbelievable sound reproduction. Also, you did NOT get the CrO2 with pre recorded cassette tapes. You got the cheap normal bias junk and that's why your Pink Floyd or Yes cassettes sounded like s**t. The problem was I liked to cut a few songs of many albums so I wouldn't have a thousand tapes in my car. Long story short, I never had to use any equalizations input while recording on cassettes and they never skipped on my car cassette tape player. My individual CD recordings could never be equalized properly because it would have to happen on the input through my PC on a program of my PC on each record. It does not give me a valid sound reproduction because it is digitized and going through my analog stereo system at the same time too. On a positive note, I have a program that can take out limited pops and scratches. My home Pioneer CD player at least will not skip my recordings but every car CD player did. So I want my car cassette players back! BOO HOO!! LOL!!...OK? Clear as Mud? If you would like to refute this, I'm open.
@gargantuablargg replies to @AudioMasterclass: @nolaserv Read up on sampling theory, particularly the Nyquist limit. You don't have to sample a band-limited waveform at every instant in order to reproduce it fully.
@Rick-l4w: Benny Audio Odyssey Turntable
When only the very best on the planet will do !
@alexstevenson7941: Old records have sentimental value. Why do old books have value? You can read them online for free.
@JSM1963: Giles Martin said in an interview that when The Beatles mixed their albums for vinyl, they had to bury the drums a bit, otherwise the punch could cause the needle the jump out of the groove. That's not a problem with digital.
@shadowside8433: I hate cassette tapes, and I could not wait to get rid of my Walkman. the second the Mini-Disk came out and I could afford it, I ditched the cassette taps as soon as I could. Really, I was very happy with mini-disk, much more than MP3.
@larrypittsburgh8674: Back in the day pre CD era I would setup my turntable as best I could and when I bought LPs record them on cassette and put them away until I needed them again to make a new recording (do to cassette degradation or breakage or to make a copy for a friend). Once I acquired a CD player I began to phase out the analog formats, replacing my LPs with CDs until all had been replaced. I still own a turntable and cassette deck but haven't used them in years. Vinyl is nostalgia and I did enjoy collecting when I was younger, but LPs and Cassettes don't even come close to digital audio reproduction. And over the last decade or so digital has even up the ante with even higher sampling rates and bit depths widening the fidelity gap even further.
@junkmail7263: Why do they say really good digital sounds like analog, but they never say really good analog sounds like digital?
@gooddaysahead1: The only thing I miss about vinyl is the added expense, the static noise, and the inconvenience.
@spookysickspiritsprinkler: This is highly comical. My father would literally just buy a new copy of a vinyl record he owned as soon as he'd wear out an old copy, or he'd get a scratch from an enthusiastic drinker at a party knocking into his turntable, etc.. I very much dislike vinyl if it's something I can get on any other format, but I'm a thrift shopper and it opened me up to a lot of classical music and genres I had never heard of like pacific island music, gamelan pieces from bali, Moroccan folk music, celtic harp i.e. Sìleas, Mary O’Hara, organ music and french Caribbean folk music and Japanese Shakuhachi flute pieces. I have a mix of old stuff my Dad likes- mostly Blues rock bands (not a fan outside of King Crimson). Since he doesn't listen to it anymore, I cleaned it all up and I've bought a little bit of newer stuff I've found here and there. The "hobby" is probably 10 times more expensive now than it ever was. I've bought maybe 2 brand new records ever and even then I don't think I could justify their prices now. Just in the cleaning duty alone it's pretty expensive. The maintenance between wet cleaning, vacuuming, dragging your fiber brush over is.. well absurd.
All that combined with the good hour or two you devote to leveling your turntable, aligning your cartridge with one of the three or four methods at your disposal, and making sure to set your anti-skate correctly were fun once or twice, but have become quite tedious to think about so I never move the record player anymore. Most of the 150 lps I have are.. how do you say- mixed in quality? Some records sound nearly perfect, others sound terrible and were given the boot immediately. Some masters are better than their early CD counterparts, but then again CD is less hassle to begin with. There is no cleaning out record wear and tear either. Once a groove is damaged, it stays damaged. I don't care if you spend 500 dollars on a ultrasonic cleaner- if it didn't sound good after a bath and vacuum then it's toast. The medium nowadays (if you don't want to waste your money) relies solely on that rarest of rare occasions when you manage to find stuff someone barely played (which almost always happens to be classical music or BOX SETS of classical music) which are unfortunately the worst genre that exists on the Vinyl medium. It's rather ironic really. Perhaps someday, I'll pull out my 12 LP long box set of Bach recordings to record onto my hard drive, but I'll need 48 hours to do all that.
@marcblum5348: No1 annoyment with vinyl: the degrading sound quality from the outside to the inside. With casettes you have consistent sound. Love it or hate it, but it is consistent. With CD you have consistent sound. With vinyl...not.
No2 annoyment: carrying around. They are big, not handy, and prone to damage when put some weight on it.
@pavlopaavo6144: If I were a robot listening to music only by analysing the physical waves reaching my hearing sensors, then yes, I would totally agree with you, mate. But I am a human being. Beyond analysing physical waves, listening to music brings me a wide range of emotions and sometimes fulfils my intellectual needs.
I enjoy the physical interaction with a record - being able to touch it, see the marks of its history, conveniently read the cover information, and appreciate the artwork, which, in my opinion, is an indivisible part of the work of art that is a music album on vinyl. Sometimes the artwork is even better than the record itself.
Of course, I could do all of this in the digital space, constantly googling things while listening to a digital recording in some lossless format, but it’s not my cup of tea. No digital product or medium can replace the physical interaction with books, magazines, and vinyl records for me.
I’m not chasing the dragon of perfect sound without surface noise, distortion, rumble, etc. The setup of my system and the records I listen to on it bring exactly the emotions my soul is looking for.
@AudioMasterclass replies to @pavlopaavo6144: Oddly enough, I do not disagree. If there were a comment of the week prize, you’d win. Alas, there is no prize.
@seanm729: When CDs came out in the 80s, they were a revolution. All the record stores sold all the albums in CD or vinyl versions. The CD was priced much higher than vinyl was. CDs sounded clean and perfect and they didn't degrade. Vinyl had clicks and pops while playing. And it was very easy to bump the stylus and put a scratch on your record. But another problem with vinyl is the record wears, just from being played and soon acquires a scratchy sound. This newfound enthusiasm for vinyl is a lot of revisionism. Vinyl sounded good when your records were brand new, but sounded terrible after being played a few times. No one thought vinyl was wonderful when CDs came out. CDs were a revolutionary improvement and technology when they came out. I think there's a lot of romanticism with vinyl, but not too much reality. CDs sound better. I'm sorry to say it, but if you want the best sound, stick with CDs.
@Scan_Speak: When you invite your friends over and they bring their favourite vinyl albums.
Good times.
@bab008: I long for those Edison wax cylinder days, when the sound was so pure. All down hill from there. Seriously, after 15 years of nothing but vinyl and all the defects I was glad to move on to digital especially once they refined it after a few years.
@LeicesterTemple: Modern vinyl is a sham?
Now in recording studios, recordings are made in digital format.
Then Master Record is converted to vinyl.
Then comes the phono preamp, then the amplifier.
It’s too long a process. The process should be short - moving from master copy to DSD (SACD).
@WizardClipAudio: Okay boomer. 😂 Clean your vinyl records, and use better cassette tape player mechanisms, tape cassette formulations and biases. Metal Type IV cassette tape formulations do indeed potentially have better fidelity than CD’s, provided the source recorded to it does too. Chromium Type II cassettes generally have about the same floor to signal performance as CDs. The general music consumer doesn’t really care that much, and somewhere between them and audiophile snobbery resides practical common sense. If ultra-fidelity mattered so much, music albums would be predominantly recorded at absurd bit-rates and released and distributed on SD cards, bypassing streaming services and their compression algorithms. They aren’t cause sometimes good enough for intents and purposes. Also, fidelity is just a component of the music consumer’s preferences. Aesthetics of a medium’s inherent shortcomings, nostalgia, insurability, tactile ritual, and all else play a supporting role in the consumer’s preferences. Hifi obsessed audiophiles make up less than 1% of the consumer audio market, and for this reason, mastering is conventionally done on boomboxes, Bluetooth speakers, earbuds, car audio systems, soundbars, and whatever else the general consumer is probably going to conventionally use to reproduce the audio in real world applications. If someone wants to pay you money to buy your record and play it on a shitty Crosley turntable from Walmart, and that pleases them; All is as right as rain about it.
@ChrisDavidsonDoobieWainwright: It’s like soup. In a can it’s so easy to store and heat up. Later on we had plastic tubs and you can microwave the soup in the tub. Then came the home cooking revival and people start making their own soup again. Personally, even though it’s time consuming and involves a lot of fiddling and can sometimes have unwanted lumps in, I really enjoy the good old fashioned bowl of homemade soup.
@stevenwilliams7300: I see a lot of these type of videos talking about vinyl but you don't seem to hear people talk about compact discs needing digital analog converters . When the digital information is sampled and then stored as ones and zeros it loses its spatiality. Modern digital to analog converters are Miles ahead of what was available in the 80s. They do sound good. But they're not analog :-)
@nx01craig: Boom! You nailed it. Bravo!
@AusSarcosis: After a year and a bit of upgrading, tweaking, and generally chasing down issues, I'm at the "every elliptical stylus gets inner groove distortion every few records" stage.
@rongreen4536: I hear you when CDs came out I took all my vinyl to Half Price Books. I can't tell you why but I hate digital music. I set out to rebuy my vinyl. You are of course correct in every thing you said about vinyl but it's assuming the worst case. For me this is very rare because I treat my vinyl like it's worth more than my car. If you like digital music and it's music to your ears then enjoy, it's not my cup of tea as you Brits like to say.
@francoisroberge5882: Don't need a DAC with vinyl.
@AudioMasterclass replies to @francoisroberge5882: But you need an RIAA preamp.
@philclayton3018: I don’t agree that vinyl records are noisy, as you describe - I have about 2000 LPs, most of which are perfectly clean and very quiet - the trick is antistatic sleeves and a lot of care - I love them (I do agree that if played many times then they will gradually wear…)
@mg8720-u7j: I tried to go back to Vynl, and it was a terible mistake. CD's are far superior.
@Rafy-i4v: Who cares what you think 😂
@tombodensick4437: "Plow its way through the grooves?" Take better care of your records. You're kind of sad and lonely. Do you need a friend?
@peperkes: I love vinyl because of the actions you have to take...looking down the row in the record cabinet, taking it out, going over the songs on it, taking it out of the sleeve, putting it on the record player, slowly letting down the needle onto the record, pumping up the volume, meanwhile listening to the music, reading all of the info on the inner sleeve.... And of course this guy is right when he states that digital is better...but it's about the feel you have when the music plays....we are not robots. And another thing when you play vinyl records : you listen to songs you probably never heard before, because you listen to the entire record. While streaming, I mostly listen to only those songs I want to hear and not the ones the artist recorded to 'fill' the rest of the album. Vinyl is pure and warm nostalgia, either you like it and don't care about the 'mechanical' disadvantages, or you don't and go 100%digital.
@jackbfruby: It’s always those that don’t collect vinyl records, that have an opinion, those of us who collect thousands of records are totally indifferent to what anyone outside our circle thinks.
@dedskin1: ah pro insertion and extraction , make sure its in time .
@dedskin1: darn man you did not release this on plastic fantastic , i have to listen to this on YT digital . geez
@Hellseeker1: Smashing Pumpkins?
@Andre-b6w3b: Vinyl has superior base to current CD equipment.
Ive been told that the readers just aren't capable of producing all the info on the disc...but ...the base is there....
Well...so what!? If we can't hear it.
Im still buying albums...always will.
Cds are clearly " soul less"..
@murphman76: I agree...digital (it its best forms) is a great advance and whatever faults it has, simply pale in comparison to the principles of dragging that stylus through grooves. That said, I enjoy records from time to time. Quite frankly, the most "accurate" sound is not always the most pleasing sound. That's why Seeburg jukeboxes and records have their place. Simple nostalgia is also a factor.
@jamestaylor9258: 🤷🏻♂️🤣 Listen to what you want. Spend what you want, but spend on your wallet's ability to pay for your needs first. 😂😉
@rbaxter286: There are enough problems with 'imprecision' in the digital signal stream, but adding in additional 'imprecision and artifacts' from physical media like tape and vinyl is SOMETHING WE CAN FIX!
With digital, we can also eliminate so many problems because they are quantifiable and then can be eliminated. Also, people in this technology ARE USED TO DOING UNCERTAINTY BUDGETS ON INSTRUMENTATION & CONTROL SYSTEMS, and now the recording process, from the actual source (e.g., vibrating string) to your ear, IS PART OF AN I&C PROCESS.
I'm always surprised at the excuses that people 'heavily invested in X, Y, or Z tech' can CREATE, AD HOC, TO JUSTIFY THE SUPERIORITY OF THEIR TECH IN AN ATTEMPT TO PRESERVE THE 'VALUE', PRESTIGE, AND EVEN THE CONTINUED EXISTENCE OF THEIR TECH. It resolves in some cases to merely A QUESTION OF EGO.
That's why it is Da Yout who 'break' the old tech and make Old Men cry because their toys are no longer the BESTEST TOY and they can no longer derive emotional joy from being the HIGH PRIESTS OF AUDIO!
I'm not rich enough to EVER become too invested in ANY tech.
Thank-you for your realistic account for the ugly little truths and facts on WHY people need to stop EMOTIONALLY investing in their tech!!
@RudyDeblieck: Lots of nervous babbling... but then why does my vinyl sounds superior?
@mikeg2491: I’ve been to a lot of concerts, rock particularly and a true live performance is generally a bit muddy sounding to begin with as you have so many factors at play from venue acoustics to giant PA speakers or small onstage setups, tube guitars, etc. bass overload it’s just a lot grimier experience. This is why vinyl still feels more real to me than digital, live music is rarely clean, pristine and razor sharp except in the finest jazz lounges or orchestral halls. That said I enjoy all formats.
@shaneallen4042: Silly old coot.
@MountainandWaterHiFi: Super audio CD is best, and then reel to reel, then cassette, then CD, then streaming, and vinyl being the worst. This info according to the owner of the Tokyo music history museum. He has one of the world's largest collections of master tapes. Anybody who doesn't like cassettes never use the right equipment. Nakamichi all the way.
@mikeg2491 replies to @MountainandWaterHiFi: But whose cassettes? The mixes you’re making yourself or commercial releases?
@MountainandWaterHiFi replies to @MountainandWaterHiFi: @mikeg2491commercial release, factory recorded ones. Many I've heard sound absolutely sublime.
@cineffect: Interesting, before the digital, the only recorded music I truly enjoyed was reel-to-reel.
@christophervan6966: I have Brothers in Arms both on vinyl and CD. I have a good hifi set (NAD 3020 and a CD player with the legendary TDA1541A DAC.). Well, Brothers in Arms sounds better on vinyl than on CD. More true to life. Sorry if my ears are mistaken.
@AudioMasterclass replies to @christophervan6966: It may depend on the vintage of your CD. I don’t know for sure but it wouldn’t surprise me if later pressings have less dynamic range.
@NotMagenta: Can't stand "audiophiles". For me, vinyl sounds good enough, and at that point it really does not matter so long as you're not using a cheap ass turntable/cartridge. At that point you're splitting hairs. We could get into THD and "transparency" of audio equipment but the truth is that nearly all modern audio devices have low THD (order of hundredth of a percent) and are transparent. At this point you'd arguably want to pay more for equipment that actually colours the sound e.g. by adding harmonics/saturation. Absolutely NO setup reproduces the original sound exactly, and when you get into what sounds pleasant, it's usually the setups that do add coloration. When we are considering sound-systems e.g. in the club for example, the situation moves further in this direction, the sound system and room acoustics becoming an instrument in their own right that is played by the source.
I very much question this technical quest for flat, linear response on the playback side of things. If you are in the studio, okay, I can understand this, but the reality outside of that sterile environment is much different. As has been said before: music first, equipment second, format third.
@mikeg2491 replies to @NotMagenta: The biggest problem with audiophiles is the philosophy is bunk to begin with. I’ve tried all those super low distortion amps from the likes of Topping and all the SINAD guys rave about them for replicating the original signal 1:1 but audio engineers generally mix music to be as cold & neutral as possible because they know MOST consumers will be listening on equipment that warms it back up. When you try to play the signal back without a colored amp or speaker it just sounds dull or lifeless. If that’s your bag that’s fine but it definitely was not the “artist’s intent”. They’re great equipment for recording to tape or doing your own mixes as an amateur musician but I don’t enjoy playback on them. If this was all the artists intent famous musicians would be listening inside their recording studio all the time vs in their living room on tube amps and other house sound equipment that would make audiophiles shriek like vampires in front of a cross.
@billadams4924: The simplest solution, I find, is vinyl conservation. This is acheived with the help of a good USB turntable; I make a lossless copy of an album with my USB turntable and save it onto my compauter. Then I basically have two; I can listen to the MP3s while I'm working, and then listen to the vinyl on occasion.
@Rondo2ooo: I've been in audio recordings and music making for like 30 years now, and I learned a thing or two on the way. As a result, vinyl would never make sense from an analytical perspective. But that's not the point.
I've got all types of online and offline media for listening to music.
But there's no replacement for listening vinyls you bought as teenager or like recently, the opening of the fabulous 50th anniversary The Lamb package from Genesis with booklets and large physical audio (and a Bluray audio). When I am in my car, I enjoy the FLAC files that came along.
Music is about emotions, which is particularly true for vinyl fans. You buy that quirky unreliable Italian oldtimer because of all the limitations that come with the emotions.
@Svemirsky: My theory on why every phisical media, not just vinyl, is getting more popular again - is tied to something not even related to music at all. It all goes back to a single sentence said on WEF in 2015. I believe. 'In future you will own nothing and be happy'. So subscriptions slowly started to gain traction in every single aspect of our lives - and then Ads became extremely intrusive, reliability of tech fell off while cycle of rebuying sped up. And millenials just got so tired of that business model that they started acquiring good enough retro tech, that still works, in hope to own at least some part of life. And now we are here listening to expert being confuzed on why vinyl is coming back.
@MrSauceman09: For me, a zoomer, vinyl with all its imperfections adds a sense of character to the music that makes it unique from digital. I was born in 2000 and growing up the only physical music media I was exposed to was CDs. I got my first iPod Touch when I was 12 and up until recently at the age of 24 it's only ever been "perfect" digital music. My first time hearing my father in laws vintage 70s copy of Dark Side of the Moon on vinyl and cassette I was blown away. No it didn't sound perfect, and that's what made me fall in love. I recently "acquired" ZZ Tops Greatest Hits album in 16 bit FLAC after listening to the same album on cassette and I honestly kind of hate how the digital version of the album sounds. It's like they sucked the life out of the songs. Oldheads like my father in law will take even the most compressed MP3 digital garbage over analog any day mostly for the sake of convenience. It's the convenience and the years of hearing these songs in their "perfect" form that draws me towards the more personal and unique experience of analog music
@shullinger6: So very RIGHT you are! The vinyl revival is so wrong on so many levels.
Vinyl is not particularly bad, no;
it's just that a premium quality recording on compact disc is infinitely better.
And by the way ... if an old analogue recording is put straight to CD with no further processing,
then it sounds indeed quite identical to the analogue recording released on vinyl.
@Chris.Davies: I can honestly say, hand on heart, that in over10 years of solid record playing at my home from 1979 to 1988, that I never once scratched a single record, or damaged one in any way. The tracking weight and antiskating on my 5120 were set perfectly, and I was extremely fastidious about careful handing of records at all times. And no one else was allowed to handle them.
This wasn't because of OCD, but simply because I was always flat broke. And I seem to recall that albums cost around $15 each when I earned around $10.50 an hour. So, $38 each in today's money. That means my record collection would cost around $15,000 today. So, no wonder they're still in perfect shape: each one on its own sealed plastic bag, except for Talking Heads Speaking in Tongues. That is a clear LP and it came in a clear plastic box, but now the box is yellow. The vinyl is still crystal clear, though. :)
@Chris.Davies: I have spent the last 48 hours resurrecting, repairing, and restoring my NAD 5120 flexi-arm turntable, which has been in its box with its platter clamped down for the last 36 years. Chat-GOAT (as I call it these days) was with me every step of the way, and together we have invented repair and restoration parts which I have 3D printed, tweaked, and repeated until I was able to create efficient and effective suspension spring stand-offs to get the platter back to its correct level with the platter, the rubber mat, an LP and my 163gm Orsonic disc clamp.
After very careful tuning of the platter height, to get exactly 3mm of clearance, I was able to get the (untouched!) spindle bearing spinning (with a full platter load) at 33rpm without the belt engaged, and it finally came to rest 102 seconds later - after 36 years in storage. That is 10 seconds longer than the factory spec. Which I feel pretty good about. I feel pretty good about those NAD engineers, and also my buying decision in 1983.
With a fully loaded suspension, flicking the edge of the disc results in oscillations which stop after exactly 4.5 seconds, which is also factory spec.
I was the opposite of you, and I seemed to recall the arm had an OM10 on it. But when I opened the box was very pleasantly surprised to find a new 30 stylus, with the receipt (and a broken 10 stylus!) in the box. What a bonus. I cringe at the expense I shouldered in 1988 (I was always broke) and pat myself on the back at the same time.
Chat-GPT was an absolute legend in this process, guiding me through the disassembly, testing, production of the STL files (about 6 generations of prints) until we got the design and the heights right, and the final tuning of the suspension to align it correctly with the chassis. It saved me probably 50 hours of extra research and design work for the 3D printed parts alone.
I've ordered the correct DVA damping fluid to top up the reservoir, and grabbed an original drive belt from Thakker, but...
I am prepared to be underwhelmed very quickly at the inaccessibility of my music on 350 LPs and 150 EPs. My recollection of vinyl (I was a big fan!) is a bit rose-tinted after 4 decades, I think. And so I can easily predict the future:
1) 2 months from now I will get sick of vinyl again.
2) Sell the NAD
3) Buy an LP12 / ITOK & and a Behringer UMC202HD ADC
4) Digitise the whole lot using VinylStudio into lossless FLACs
5) Sell the LP12 and ADC to someone who wants to do the same.
Because let's face it. The best thing about 12" records was always the album covers. I have 4 huge books (12" x 12" oddly!) of album covers. CDs killed album artwork, because they are too small to represent art properly.
Fortunately, in my business - which is disc golf discs - a 21cm disc is large enough to be a legitimate format for genuine art. :)
@rolfgiehmann528: Stereo wide band classical ones are the best ones made after the mono ones.
@rolfgiehmann528: Records and tapes are greater than any cd sound can ever produce. Classical records are my favourite . They are my biggest collection . Particularly a fondness for original 50s mono and 60s stereo pressings.
@ssnd001: You’re right in every aspect.
Nonetheless, people keep buying vinyl. And why is that?
Firstly, you have something tangible in your hands — much like holding a Bible instead of reading it on a tablet.
Secondly, because old(er) people can be beautiful, imperfections and all. They have history; they’ve earned their wrinkles, stood the test of time, and they tell the best stories.
@AudioMasterclass replies to @ssnd001: I was in John Lewis (a department store for people who think they’re posh) the other day. Among the enormous TVs in the tech section… turntables! Priced up to £359 GBP. I didn’t find any records though.
@captaincrankysdock9730: While as you say, "vinyl is quiet", the "quiet" still craps out at about -68 DB. Which in no way is comparable to the -90+ DB SN ratio of the CD medium. As for "cogging", and assuming the same number of motor poles, (assuming you were even able to hear it), all that's necessary is to increase the mass of the platter. Sir Isaac tells us that, "a body in motion tends to remain in motion". So, the higher the mass in motion, the less deceleration would occur in between motor poles. Problem solved.
The most irksome defects in reproduction that spoil it for me, aren't couched in audiophile minutia. !: 99+ percent of listeners can't even tell when an amplifier is clipping. 2: Excess compression annoys the living daylights out of me. It makes it impossible for me to truly enjoy much older, and otherwise very enjoyable music. By it's very nature a compressor has to round off the waveform, otherwise it would clip the signal, That rounding obviously affects the slope of the waveform, and kills the transient response. Lack of transient accuracy, particularly in a loudspeaker, is annoying unto itself. IT "takes the edge off", to the point when you can immediately, tell live from recorded. 4: Last, and possibly worst, is you're only ever hearing the recording engineer's impression of what he or she likes, or thinks it's what you want to hear. There's an old joke about car crashes and what caused them; "there was a loose nut between the steering wheel and the seat". Which is a perfect metaphor for describing the garbage that can sometimes emanate from behind the console.
But, the grossest audio irony of all, is how much people are willing to spend to "accurately reproduce", the massive amounts of distortion introduced by the musicians and their equipment to begin with . I'm looking at you metal heads. But yeah, I'm guilty of quite a bit of that myself.
I could go on, but I've probably said too much already. If anybody's still with me, Cheers. If you're not, Cheers anyway. 😃
@MikeRox83: I've recently got "into" vinyl having always been of the opinion that CD is quite simply the superior format so it's just a waste of money.
I can't explain what it is, my head tells me exactly a you say, all the flaws, imperfections, etc.
But there's just something that hits different listening to music on vinyl. I'm fascinated by the technology, that anyone was ever even able to conceive it. And there's definitely something about the artistry of mastering for it.
CDs will always be my main choice of music playback, but on a quiet night in, as someone else has said, the ritual around vinyl and the beautiful artwork that is contained in some of the sleeves just makes it so much more of an overall experience than putting in a CD.
@guidon.5413: Dragging a rock through a corrugated canyon, expecting no erosion, and a sound that's acceptable ... it fits right in with cable lifters and room air blowers to align the air molicules for better sound. I can see the appeal of the process, but the result is generally garbage after a few times listening to a record. I had more than a thousand before I moved continents and I'm happy I left them behind. I have CDs from the early 80s that I have run through the player hundreds, if not thousands of times by now, and they sound just as good as on day one. A record would be translucent by now ...
@RsiX_45rpm: here's a thing . put a guy on turntables with a beat on vinyl on the left .. and the same beat in digital form but 41000 resolution on the right .. grab the fader and chop a snare on the vinyl , then chop the digital version using timecode vinyl. what you find is the drums on vinyl have more " drummy-ness " and more weight and often snares sound better . when a drumstick hits a drumskin there is impact , when i stylus hits a strong snare there is impact . which is why certain music sounds "right " on vinyl over the digital copy . as for frequency overall .. no vinyl isnt up there , what it does have is oomf in its own way . i like most of my music digital , but for drum n bass / jungle i really need it on vinyl to hear it sounding proper . whats vinyl good for ? .. drums and bass ( except for the very lows )
@peacewithin-h1p: ok ok I get it viynl sucks im sorry I said I liked it
@svtk5104: One more reason I like the LPs - when I listen to digital, of course the quality is good enough very often. But every single time I wonder - is this the real sound, is this the real instrument. Is this the real voice of this man/woman. Is that a real saxophone in that song? Does it sound usually like that or it was changed somehow. Or it is added due AI and there is nothing genuine. Or how does it sound if you do not polish it so much digitally - you must have other positives that are not erased. By the old LPs you know - what you hear is there. It is something real. F.i. by something like house and club music I love, everything is perfect but for the rest of the music I respect the true nature. F.i. I was not there - I have no idea at all how the voice of Elvis or Louis Prima sounded. You download the remastered lossless wavs and you hear some perfection. But you ask yourself - is it real. Through so much polishing, what is gone? When I take the LPs, I hear some nuances and some very subtle details more and the original (mostly) voice. And yes, I manage to extract a better sound out of it.
@svtk5104: Next one: The Girlfriend revival - So wrong on so many levels. I listen to vinyl it's absolutely awful and disgusting! Masohist!
Now serious - I start to develop the impression that people who used LPs in the past have most of the problems and the importance of these problems only as an idea in their head, based on memories with the old tech. I have simple cheap brush, cleans perfectly. Modern average cartridge, modern amp, cheap 90s turntable, you have pretty modern sounding and functioning device. If I had so much trouble, I would listen only to the PC all of the time.
@yuricopperhooves: Vinyl is for normies, I keep an orchestra in the pantry.
@donk1822: Just picked up an absolutely mint copy of Status Quo's 'Dog Of Two Heads' for £20. Happy, happy, joy, joy ;).
@EdwardDore-g8h: I love CDs as long as they are mastered correctly, that being said if you want great sounding analog, especially if the original recording was an analog, It's reel to reel, or records, which format is easier and cheaper, records of course
@niklauskallergis9148: 😂❤👍👍
@Bob-kz6vs: I have every song ever at a touch of my fingers and I don’t enjoy it. Nothing special. Moved to Hawaii from the mainland USA, left my record collection behind. Miss it so much, played my records through a tube amp and it felt magical.
@enzodisegni5718: I think what people like about listening to vinyl is exactly the thrill of overcoming all these issues by years of improvement to their sound stystem. Like you buy yourself an ingot of gold but have to constantly work your way to get the most gold out of it. It's also just cool.
@lightexposure: I’m very late to this channel. What about recording vinyl to 7” reel tape at 7.5 speed?
@AudioMasterclass replies to @lightexposure: Super.. All the degradations of vinyl plus all the degradations of tape. And your seven inch spool will only hold around 32 minutes which isn't enough for most albums, so you'll have to use long play tape and lose three to six dB of signal-to-noise a few kHz off the top end, and maybe an extra percentage point of distortion. Still, you're having fun.
@ProgressiveHifi: Oh my God, I think I needed some popcorn for this one
@EdwardCheek: Can't go back to the crack, snap, and pop of vinyl. Thought about the top-loading CD player to repeat the ritual. Nah, my CD/DVD player with optical out sounds good.
@kevinatkab5219: Some DJ tonearms are fully straight "underhung" tonearms which truly only have one alignment point. These should never be used for hi fi of course, just rap scratching. As for dynamic stylus drag, a term coined by Tony Cordesman in his Audio Mag review of the VPI TNT turntable back in the 90's, It usually shows after a loud crescendo, when the music level falls back down, you can hear the pitch increasing due to the release of the drag on the platter. If you are sensitive to pitch, it should be easy to hear on any light weight platter belt drive, light weight being under 10 pounds. My Thorens 125mk2 was notorious for it. I used to think it was the record until i got a Technics 1200 mk2 and noticed that it did not suffer from this. The direct drive has such tight control of rotation, that compensates for the drag, essentially simulating a heavy platter electronically. Rim drive smiliarly but due only to high torque also seems to be immune to this, albeit with the tradeoff of increased rumble. Overall, I agree with everything in this video. Very well presented. Lastly, on cogging, I wrote a paper on this; Cogging is not a rotational defect, it is a vibrational defect. it introduces a rumble note, which can be measured, but still inaudible. Cogging force can be measured. In the case of a Technics 1200, it is only about 3 grams, this is only twice the bearing friction, so it is easily overcome by the drive system. https://www.kabusa.com/cogging.pdf
@joskabouw: Totally agree with the human ignorance..... and how they value and justify the unjustified
60Euros for a LP .....it is nuts....
Anyway the best solution is start the record on the record player and then let streaming take over until the end.... and you will have the most magical experience
@aspirativemusicproduction2135: I have never touched a vinyl in my life. I have never touched a poisonous frog 🐸 neither. I have no intention of touching non of it. We are all going to die and all the junk with us. I am perfectly fine with wav files and mp3 files. I wasted I don't know how much money on CDs and I am not even tempted to play them anymore. I was going to convert all the CDS into other files but this was such long process I just didn't feel it. Records are useless pile of $#!t. And I am a musician. And I listen to music on my phone.
@Manu-rd4pb: How then works vinyl in a loud club?
@DeKemp: I buy vinyl to support the artist and the artwork is bigger. Ofcourse digital is better and more convenient in any way.
@ZiehmerTheGamer: Aw, pumpkins which is great fir pumpkin pies and pumpkin spice. Vynil is it fir me do not mind the pops. Also handy fir syncing Richter or Tilson Thomas. Resident Evil remakes just play better and you can feel the unsettling moods. Or some clasaic Ink Spots for Fallout.
@stighenningjohansen: Whats wrong with cassettes, for 10 years, my Made in Norway Tandberg sound freezer wiped the floor with CDs. 11Hz to 26.5Khz at +0, -3b at -15db. and an S/N ratio of close to 110 Dbdue to a Sanyo D55? Compander.
No one coulld tell if they listened to a CD or tape. Vinyl was another story. Useless.
@dhpbear2: 11:12 - The VERY simple AR Turntable (circa 1967) had NO rumble at all! It was belt-driven.
@dhpbear2: I had pretty good luck with vinyl back in the day. I would clean the disc with Watt's Record Preener before EVERY play!
@dhpbear2: 3:26 - I ripped several rare albums to 16-bit .wav files some 20 years ago. I was using Cool Edit 2000 (which I STILL use, BTW). CE2K's 'noise eliminator' worked amazingly well, once set up correctly.
@stephenino: So when cd became available I thought I’d found the media that would give me the audio play back from the sound system I heard back in 79! So I played Fleetwood Mac’s go your own way, and instead of the drums being clear and vibrant. They were weak and shallow. I later discovered that the audio frequency on CDs were clipped. You weren’t getting the full frequency being produced, because for some reason it was decide that the audio consumer weren’t going to get the whole audio sound, but a clipped or compressed version of the original. I ask why. But that was last century technology. The teen years of this century the audio industry came out with HD audio. Another way to Jack up the price for music, and have us buy some music we had already purchased again. Which reminded me of the tv with VHS tapes, then to DVDs, and then Blu Ray discs. Oh I left out the larger format of Laser discs. I know I have there different formats of the same movie. But that all came to a halt to removable media with streaming services killing DVDs. That you no longer have any sections in stores for CDs or blu ray discs. Everything is online. Ugh!
Yeah I designed and built my own isolation vibration turntable platform to reduce all the negative effect surround playing vinyl on a turntable.
@TheGammelfjols: LPs have an asset and an asset alone, the record cover it's fantastic and listening to a good one. "record" and page with the cover in hand but today I prefer the experience of listening to the record via appel muic and retrieving the cover from my old plasde collection, if I then have that record in my old collection. I use them as decoration on the wall and think they are much nicer than a reproduction of a French impressionist painter that I would only otherwise have. a reference surface to because it would seem pop smart to have this hanging in the living room. so no I have old record covers hanging because they have a content a private in my life.
I have listened to enough dust on records in my life.
@flippery-flop: And actually with digital sound audiophiles and audio pros are win. But what we get from that? Yup absolutely supersampled dead sound, loudness steroids. So it's so good that we still have old technologies to bring a bit of 'soul' to modern sound
@flippery-flop: Just look at vinyl as wine - moderate noise, distortion make it kinda better, it's like canvas for picture all these impurities gives a carrier more value - its like the music break through the noise, crackles, so give you feel of something live. Where you can get real silence - maybe only in anechoic chamber, in real live noise is everywhere, so its okay to have some noise in record even unwanted by professionals. Such noise is like finishing , a final cut for listener, super individual performance for an owner
@Fontsman-14: Over the last 20 years, brickwalling, quantisation and over manipulation of digital masters, has resulted in a major drop off in quality. In the right hands, digital recording should be the best form of reproduction.
@ctek9: For a moment in the early 2000s during the 80s revival I believed that vinyl sounded better than CDs. Buying vinyl was also seen as a status symbol since you were part of an elite minority. Being part of this cult I really believed it was the superior medium so it sounded superior to me. Cults will do that to you.
@KarlBokelmann-o8s: If a future civilization found some dude's stash of vinyl, 8-Tracks, cassettes, and CDs, which one will they figure out to use first? "I wanna hold your hand?" What's that? I think it's the physical structure on which the digital extremities are attached.
@chongyoonlim48: difference between Monet on digital computer monitor 4k and canvas in original room
there is possibilities that some music is worth the trouble
@NoosaHeads: Digital photography is measurably better than analogue (film). Nonetheless, I still shoot film. (Because the whole film experience is more tactile and involving.) Double clutch transmission on a car is better than manual transmission. So what? I like changing gear myself.
@AudioMasterclass replies to @NoosaHeads: Is that what we call double declutch in Blightly? Clutch, neutral, clutch, change, release clutch. I so wish we still had manual advance and retard.
@Shenandoah9900: Nothing wrong with bringing back where music never should have left.
@AudioMasterclass replies to @Shenandoah9900: I don't think it was the vinyl. There was more concentration of talent in the old days. Today there's talent but it's spread out and harder to learn from each other.
@pwrrpw319: Thank you for reminding me how stupid Records are, in addition to pops, click, distortion, scratches, wear from playback & Stuck grooves, there is also Rumble & feedback!!!, i had forgotten about them! , yeah vinyl is better than CD & Tape, what an absolute Joke!. LOLOLOL!.
@BillKinsman: It is definitely NOT for better sound quality.
@Jeff-gi6dh: It's refreshing to have someone as yourself to blow the lid off the vinyl "revival"! The reason I choose the CD over vinyl (and of course cassette) is that I prefer to listen to the MUSIC and not the clicks, pops, distortions, rumble, wow/flutter, surface noise, inner-groove distortion, and all the other artifacts of analog reproduction starting with the stylus and ending with my loudspeakers. I read comments about the "sentimental" love of vinyl records, the joy of putting the disk onto the turntable, enjoying the artwork of the jacket, and all the other nonsense, and all I can say is, fine for you. Me? I want to hear the music in its purest form, and that (in my case with my budget) means the compact disc. I grew up in the '60s and into the '70s with "vinyl," or as I called it "LPs," and felt no such sentiment each time I had to change records, clean the surface of the next disk with a Discwasher brush system, clean the stylus, then walk quietly to avoid rattling the turntable, and then be subjected to poorly cut disks (U.S. LPs of that era were notoriously poor in quality) and all the analog limitations. I cheered when I heard of the invention of the compact disc and digital recording methods and have never looked back. I continue to by CDs because they are the most distortion-free way to listen to music in all its dynamic range and frequency range. (I mostly listen to classical, by the way).
@midnightcassettelibrary5171: What does this pompous Englishman suggest we use? Quadraphonic DAT rigs?
@dksculpture: I don’t know what you’re talking about re high quality vinyl playback.
@michaelsmullen9891: Records are much more fun to look through than Cd's or Audio Files!
@sajyho1988: The best solution for all these shortcomings; jusdt buy a cheap DAC with optical input and connect it to your TV and llisten to YouTube high resolution songs, Trust me I did it and I'll never go back to analog!
@michaelturner4457: vinyl is strictly a hipster thing.
@nonfiction-L: What awful nonsense. YOU are wrong on so many levels.
@tgiovanetti: I’m struck by the degree to which my Bang & Olufsen tangential tracking turntables address many of your objections
@thejeffersonarchive: Im getting huge Eric Idle vibes...
@Clintob: Vinyl is KING