Hello fellas.

In my recent interview with Sound On Sound magazine I ( actually No, you're an impostor ! ) said that for critical listening, or for music that means a lot to me, digital formats aren't good enough. A well-made vinyl record still sounds infinitely better than anything else.

Now, I would like to hear your opinion.
What do you fellas think about that?

C’mon, don’t be shy. Everyone's opinion counts.


MODERATOR NOTE CONCERNING ORIGIN

THIS WAS POSTED BY
Digital Emotions. former member, now banned.

Pretending to be Steve Albini.

Which I might add is a dumb ass thing to do... and should not be seen as clever, funny, or something to be repeated....

unless of course you hate it here so much you're absolutely desperate to be banned.

in which case... what are you here for in the first place?


okay so the notice is a bit belated... but better late than never

Edited by Max The Mac (19/08/05 09:32 PM)

You're talking b*llocks.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

Vinyl does sound better, no doubt about it. However, most people's listening isn't critical and cd's are damned convenient and don't damage so easily!

It's odd that, as technology makes better and better quality sound recording available (at least in theory), what most people want is something which actually sounds worse than cd (ie MP3), because it's convenient.

You also said in your interview that (and I paraphrase here), if I ask you to record my band's next album, but can't really afford it, you'll do it for nothing. Can I have your phone number?

(773) 539-2555
www.electrical.com

I can waive my fee.
But you still have to pay for studio time.
Business is business, you know.

Edited by Steve Albini (18/08/05 12:11 PM)

Hi Steve!

I was discussing this with a friend (also a keen engineer) and we both aggreed that vinyl was far superior to any other commercial music format, probably because of the lack of the 20Hz-20kHz aliasing, the format possibly only let down slightly by crackle/pops etc. One of my major gripes with technological progressions in media formats is the promotion of inferior sound quality (hello mp3/aac ipod generation). I know the majority of the consumer market may not notice the difference between 44.1 and 96 kHz recording, but who cares, in the days of 60GB hard drives in your pocket and HD space in general in abundance shouldn't accurate reproduction be priororitised over efficiency?

Mash

--------------------
www.matthewcracknell.com

I'm currently looking at relative costs for vinyl & cd as I am seriously considering a switch to vinyl. If cost wasn't an issue I would do it now. Any good links for pressing would be appreciated.
Giles www.bateaulavoir.org

I am not connected with pressing plants.
I do final mix to 2 track analog tape and I stop there.

This topic will run and run . . . (I hope!)

In a nutshell, I agree (I think!) but we should broaden the discussion out to analogue v. digital technology in general.

Having just finished reading 'The Record Men' by Cohen - the story of Chess Records and Leonard Chess in particular and having re-listened to the first ever R&R record, Maybellene, I grasp just what we have lost over the last few years.

We have all the usual digital clap-trap here at the studio, but all my efforts go into vintage kit (Vintage Kitt, Gadd how I loved that woman!)

You can have all the Mickey Mouse plugins and dufuss boxes on this planet, but we are all keyed to the sound of tape and the sound of a record. You can have all the Korg/Yamaha/bla, bla, bla keyboards, but only a piano sounds like a piano and only a Hammond sounds like a Hammond and only a Fender Rhodes sounds like a . . . well, you get the picture!

(If I ever have a problem with mastering a recording, nine times out of ten, it is because the original recording contained samples.)

We have three things in the studio that 'pull' and they are a good concert grand, a good reel-to-reel and a good Hammond. Nobody asks me what plugins we have or even if we have PT or Nuendo, Soundscape or Radar. They look for a good desk and good mics, but that is about it.

As for vinyl, hmmm, getting a recording right to sound good on vinyl was tricky and definately a skill that took time to learn. Definately vinyl sounds far better on the radio.

--------------------
www.the-byre.com No longer Forum Member

Quote:

---

A well-made vinyl record still sounds infinitely better than anything else.

---

I think "well-made" is key. Old records I've bought from the 60s/70s feel and even look different to the rubbish that was being produced in the 80s/90s, most of which have developed serious pops and scratches after a few plays.

Slightly different comparison I know, but Weld sounds a hundred times better on vinyl than my iTunes copy.

Joe Public will always get inferior sound & visual quality for mass production runs.
It's all driven my money.
I would agree that vinyl is spoiled by crackles and pops and no matter how careful I was, my records still made noises apart from the music.
I do believe that overall, CD is far better for commercial releases.
The sound difference in my opinion is marginal - in an A/B test, yes there is a difference, but let's not get too carried away. The CD doesn't get spoiled until you abuse it. LPs get wasted very easily.
A good recording released on CD is excellent. Remember that music is an art form and it's not just about which format sounds good. You'll never know that until you record the same piece twice at the same time, one to analogue and one to digital and double up the processes all the way through.
It would be an interesting experiment, but what would it achieve really?

When you weigh up all aspects, my vote is still for CD for mass production.

I often wonder if it's the same in the visual world. There's nothing to beat seeing a film on the big screen, yet many have surround sound etc... and their 32" wide TV. Are these people not kidding themselves on?
With projectors it's much better but it is inferior to the real thing.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

And another thing . . .

I REALLY miss having 12" by 12" front and back and a sleave to let my creative graphic side run riot.

I have just finished a CD cover and that is such a fiddley, stupid little format. It is very difficult to make a statement on a 15cm square.

--------------------
www.the-byre.com No longer Forum Member

Absolutely not.

Vinyl has far too many distortions - loads in the pressing process.

Just comparing the lacquer master with the pressed version tells you this.

Yes, you may like the distortions, but they are still a distortion of the original.

I go for digital every time - but it must be well recorded, with the right mics in the right position in the correct acoustic, etc.

And - of course - a superb performance.

That's the best

--------------------
John - Sound-Link ProAudio
President - Federation Internationale des Chasseurs de Sons

Hi Steve,

Nice to see you here....

I think in some ways you're right, and in others you could not be more wrong. It is very much music dependant. For example - i spend most of my time recording and mixing classical based music for movie/tv/other use. Classical music - particularly brass, does not reproduce well on Vinyl. Its very UNdynamic. The best media for us classic types is really high sample high bit digital. DSD one day, i'm sure, but for now 96/24 digi using no tape apart from for effect. We just dont dig that tape sound !!! However, for good old R+R (of which you've done some of my favourite records) I couldnt agree more. Vinyl IS the sound of rock n roll.....

there ya go - my love and hate all in one !!

nice

Cheers

--------------------
Battenburg to the power of 20 - said by Richie Royale in a moment of genius. 4pm. Wed 16th Nov 2011. Remember where you were....

Steve

Up until about 5 years ago, I was a real digital boy, but since then I've been bitten by the analogue bug big style. Nothing sounds as sweet as an analogue eq, or as smooth as analogue compressor. I couldn't get by without my SADiE for editing but for actually manipulating sound, it's analogue all the way.

With regards to vinyl sounding better, I'm not sure, but it certainly sounds more pleasing to the ear, if that makes any sense. We've got a lathe here and stuff coming back from the cut just has more presence than that coming off the hard-disc.

Byre: I'm with you here. Digital processors and plug-ins seem to be a given - no-one asks what we have. What sets you apart these days does seem to be your analogue outboard.

Just my opinion...

--------------------
Can we give it a bit more "tssss" and a bit less "ooooph"?

Quote Steve Albini:

---

(773) 539-2555
www.electrical.com

I can waive my fee.
But you still have to pay for studio time.
Business is business, you know.

---

That's understood.

Might be a bit of a treck from Brighton, anyway.

The small amounts of vinyl I own are pretty poor and compared to the same recording on CD the vinyl just doesn't have anything going for it.

My dad owns large amounts of jazz on vinyl and some of it sounds great... then again you're sometimes dealing with recordings that are 50+ years old and mixed and mastered with vinyl in mind.

--------------------
need to get rid of this stupid sig...

Quote The Byre:

---

You can have all the Mickey Mouse plugins and dufuss boxes on this planet, but we are all keyed to the sound of tape and the sound of a record. You can have all the Korg/Yamaha/bla, bla, bla keyboards, but only a piano sounds like a piano and only a Hammond sounds like a Hammond and only a Fender Rhodes sounds like a . . . well, you get the picture!

---

Aaah, might be so, might be so.. But nothing sounds quite like my copy of the Amen Brother loop with the MP3-compression artifacts sped up by Ableton Live version 3 either... Add SupaTrigga AU set to 16ths and moderate amount of repeats/slow downs/reverse and about 3% chance of silence and you're there.. I could listen to that for hours and hours. It's unique.

(And anyways, Andrew, you can take your Hammonds and shove 'em up your jacksie... it is one of the most annoying sounds on this planet, closely followed by the guitar sound on that stupid "I can't get no... (crappy guitar lick)... satisfaction..." track by that second rate 60's rock band... what are they called again?)

Did any of you listen to Bassdrive.com last night, BTW? It was [ ****** ] mental. The mixing was a bit dodgy but the tunes mate, the tunes, I swear to god, nothing could touch that. Pure d'n'b bliss, mad enough to make even dead people feel alive.

--------------------
Signature (up to 200 characters). You may use UBBCode in your signature

One thing about vinyl... by the end of a side it's doing less than 10 ips (it starts a side at 21 ips).

Or my calculator's broken.

So you should always put your most sonically demanding material on the earlier tracks and finish each side with your grunge.

The synth made to sound like a piano is quite pathetic at times, but it is very convenient for the home studio due to obvious cost savings.
The thing is for commercial music, which is generally cr*p and poorly produced, you don't need a real grand piano.
For a nice classical or acoustuc recording with a real piano - now that's when the Korg or Yamaha can sound completely false.
What gets me is the folk who want nice mic's and preamps (as if purists), then start using plug-ins for 'real' sounds. What's the point?

On the other hand, a Korg which sounds similar to a Rhodes - well so what if it's not a Rhodes. Music is all about notes and arrangements. Does it matter what plays them?
Whether a 'real' instrument or sythesised one, they can all be used effectively in good arragements, regardless of their physical makeup.

I think your train of thought (and probably many of us) is based on a set of rules that maybe we do not want to change.
If someone plays a certain part 'as a piano' then we can't see past a real piano playing it (and we're probably right most of the time).
But maybe it needs some thought 'out the box'. Any musically percussive instrument could play it whether real or sythesised and if it's well played and it's a nice piece, the quality will still shine through.

Digital technology is gettign better all the time and to be honest, for a recordist to ignore it completely would be foolish in my opinion.
Maybe a pure analogue set-up did sound better - not necessarily a better reporoduction, but better to the ears.
We can still capture performances to a really high standard and it sounds a bit different.
You take many recordings from every decade in the 20th century and they all sound different due to technology, equipment and fads.

Using a pure digital set-up isn't as bad as many say it is.

Byre,
Congratulations - you're luddite of the week.

Or as the boy at the Glasgow studio said when the songwriter phones to asked about what type of gear he has:-

"It's pure digital by the way".

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

Vinyl can sound really good, providing its a really good press, the deck is high class, well setup, etc...

But the same can be said for CD Audio, if you've got a decent cd player, amp, DA convertor, speakers you can get a stunning sound.

The problem with any digital media is it is flawed from step one, audio isn't digital and in encoding it you lose some quality. Infomation about the waveforms is literally thrown away.

For some systems this is fine and acceptable, take for instance the Telephone system thats a digital system. I think it runs in a varible style so at 'normal' volumes you get more infomation, but if you shout more infomation is lost. This because people rarely shout on the phone so theres no need to waste bandwith on a area which isn't as important.

Anyway back to the CD's... They are fundlementally flawed! Ah but then we get into how its been recorded, has it been digital recorded?

When your digital audio systems hit around 96khz it starts to get harder to tell the differences, but they are still there...

Laurence

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

Well I wanted to lay hands on The Tubes first album. Had the choice between s/h vinyl and CD. That album means a lot to me and I lost all my vinyl some years ago. I went for the vinyl copy in the end. Sentimental reasons and because it was produced for vinyl so i think that was the whole intended package. The band probably approved the master listening on a record deck. I wanted the original cover and stuff.

I dont have a great record deck but yes it sounds better. It sounds more REAL, and I have some identical tracks that ive been listening to from a Tubes comp for months. I find myself not having to try and listen. Vinyl just sort of fills the room. Digital is at ya.

I think my own recordings made on tape sound way better than the digital recordings I make now. I struggle to get a sound when it used to be easy. Its like trying to paint on glass. Im in the market for a tape machine. Ive given this digital thing a good crack of the whip now i reckon. Thought i liked being able to leave the piece and work on something else, but theres too much to think about. Tape and a desk always made me absorb and finish things.

I think the most stupid thing the record industry ever did was to go digital. They took an album with its cover and slip and its lush arty smell. And replaced it with something thats disposable rippable, its cheapened the form. We had the best canvas format for this lark and we dumped it, doh.

Quote The Byre:

---

And another thing . . .

I REALLY miss having 12" by 12" front and back and a sleave to let my creative graphic side run riot.

---

TBH, Andy just hit the nail on the head as to why there is such a vinyl nostalgia - we loved the tactile feel of the medium rather than it's technical specs. For the average listener, a CD-based system was a huge leap up in fidelity. I mean, how many people actually had separates, and of those, how many had other 'domestic' systems like tape players around their home ? Hi Fi was, is and always will be a minority issue.

But the actual record itself - especially the 12" size was a beatiful thing. It was a chance to read the the lyrics without a magnifying glass, look at exquisite artwork, marvel at the translucent disks and the record shops had a different, homey feel to them - not just endless (soulless) plastic racks. (sighs)

On most domestic audio systems, CD rules. But when it comes to the elusive 'feel' of the product, we all adore records....

Quote BigAl:

---

On the other hand, a Korg which sounds similar to a Rhodes - well so what if it's not a Rhodes.

---

I've yet to hear a Korg or any other box that's not a Rhodes sound as good as a properly tuned and maintained Rhodes.

--------------------
Scott
--Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?

The Byre,
I think that goes hand in hand with todays "lifestyle" people don't seem to care for the awesome vinyl collection any more. It's enough to have a CD rack next to the miniature Denon stereo, or ditch that altogether and plug their iPod straight into the stereo. Of course it's not so much what people "want" as what they've been convinced to want over a period of time now, by the marketing forces driving the sale of CDs and now portable mp3 players. I say this because people (yes, average human beings) of the 70s and early 80s used to all love browsing vinyl record sleeves and then purchasing said record&artwork to add to their home collection. I don't think the gene pool suddenly changed and people no longer appreciated the art that went into vinyl records. It's more like the means to peruse and sample vinyl records were slowly taken away from us to pave the way for the "digital revolution". I've heard claims that it's all about choice, and the public have voted for convenience over quality, but when the shops simply no longer stock a product, you cannot claim that choice is involved. It's like Dixons just last week announcing they will no longer sell non-digital film cameras any more. This is not because they are selling none, it's because they make a bit more margin on the digital cameras, and like any huge business, it simplifies the operation when you only sell carrots, not carrots and onions.

I have heard of bands writing, mixing and producing their work entirely inside a PC or Mac then making a big deal about the final thing being on Vinyl as opposed to CD but I don't really see the point in that, you've already lost anything truly analog in the music. When people listen now to the incredible engineering that made vinyl like ELO's or Stevie Wonder's records in the seventies, they oft forget that apart from the awesome musicianship, these recordings were purely analog from beginning to end. No virtual instruments, no plugins, not even cheap 80s digital effects units. So putting current work onto vinyl to restore some magic is probably foolish if the entire opus was recorded and mixed in Pro Tools.

Which brings me back to the point earlier about supposed choice, musical equipment has never been cheaper than it is currently. You can buy a mic, guitar, 24 tracks of 24bit recording and as many virtual synths as you want for under £1000. The trouble is, many professional musicians have gone down the path of downgrading their gear to the cheap prosumer stuff, for the simple fact that it is so much cheaper and compact. But this has had an effect on the sound and quality of music out there. People complain that tape machines and tape are no longer viable because the cost of machine, maintenance and finding tape has become prohibitive. It's nonsense, it's only really prohibitive if you're comparing to the cost of a cheap PC and Cubase SX and you're trying to keep the studio budget under £1000. Great bands of the 70s and 80s weren't applying those rules, they just bought tape machines and used them, while budding musicians settled for 4 and 8 track reel to reels and portastudios. The great levelling of the playing field that has occurred since the computer revolution has not all been a great thing, the overall standard of released music has dropped signicantly, and coupled with new formats and technology that serve only the vast media corporations like Sony, what joe public is listening to is even more degraded.

Sony are in the process of rolling out Blu-Ray discs, with a 50gb capacity on one DVD-sized optical disk. Am I the only one who thinks that hard disk and flash based storage is only a sideways step? Why are there not in the pipeline, new "Sony Walkmans", that use Blu-Ray for storage? With 50gb per disk, you could store 200 albums in CD quality with lossless compression, or alternatively 50 albums with greatly improved fidelity like 24/96. As the storage capacity increases, the argument for utterly shitty formats like MP3 becomes weaker and weaker, and we begin to see that it's got more to do with
a) Restricting the end user's take-home product so as to protect the corporations intellectual property via poor quality and DRM or similar technologies and
b) Increasing the profits of the same companies by allowing them to sell a low bandwidth equivalent minus artwork, minus CD, minus vinyl etc etc. You can't get much a much cheaper way to sell music than the minimum-quality-bandwidth mp3 download model.

Bob

Quote Scottdru:

---

Quote BigAl:

---

On the other hand, a Korg which sounds similar to a Rhodes - well so what if it's not a Rhodes.

---

I've yet to hear a Korg or any other box that's not a Rhodes sound as good as a properly tuned and maintained Rhodes.

---

Funnily enough, my biggest problem with all the virtual Rhodes emulators is that they don't sound like my f**ked old Rhodes, which is improperly tuned and maintained but sounds unique

I don't dispute that and I was actually saying that in my point, although maybe it wasn't clear.

What I meant was - you get a Korg which has a similar sound, but it's not an actual Rhodes.
So what?
It's still a useable sound to play your music with.
It may not sound as good as a Rhodes but you can't compare apples and pears.

What if the Korg sythesiser had its sound first, then the Rhodes came along. What would be best?

Neither, they're both still useable.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

Quote BigAl:

---

What if the Korg sythesiser had its sound first, then the Rhodes came along. What would be best?

---

You have obviously never owned a Fender Rhodes.

Quote Scottdru:

---

Quote BigAl:

---

On the other hand, a Korg which sounds similar to a Rhodes - well so what if it's not a Rhodes.

---

I've yet to hear a Korg or any other box that's not a Rhodes sound as good as a properly tuned and maintained Rhodes.

---

I'll second that, nothing sounds like a Rhodes!

nothing sounds like a badly maintained rhodes either!
part of play a rhodes is that action! I ain't seen a controller keyboard like it!

and they never get the tine sound right...

Those's Logic Virtual Instruments EVP88 are a bit of a joke!

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

Edited by Pirate Giant with Laser Eyes (PGWLE) (18/08/05 01:37 PM)

If they could digitise women would you prefer a real one or the holohooker with the real love plugin.

Before anyone murders me for my anti-digital comments in the last post, I should make clear I'm not criticizing digital per se. What I feel is that if the end medium was quality enough, like DSD/SACD upwards, and if the recording and mixing had all been done in that domain, the resulting product would be fantastic sounding. But what's often the case now is that records are coming out recorded in 16bit 44.1 (yes many people are still recording at 16bit), and then due to lack of skill they overuse digital plugins, especially the hellish Ultramaximizer type. The final CD then rarely gets listened to "as a CD" by the end user. More often than not, it's going to be heard as a 160kbps VBR MP3 on their iPod, or even worse, people download it from peer to peer and it's been ripped in burst mode complete with wonderful CD skipping noises, encoded at 80kbps with the crappest MP3 software available, snipping seconds of the start and end off for good measure, and probably mistitled to boot.

The techological means will exist very soon for most musicians to be recording high fidelity all the way to the final product, which could be released high fidelity. While the marketing people will tell us that the public are choosing low fidelity for convenience, the truth is, it's the marketing people and their accountants who will make the decision about what product is actually for sale, and my point is that it is in their interest to "cripple" the end product somewhat. Why sell some people a Ferrari when you could sell millions a sketch of a Ferrari on a piece of paper?

This argument could go on and on, but just think for a second, compare this to the very similar question in photography...Has anyone seen a digital photograph as stunning as the most stunning from a real, chemicals-based camera? Really?

Bob

I've seen some lovely digital shots!

With somthing like a photography digital has meant its avalible to them, but only 1 in a million accualy takes that breath taking photo.

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

And I agree with the comments above about the tactile nature of the vinyl sleeve. It almost seems pointless going to all the work making beautiful artwork for a CD jewel case when..
a) it's so small
b) through the plastic they often don't look that endearing
c) when the CD inevitably ends up in a 240-CD folder, only the CD's on body image matters.
d) when the CD inevitably ends up inside an mp3 player, none of the images matter.
e) they don't *feel* half as good as the big 12 inch inky sleeve

Quote Pirate Giant with Laser Eyes (PGWLE):

---

I've seen some lovely digital shots!

With somthing like a photography digital has meant its avalible to them, but only 1 in a million accualy takes that breath taking photo.

---

Not meaning the actual artistic shot as much as how it looks. Try scanning a measly Polaroid at 2400dpi and then print it professionally up to A1 poster size. Do the same with a digital photograph and you get this ugly, RGB mess reminiscent of ZX81 sprite graphics.

People also talk about how much cheaper going digital is, yeah for sure, the camera, the PC, the Epson/Canon Photo Printer, the £25 colour ink cartridge that lasts 30 photos, the £20 black ink cartridge that lasts the same, the £1-a sheet paper that your printer likes to chew every second sheet of, the memory cards, the memory card reader, the NiMH batteries that last 15 minutes, the NiMH charger, the new lenses you had to buy for the camera because they made the fittings incompatible with previous lenses of the same brand.

Slightly off, but something else about daws. Theres a lot of food in the kitchen. Lots of choices available. However focused you are on getting what you want. The distractions are infinite. With more traditional recording setups, you got your sound and recorded that. Almost now like im recording 'to it' as opposed to it recording 'from me'. Nurse

/rant off

Quote Steve Albini:

---

Hello fellas.

In my recent interview with Sound On Sound magazine I said that for critical listening, or for music that means a lot to me, digital formats aren't good enough. A well-made vinyl record still sounds infinitely better than anything else.

Steve Albini.
Electrical Audio.

---

I have both a pretty good CD and Record player (and cleaner!) and I've always preferred vinyl.

I've been in the happy position to be able to listen to a CD and vinyl version of a record I recently played on - I also did some of the recording, so I know what the 'raw' product sounded like. Even though it was recorded totally on digital systems it still sounds better to me on the 180g white vinyl version.

I think it's something to do with the 'friendly' distortion but also the skill of the cutting engineer - proper 'mastering' . The vinyl version's bass is much more controlled - yet just as deep, the highs sweeter.

The thing is, a inexpensive CD player usually sounds pretty good to me. An inexpensive turntable invariably (IMHO) does not. But when you approach the 'high-end' the record player overtakes the CD in listening pleasure. All IMHO of course!

I love CD for convenience, but I would never sell my vinyl!

Stephen

--------------------
New Henry Fool album (Featuring Phil Manzenera and Jarrod Gosling) out now. https://www.burningshed.com/store/henryfool/

I have to agree absolutely with Steve Albini on this- a well pressed good quality vinyl sounds far far better than CD. For instance my original copy of Highway to Hell (AC/DC) sounds superb, the drums at the start have so much more depth and air than anything I've ever heard from CD and the guitar riff, has real crunch, and when the vocals come in, phew...its like Bonn Scott is still alive and in the room.

and I only have a Rega Planar 3 with the elyse cartridge through a midrange/budget UK hifi system and it sound much better than any CD system I've ever heard. Its like the life is back in the music, you can hear the air and the space around the instruments.

CD's suck and computer based/digital recording sucks- well done to Steve for also staying all analogue, fantastic stuff, best SOS interview in years!

keep up the good work (even though its not really Steve Albini there, is it???) I know that because the real Steve Albini WOULD take an interest in pressing the master from which vinyl is made- Frank Zappa is reknowned for getting up to 20 test pressings done of some albums before he was satisfied in the mastering quality, and FZ vinyl sounds great...

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

Hi Steve, and welcome to the SOS Forums! I always enjoy hearing your views, and find myself agreeing with many of them.

To be honest, I haven't had the opportunity to do any proper A/B comparison of the same recording between vinyl and digital since probably the late '80s, at which point I was able to do the comparison on a comparably high end audiophile turntable and CD player, with records that were well maintained and regularly cleaned on a VPI machine.

I would wonder how many people here even have access to that kind of gear.

Back then, I definitely felt that vinyl sounded better. But then again, CDs were quite new, the quality of digital gear we had available wasn't up to what we have available to us now, and the digital remastering was often poor. I also always found that CDs that were recorded/mastered from beginning to end (DDD) most often did not sound as good or musical as CDs that had at least one analogue step in there somewhere (AAD, ADD or DAD).

I held out to the bitter end, until I found I could no longer get new releases that I really wanted on vinyl, before I broke down and bought a CD player.

I still do have some vinyl, but off hand I think I only have one duplicate with vinyl/CD, which is Fagen's "The Nightfly" -- the CD of which, to my ears, sounds like it wasn't particularly well remastered for digital. Perhaps this was one of the ones that was remastered early on? I haven't had a chance to do an A/B of these yet on decent gear (I've got a Thorens turntable, but have never been particularly happy with the tone arm/cartridge combination on it -- relatively a bit thin and scratchy sounding for my liking). But in that case, I do feel that the sound of the vinyl version (mostly from memory, listening on high quality turntables, etc.) sounds better to me than the CD . . . but would it if it was better remastered and recorded at, say, 24/96? I'm not sure.

I do sometimes find that vinyl records don't have the dynamic range that a good digital recording does.

I while I realise that in the end it is the ears that matter, I would actually be curious to understand what technical reasons you feel cause vinyl to sound better than any digital recording. Or is it just the pleasing/musical artifacts of the analogue gear or process?

If the latter is the case, would inserting an analogue step (perhaps with the requiste skill and intent ) before the final pressing to digital add the necessary euphonic improvements to make the two forms more equivalent? Or would the final digital step somehow not manage to transmit the subtleties of the effects? And, if not, why?

Also, as I understand it, when a record is cut/pressed, the highs and lows are rolled off and then "reconstituted" using RIAA equalisation. Does this not add its own artifacts that may or may not have as much effect as any potential aliasing in high quality AD and/or DA conversion, particularly at higher sampling rates?

Hehe . . . I have more questions, but perhaps I'll save those for later.

I too must admit missing the tactile experience of the full size LP jackets . . . at least when listening at home. Records and a turntable were a bitch to try to carry around in your backpack, though.

--------------------
Scott
--Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?

Bob it rather depends on the camera, etc in question...

A scanner for instance is accually a digital device.

If you have a decent SLR Digital Camera you can get some amazing results with great quality, at 100% digital camera resolution tends to be good enough, but you drop it to 50% and you in effect double the D.P.I making the photo's look at lot better...

Printers do suck harshly! I get any photos i take printed professional, and have laser printers in the office for everything else, they are so much cheaper to run!

Anyway!

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

What makes me really angry is when they remaster classics, and they sound worse!

I got one the other day, recorded a 10s piece of the record, and then the same 10s from the CD...

They had re'eq'ed it, and the compression was unbelivable!

Its worth noting that when CD's first came out they where mastered to sound very crisp at the top end, to try and make the listener apperciate the 'crisp clear sound of digital'

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

Never owned but used many times.
I love the sound of the Rhodes but if it's not available, I'll use something else which still puts the idea across in the way I want.
There's more than one way to play a song.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

Pirate I agree with you there. I think my point is the comparison of like for like, in that people are forking out £400 for a small digital like a Fuji that has no interchangeable lenses and something like 6Mpixels. If you look at what £400 can buy you in "analog" cameras, you could buy a Canon AE-1 for around £80 these days, spend another £120 on a pair of nice lenses, say one all rounder and one wide angle, another £100 on associated bags, tripod, filters, and then keep the last £100 to go nuts buying some bulk film stock. The end result would be unquestionably better photographs and the user would have to learn a bit about how to take a good picture, which digital cameras tend to discourage people from.

It's a different story if you get up to stuff like EOS-1D professional digital SLRs, which can take great pictures. But when you can buy something like an AE-1 for under £100, and take images good enough for even professional uses, knowing that the camera will probably still be working in the year 2105, it shows the comparison. I think it's incredibly similar to the audio question, because many people have switched to digital (i.e. non linear sequencers) purely because it is so much easier to edit and manage large multitrack projects. Hence the reason you will find many professional newspaper, wedding, magazine, architectural etc photographers now using the pro digital SLRs. They can see results instantly and edit & transmit digital files quickly. In a way, digital makes a lot more sense for them than it does for the average home user.

I'm completely in agreement with John Willett here. Vinyl may have its merits and advantages for DJs, but quality and accuracy aren't on the list.

There are enormous technical limitations and problems involved in cutting a vinyl record -- a pressed disk doesn't sound remotely close to the source master tape, ever! And thats before we even think about the effects of dust, dirt and physical damage.

Then there are all the replay problems associated with having a disc cut with a parallel arm and replayed with a pivoted one, and of the variable vertical tracking angles, and with the different pickup stylus geometries, weights and anti-skate forces.

And then there are the radically different sonic effects of mioving magnet or moving coil pickups, capacitive loading, RIAA curve errors....

It's all a complete technological disaster which is as far behind modern digital recording performance as it was ahead of the wax cylinder.

I agree that listening to old vinyl from the 50s and 60s often delivers excellent recording quality and stunning musical performances, but the reasons for that are entirely to do with the talent and technical approach of that era.

Recordings were made of musicians with talent and ability, produced by people who knew what they were doing, and recording by skilled and knowledgeable technicians who knew how to use the limited amount of equipment they had to the best effect.

It is the sound of real instruments played well and recorded carefully in good sounding rooms. No samples, no stack of Plug-in effects, no editing thirty different takes to make one that more or less works, no overdubbing of individual parts in isolation on different days....

Thats where the differences lie, not in the mysterious qualities of a black plastic disc.

hugh

--------------------
Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

Is anyone actually getting my point?

Yes, the Rhodes is great, but it's not the only sound.

This is exactly what I was meaning in my other points. Don't always dwell on the past and what you're comfortable with.
Try things differently for a change.

I have a Korg keyboard which has a Wulrlitzer type sound. Now I've never tried one for real (heard a few) and this sound doesn't really sound like it, but it's a lovely sound and I have used it a couple of times.
I faffed around with the programming to get it sounding a bit sharper and it's a good Wurly type sound and perfectly useable, but I don't lose sleep over not having a Wurly.
It's what I play and the feeling I put into which counts for more.
I've also got a nice 'Vintage' electric piano sample in my Clavinova, and I like it. Is it a Rhodes or Wurly?
I couldn't give a toss.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

Well said Hugh.

Why do people put good records down to the black plastic disk?

To echo your words, it's always down to talent.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

Wow, reasonably famous producer type in actual sos forum post shock. Not incognito like.

Cool. Hopefully you'll stick around these parts, if you have the time?

Would you solicit my demo to someone who could possibly help me further my musical endeavours? That question could be deemed rhetorical, possibly? (semi joke?)

Enjoyed "The problem with music" article you wrote.


Vinyl? Yeah, i love vinyl. But i'd need a better set up than a 1210 to fully appreciate a well pressed good condition record.

And you really can call it a record, cause records are round with a hole in the middle, always best in black.

Now i have to go and lie down for a few years.

Nice to see a known quantity on the forum.

Yep i'm with you there Bob...

I've got a fully manual SLR with a couple of lens, and quite a few filters its a lovely camera, I use it a fair bit... but I just couldn't justify the film costs I got my self a Canon PowerShot A70 in the end, great little digital camera.

Best feature of it? The manual mode!

Its really convient when I'm out cycling I can just take the odd shot like...
http://www.msweb.co.uk/LG/IMG_3798_1.jpg

anyway!

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

Good affordable stereo (I deliberately avoid the loaded term "hi fi") has been with us since the 1960s, and really the changes (in quality, not format) since then are incremental, mostly small, and possibly in the case of CD, retrograde.

The problem as I see it is the need of hardware manufacturers to keep reinventing formats to get our wallets out of our pockets. Betamax really was better than VHS.

Manufacturers also gamble (sometimes massively) on innovation. Without which we'd no doubt be messing about with wax cylinders, so sure, a lot of this is good. And a lot is not - mp3/iPod etc being a case in point (at least quality wise - I guess it's fine to take out for a jog, which you can't do with a 1960s sideboard "stereogram").

I don't know if my affection for vinyl is all tied up with romance, nostalgia, and - yes - the sleeve artwork more than the sound quality, but the affection is real.

However, may I controversially suggest that a well recorded album done in the analogue domain (step forward Mr Albini, or indeed say White Stripes) and then properly mastered and released on CD (no flaky copy protection systems please) will also be an excellent product. Isn't the real problem, as someone said above, that there's too much crap being put out?

--------------------
Dynamite with a laser beam...

Yeah yeah, talent, the quality of the music far outweighs the medium it's pressed onto, or burned into, etc.

Absolutely.

Quote BigAl:

---

To echo your words, it's always down to talent.

---

We get it, Al. As we have the last hundred of times you've tried to impose this argument as the main focus of a different argument. Nobody's disagreeing with you on the point that it's all down to the talent and you need to work with the medium you have, not the medium you don't have available to you, etc. I would, however, like to see this thread remain a little more on-topic, before it morphs into a thread about religion and someone puts an eye out.

The subject of the thread is the relative sound quality (subjective and/or objective) of vinyl versus digital recordings, and not the quality of music itself. While we all agree the music is most important (including, I'm quite sure, Mr. Albini), the topic is quite valid irrespective of the music. We could be talking about recording birds, the sounds of animals in the jungle, trains, thunderstorms, or anything else for that matter.

Thanks.

--------------------
Scott
--Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?

Or farts?

One other thing. I was much taken with Steve Albini's comment that he'll track and mix an album in 4 - 10 days. Had a band in recently who bored the pants off me and quite possible even themselves spending 7 days on one four minute song. Bass, drums, guitar, trumpet, voice. And a zillion overdubs of every part, all comped to smithereens, because of course track count was essentially limitless, "so they could".

Oh for the luxury of being able to say "you can record it again if you like, but you'll have to lose the previous take"...!

--------------------
Dynamite with a laser beam...

Lots of valid points here...

I just dug out my *huge* vinyl collection from the 60's, 70's and 80's, set up a nice turntable (my old Techniques had seen better days...RIP old friend), and have been doing some transfers to digital.

All I can say is that the vinyl sounds pretty dang amazing! Now, could that be due to the era of the recording when everything was tracked to tape to begin with, or is it the format of the final recording?

--------------------
James
"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake" ~Napoleon Bonaparte~

There is a theory posted by a well known nusic industry person (I cant remember who and don;t have the link) that says that listening to digital music can make humans feel on edge and irritated, subconsciously wheras listening to pure analoge (a vinyl record made from analogue equipment) is relaxing and pleasant.

He also goes on to suggest that this is the cause of most of the antisocial behaviour and crime in the modern world, (and possibly terrorism?).

Hard to believe, but listening to vinyl IS more relaxing and pleasant, he gave a technical reason for it, which I cant remember.

What do you think about that???

and despite what Hugh says vinyl DOES sound much better than CD, although i do have an iPOD, just to try and prove I'm not a complete technophobe.

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

Quote Steve Hill:

---

One other thing. I was much taken with Steve Albini's comment that he'll track and mix an album in 4 - 10 days. Had a band in recently who bored the pants off me and quite possible even themselves spending 7 days on one four minute song. Bass, drums, guitar, trumpet, voice. And a zillion overdubs of every part, all comped to smithereens, because of course track count was essentially limitless, "so they could".

Oh for the luxury of being able to say "you can record it again if you like, but you'll have to lose the previous take"...!

---

I think if a band was any good they should take no more than 2 weeks (10 days) to make an album, somthing else I agree with Steve Albini on, even though its not really him posting.

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

One has to take these sort of things with more than a little sodium chloride. Just check out the "roll up, roll up! snake-oil" vibe of the Diamond Center's website.....

http://www.diamondcenter.net/AR-HumanStress.html

But it's ok, you can take vitamins that make the CDs analog again.

I'm sorry for suggesting that good recordings are purely down to the equipment which is being used. Bad Al.

Anyway, why didn't you direct your post at Hugh - he made the point and I just greed with him.
He summed the whole vinyl thing up quite well. Some may prefer the sound, but it's far from perfect.

Do you want clear audio recordings or coloured and distorted ones?

Does it matter?

So lets forget the talent thing. What do we assume? that we've recorded a top song, performed by a top singer and band, recorded by a top engineer and produced by a top producer.

Has anyone (and I'd be interested) actually recorded the same piece and routed the mic's to two machines (one analogue and one digital) ? - Produced a vinyl copy of the analogue and a CD of the digital.
Then we could have a more level playing field for the discussion.

The problem is that the talent is always assumed and then people think that they need some 2 grand preamp and mic to make good recordings, whether for CD or vinyl. You don't and in these cases, they either don't know what they're doing or the performers aren't good.

How can you discuss the merits of two recording mediums without relating to some sort of audio output?
Let's not turn this into a HiFi type thread.

All our recording experiences are different and we base our opinions on our own experiences. How can I say I prefer vinyl or analogue when all I remember is scratches and pops and recordings done in analogue studios sounding worse than mine.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

Scott,

I prefer the sound of a blackbird on 2" transferred to vinyl via a 0.5" master.
On the other hand, the magpie just sounds better at 24-bit 96kHz digital.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

yes, digital sucks the soul out of music....

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

Doublehelix,
Part of the difficulty with this debate is that it's hard to compare like for like with CD and Vinyl, because....

Most of the CDs we can buy now of classic 70s records are remastered, which may mean "remastered slightly better" or "remastered to death". So the new version may be better sounding simply because of remastering, or it may be worse sounding simply due to the remastering

And the other side of the coin, brand new records that are given a simultaneous Vinyl and CD release, well it's 99% likely they were recorded mixed and mastered fully digitally, with a straight digital copy going to CD and the vinyl pressing being the only analog component in the whole chain. So these also can't really be compared because we may be hearing something in the recording that is down to the recording and mixing method and technology.

The only real comparison is an un-remastered CD version compared to the original pressing of an album, say for example Songs in the Key of Life by Stevie Wonder. If you could find an early CD release that hadn't mean remastered and compare it to a mint copy of the vinyl. Interesting that someone mentioned the Tubes above because I just bought the CD of "Outside Inside", and *yawn* while it does sound immaculately clean and "correct", my vinyl copy still has something...more.

While Hugh and John are totally right about technical accuracy of the CD format, maybe it's not about that, maybe it really is the imperfection of the Vinyl that gives something a human charm, just like with tape.

Bob

Quote BigAl:

---

Has anyone (and I'd be interested) actually recorded the same piece and routed the mic's to two machines (one analogue and one digital) ? - Produced a vinyl copy of the analogue and a CD of the digital.
Then we could have a more level playing field for the discussion.

---

That was indeed a large part of my initial query. I imagine Mr. Albini has, and a few others here possibly have -- at least to some degree.

Quote:

---

How can I say I prefer vinyl or analogue when all I remember is scratches and pops and recordings done in analogue studios sounding worse than mine.

---

Exactly. I would bet that a good many people here haven't had the chance to compare under the proper circumstances and equipment with to make a fair subjective comparison.

[EDIT: And also . . . What Bob said above. ]

--------------------
Scott
--Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?

You dont think it really is him then?

Probably not though.... Coo, an optimist for a few seconds there, cant have that.

Now if it was Elvis....

Quote The real musiclover:

---

Now if it was Elvis....

---

Actually, Elvis has been spotted alive and well, living in Kalamazoo, Michigan, which is only a couple of hours' drive from Chicago.

--------------------
Scott
--Where are we going and why am I in this handbasket?

The biggest problem with digital photography is the hidden costs if you wish to print. You don't have to think in big numbers in terms of photos taken before buying and developing film is just as cheap.
I think the culture of viewing may change (DVD on the TV).

I wasn't convinced by digital photography and I have a Fuji camera which I don't like at all.
I got a shot of a Nikon SLR Digital and the quality is fantastic - even blown up to A3 and printed at medium quality on a plotter!

Anyway, back to the vinyl...

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

Quote BigAl:

---

_snip_Let's not turn this into a HiFi type thread.

All our recording experiences are different and we base our opinions on our own experiences. How can I say I prefer vinyl or analogue when all I remember is scratches and pops and recordings done in analogue studios sounding worse than mine.

---

it IS allready a hifi type of thread as "Steve Albini" (yeah right) asked is vinyl better than CD, is that not a HiFi type question???

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

Quote Scottdru:

---

Quote The real musiclover:

---

Now if it was Elvis....

---

Actually, Elvis has been spotted alive and well, living in Kalamazoo, Michigan, which is only a couple of hours' drive from Chicago.

---

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

Quote The Bob Campbell:

---

Doublehelix,
Part of the difficulty with this debate is that it's hard to compare like for like with CD and Vinyl, because....

---

Great post, and I agree wholeheartedly!

btw...Songs in the key of life is one of my favorite albums of all time, and I am usually a "rocker" by heart! What an incredible piece of music that album is!!!

--------------------
James
"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake" ~Napoleon Bonaparte~

Quote Hugh Robjohns:

---

It is the sound of real instruments played well and recorded carefully in good sounding rooms. No samples, no stack of Plug-in effects, no editing thirty different takes to make one that more or less works, no overdubbing of individual parts in isolation on different days....

Thats where the differences lie, not in the mysterious qualities of a black plastic disc.

hugh

---

Hugh

See my post above; the album I mention uses real instruments and very good musicians (ahem! ) but also a lot of plug-ins, editing, VI's and the whole modern studio caboodle.

So it can't just be the things you mention above that make vinyl sound so good. I have a lot of new vinyl and it's almost always better than the CD version. These days it's usually well pressed too - which couldn't be said for all the vinyl in the '70s and '80s.

Stephen

--------------------
New Henry Fool album (Featuring Phil Manzenera and Jarrod Gosling) out now. https://www.burningshed.com/store/henryfool/


Edited by Stephen Bennett (18/08/05 03:14 PM)

Quote The Bob Campbell:

---

While Hugh and John are totally right about technical accuracy of the CD format, maybe it's not about that, maybe it really is the imperfection of the Vinyl that gives something a human charm, just like with tape.

---

Is it possible to reproduce imperfection of vinyl on CD?
I would appreciate if Hugh R. can share his opinion on this one.

I am absolutely sure that if for example Pink Floyd albums from 70s
*Dark Side Of The Moon
*Wish You Were Here
*Animals
could be re-released on CDs that sound like vinyl
they would sell millions.

Is it possible to take high quality LP(not original tape)
and transfer it to CD without any stupid re-mastering?
Can it sound like vinyl?
Is it perfection or imperfection that make it sound this way I don't really care.

Digi Em.

"Back then in 1980, I had only digitally recorded and/or mastered vinyl LPs to test. The arrival of CDs a few years later increased the problem. As with LPs, but more so, the stress leads after a certain time (different for each individual) to a reversal of their usual ethical and medical standards of belief. The effects of this profound change that I have now investigated for some twenty years are I believe a very important etiological factor in the increase in childhood and adolescent disturbances, (witness the soaring rate of Ritalin prescribing), and in the escalating violence in our society.



Especially when we recall that the digital process is no longer confined to recorded music but is now affecting us nearly all day: TV, radio, telephones etc. It is we who have become digitalized!"

there you go! digital has ruined the world.......

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

The routing experiment would be very interesting, but I would argue that it would be a waste of time.
I know what you're saying about recording birds etc.... (too limited frequency range to hear all pros and cons ), but what are you going to find out?
The bird reference has a serious point behind it, because once you find that out, what clear conclusions can be made?
{well it is also funny }

You'd be as well recording tones of various frequencies, but again what does that tell you when you are about to record some performers.

A strict A/B test is the only way of a clear comparison. I've seen a good A/B in a shop with digital and analogue SKY boxes into the same 32" wide TV.
the analogue picture was great with a nice softness which I like.
The digital was clear and perfect.
I preferred the analogue, but we're clutching at straws here.
I reckon my TV analogy isn't far away from the one we are discussing (what are we discussing again?)

Digital - good clear perfect reproduction.
Analogue - same but a bit softer due to a little distortion.

In all honesty, the record or CD is a representation of a performance - not the actual performance itself. You have to be there for that.
On whatever medium through your hifi, neither to that extent are anywhere near actually being in the room with the Marshall amp up full or the orchestra in the room.

Due to that, both CD and Vinyl are good enough and the difference between the two isn't as big a difference as being there and not being there.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

So why then are we using expensive mics and preamps.
We should use cheap dynamic mics and average preamps to dirty it up.

It's time I went home.

Gigging this evening...

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

As a non-techie, are we not all missing something here? Us humans listen to everything analogue - we certainly don't have ears with ADDA converters. The sound we hear is usually caused by a speaker cone being made to move in and out to transmit the sound waves - a very analogue process because the cone can take up infinite positions between fully in and fully out. I am finding it hard to believe that it isn't possible to drive a speaker using a digitally generated sound so that the ins and outs, so to speak, exactly match the ins and outs produced by playing something recorded analogue. Surely the point is that we generally like the sound of analogue recordings because they are in fact "coloured" by the recording process itself, and the holy grail of making digital sound like analogue is actually a quest to mimic those "colourations".

If we had carried on developing analogue recording and vinyl and record player technology. Then where would we be at now? Maybe some of those problems that Hugh pointed out would be smaller or gone problems. And 32 track home machines would be standard project kit.

I think vinyl and tape go in better they seem to stick in my memory better. But maybe thats the beer plugin.

Here's the thing that convinced me when I was very young.
With digital, you are listening to a light that is translating data.
With tape, you are listening to the movement of a magnetic field's fluctuations. Getting closer.
With vinyl, you are listening to a physical object vibrating, physically recreating the vibrations that were in the room at the time of the tracking. It is the closest thing to a 'mould' of the sound that leaves the instruments. A physical, analog representation. My ears like it better.

I think the problem with digital is that it isnt really music its just numbers. When you look at a vinyl record, you can SEE the music, you can SEE the soundwaves as the grooves, turn the volume down and you can still hear music coming directly off the surface of the record, wheras digital is merely a numerical representaion of chunks of loudness, the sound is "squared off" by both the sampling rate and bit depth and thats what you can hear on a CD that is irritating compared to the smooth warm, relaxing sound to a vinyl record.

That guy may be trying to con people into buying his vitamins, but thats not to say he's not wrong about the stressfull effects of audio digitisation.

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

Quote jerry123:

---

...you are listening to a physical object vibrating...

---

Welcome to the forum brother

Quote ow:

---

If we had carried on developing analogue recording and vinyl and record player technology. Then where would we be at now? Maybe some of those problems that Hugh pointed out would be smaller or gone problems. And 32 track home machines would be standard project kit.

I think vinyl and tape go in better they seem to stick in my memory better. But maybe thats the beer plugin.

---

no, you're right, the real crime here is that by the late 70's, analogue quality was still getting better that included both the recording technology and also the playback technology (vinyl), but today with MP3's and the like taking over digital is making the quality worse and in a much less pleasant way, as bad digital sounds far worse than bad analogue.

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

listening to "the Dark Side of the Moon" vinyl on a £20,000 set-up (that includes the loudspeakers, can't remember the brand of it all) was the most memorable listening experience I ever had..

now count me on the vinyl lovers side


I have technics SL1200s at home and although they're not *great* sounding devices I still prefer their sound over iPod's sound... but I also use an iPod for commuting and on-the-go listening..

Quote Chickenjohn:

---

I think the problem with digital is that it isnt really music its just numbers. When you look at a vinyl record, you can SEE the music, you can SEE the soundwaves as the grooves

---

That just cannot be serious.
When after WW2 taperecorders become available
it was clearly an improvement, there is no argument against it.
And of course you couldn't see the music.

Digi Em.

Quote Digital Emotions:

---

Quote Chickenjohn:

---

I think the problem with digital is that it isnt really music its just numbers. When you look at a vinyl record, you can SEE the music, you can SEE the soundwaves as the grooves

---

That's just cannot be serious.
When after WW2 taperecorders become available
it was clearly an improvement, there is no argument against it.
And of course you couldn't see the music.

Digi Em.

---

I think your missing my point, on analogue tape the sound is still there in a captured magnetic form as analogue waves of magnetism on the tape. My mention of seeing the soundwaves on a record shows that the sound is actually on the record, its not just numbers.

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

are you blind?

if you can look at a record and hear the music then you are a spaceman!

Edited by ow (18/08/05 03:50 PM)

I used to have a high end turntable and now I just listen to my CD collection via i-Tunes broadcast on my hifi system (still quite a nice one). I think that analogue sounds different but not necessarily better. I prefer the sound of analogue but it is a pain to have to get up every five minutes to change a track or record....and the good hifi stuff to get the best off a record is just too big; my turntable was made of four separate components as was my amp, all with dedicated power supplies etc, it was a joke, and now I am as happy as larry with i-Tunes. Did you know that Max Townsend, designer of the Rock Turntable, one of the best every made, said that he would love to be able to made a turntable that did base as well as a £200 CD player!!! But, I would not sell my Jupiter 4, Minimoog, CS60 etc though, but I do have a Roland and Yamaha modern thing for convenience of having lots of instant sounds on tap. These days convenience seems to be winning with music reproduction (and in dance circles with recording); maybe we all have our work/life balance wrong!!!!!

Quote Digital Emotions:

---

-snip-Digi Em.

---

just clocked your username.....
digital emotions, somewhat of a misnomer, me thinks, an oxymoron?

not you personally, just the very idea of putting the words "Digital" and "emotion" together...

join the guy who's just heard Dark Side of the moon as it should be heard and change to "Analogue emotions" puh-leease...

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

Quote Chickenjohn:

---

Quote Digital Emotions:

---

Quote Chickenjohn:

---

I think the problem with digital is that it isnt really music its just numbers. When you look at a vinyl record, you can SEE the music, you can SEE the soundwaves as the grooves

---

That's just cannot be serious.
When after WW2 taperecorders become available
it was clearly an improvement, there is no argument against it.
And of course you couldn't see the music.

Digi Em.

---

I think your missing my point, on analogue tape the sound is still there in a captured magnetic form as analogue waves of magnetism on the tape. My mention of seeing the soundwaves on a record shows that the sound is actually on the record, its not just numbers.

---

would be nice idea if RIAA wasn't there

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

Quote ow:

---

are you blind?

if you can look at a record and hear the music then you are a spaceman!

---

Not blind, but quite short sighted actually , I've had to wear glasses since I was a kid, and not deaf, thankfully so I CAN hear how much better vinyl sounds than CD.

Oh, and thanks for the compliment! NASA take note of OW and please employ me as a spaceman!

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

no offence, im a happy poster man

this is gorgeous! you can tell its going to sound good (OW) just by looking at it! The quality of analogue......

--------------------
Chaas
cJ na

A bit late to the discussion but here goes...

I can't stand vinyl and never have done, in fact I bloody hate it.
Why? Because once the sounds I've spent weeks recording and mixing are pressed onto vinyl they're magically transformed into a warped platter full of scratches, hiss, pops and distortion that destroys any dynamics, nuances or clarity the original music had. The sooner vinyl dies out the better!

Chris Carter
(been releasing stuff on vinyl since 1977)

And you can quote me on that...

Ive just shot my bolt!

does it matter what you prefer?!!?

Of course not it's the music that matters so get a grip on reality and stop taking crap ..Led zep4 is gonna sound great whether it's on my grannys gramophone or on N.A.S.A.s latest digital device....

Beauty is in the ears of the beholder....

Quote Scottdru:

---

The subject of the thread is the relative sound quality (subjective and/or objective) of vinyl versus digital recordings, and not the quality of music itself. While we all agree the music is most important (including, I'm quite sure, Mr. Albini), the topic is quite valid irrespective of the music. We could be talking about recording birds, the sounds of animals in the jungle, trains, thunderstorms, or anything else for that matter.

---

In which case it is easy to show that current, well designed and constructed digital recording technology surpasses (and by quite some margin) any form of analogue recording (tape, vinyl, or whatever) in every possible measureable technical quantity: signal-noise, headroom, linearity, distortion, wow and flutter, bandwidth and so on.

Quite simply, whatever you put on digital you get back the same way. It doesn't come back with wobbly pitch, or added harmonic distortion, or transient distortion, or tracking distortion, or noise modulation, or added noise come to that...

Clearly, some people like all those things -- just as some people like sepia-toned photographs -- and that's fine. We are talking about musical art here after all. But the technical argumetns are entirely pointless because the case has already been proven absolutely and completely.

I have several hundred vinyl records. I play some of them occasionally/ I love the scale of them, the cover art, the very tactile quality of loading the record onto the turntable adn lowering the cartrdige. I quite enjoy tinkering with the VTA and raking weights too -- it's all part of the fun.

But I also know that if I swapped the cartridge for another make it would sound completely different. Same applies to swapping the turntable itself. It is not a reliable, consistent or accurate medium. End of story.

hugh

--------------------
Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

sound, is accually changes in presure.

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

Quote Chickenjohn:

---

The quality of analogue......

---

How did you get a picture of my studio? (I wish!)

i'll tell you this for nothing on the earth sound travels faster in one direction! but which one is it!

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

Nine out of ten Dogs say they like Vinyl better

You know, if you'd round up a dozen or so "critical listeners" who have years of experience with mastering, mixing, and things of that sort,... and you play them a song off of a CD on some $3000 ADAM monitors, and then you play the same song but off of vinyl though that has absolutely no scratches and doesn't pop (not telling which song is digital which is not) do you really think that they would be able to make a unanimous decision? I think not!

I think they could

Well I'm glad my opinion is in line with Hugh and John's, it makes me feel like I'm still a proper engineer, and not a sentimentalist.

It may be because I've never had access to a top-end turntable and hi-fi setup, but all vinyl to me sounds dreadful. It sounds like there is a low-pass filter at 12kHz, there's no top end there. And the point about bass has already been made. I'd rather make a recording distributed on CD that gets played in a £200 CD player and is guaranteed to sound accurate, than make a recording that ends up on vinyl and sounds awful played through a £200 home turntable setup. I must admit though I can't stand mp3 under 256kbps.

There's no point in arguments along the lines of 'there's no emotion in numbers' / you can't see the music / stepped waveforms sound bad. The mathematics of A/D and D/A is solid. I agree that 16-bit should be improved upon (especially for classical) and that higher sample rates can make digital processing sound better, but:

Fundamentally, digital replay has a better frequency response, distortion spec, dynamic range, wow and flutter, crosstalk etc etc than vinyl.

Oh, and before someone argues that better spec doesn't mean better sound, I think that it does. Having said all that, I quite like the sound of open-reel tape on some material, but accept that it isn't as accurate as digital.

One last point to do with the digital camera comparison (I am a bit of a (film) photographer ) - it seems that the best results are had with digital cameras by capturing the image in RAW mode, exposing to retain as much information as possible then doing post-processing on it to make it look the best possible (boost saturation maybe, shift the white balance) before creating the final TIFF or jpeg file. It strikes me that this is similar to recording in 24-bit then applying mastering plugins, normalising and dithering down to 16-bit for CD distribution. In comparison, with film, the film itself has a certain 'look' - colour balance, saturation etc, which is pleasing but isn't exactly accurate - and the lab enhance this. A bit like tape compression and distortion making things sound good, and having to work harder with digital to get similar sounds.

I'm rambling now, I'll stop.

Matt

EDIT: Oops, took me so long to write that Hugh made the point first!

Edited by mattneighbour (18/08/05 04:19 PM)

Hello Steve
Records played on average systems never sounded that good.
What system do you use?

--------------------
.. is this thing on?

And it's great fun turning Pink and Perky records down to slower speeds to hear the guy singing.

--------------------
Jack of all trades, master of some.

ye theres a chance they could, things are mastered specifcally for vinyl...

its likely to have a different tonal quality...

how about you put the record's sound on the cd, and play the cd though that RIAA filter as well! less varibles!

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

Depends according to general theory of relativatity....and where you are equator or poles

yep

and the fact that we are moving!

constant movement is a bee to spot!

--------------------
P.I.G.L.E.T - where is polly?

While we're talking Vinyl, I have a SUBERB old turntable made by a company called Goldring Lenco. It's 70's, with lovely wood body, tiny little weights for the tone arm and a fabulous sound.

trouble is, I cant find a cartridge for it

Any ideas anyone? I assume Stantons and-the-like wont work, in fact pretty sure they wont.

--------------------
"If I had all the money i'd spent on drink, i'd spend it on drink". Vivian Stanshall

Edited by Les (from the Island of Lesbos) (18/08/05 04:27 PM)

Quote Chickenjohn:

---

There is a theory posted by a well known nusic industry person (I cant remember who and don;t have the link) that says that listening to digital music can make humans feel on edge and irritated, subconsciously wheras listening to pure analoge (a vinyl record made from analogue equipment) is relaxing and pleasant.

He also goes on to suggest that this is the cause of most of the antisocial behaviour and crime in the modern world, (and possibly terrorism?).

Hard to believe, but listening to vinyl IS more relaxing and pleasant, he gave a technical reason for it, which I cant remember.

What do you think about that???

and despite what Hugh says vinyl DOES sound much better than CD, although i do have an iPOD, just to try and prove I'm not a complete technophobe.

---

I think I read that comment in an interview somewhere with Rupert Neve. I don't have golden ears myself, but I can understand his point if I think about badly encoded mp3s, for instance - they irritate the hell out of me. As for vinyl being better than CD, I prefer to concentrate on the emotion of the music - when I master that (i.e. never!) then I'll move onto the vinyl vs CD question...

Hehe, Goldrings, 16-78rpm and beyond.

To boldly listen where no one has listened before.

Quote Stephen Bennett:

---

I have a lot of new vinyl and it's almost always better than the CD version.

---

But how do you define better? You clearly don't mean better in any technial, objective sense, because we can show that vinyl technology certainly isn't better than digital technology.

So you must be talking about subjective preferences... and that is a no-win argument isn't it. What I prefer is always going to sound better to me than what you prefer...

I once spent a considerable amount of time listening to two stereo loudspeaker setups hidden from view behind a curtain. One pair was significantly 'better' than the other.
It turned out the two systems were identical in every way except that one had a tweak to the crossover that gave a mild lift of 0.75dB in the upper midrange -- yet it sounded more open, more spacious and seemed to have a richer bottom end too!

The frequency response of most record playing systems is all over the place, so it's not surprising that subjective opinions vary so much!

I've spent a lot of time in studios comparing directly what came through the desk and over the speakers during the recording, with what came back off whatever medium I was recording on. In the days of tape, the difference was clearly audible -- not unpleasant, but audible all the same. With good quality digits (and I'm the first to ackonwledge that a lot of budget gear isn't 'good'), the perceivable difference is so small as to be utterly irrelevant.

I've also been able to comapre at first hand several pressed vinyl discs with their original tapes, and again the differences were obvious and not entirely flattering. I'm not saying the records were unpleasant, but they were certainly not the same as the tapes.

If you like the sound of vinyl that's fine. Enjoy it. Some people like the sound of 78s or old cassette tapes too. But please don't try to tell me they are 'better'. More enjoyable to you on your replay system, maybe, but not 'better'.

hugh

--------------------
Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

Quote Hugh Robjohns:

---

Quote Scottdru:

---

The subject of the thread is the relative sound quality (subjective and/or objective) of vinyl versus digital recordings, and not the quality of music itself. While we all agree the music is most important (including, I'm quite sure, Mr. Albini), the topic is quite valid irrespective of the music. We could be talking about recording birds, the sounds of animals in the jungle, trains, thunderstorms, or anything else for that matter.

---

In which case it is easy to show that current, well designed and constructed digital recording technology surpasses (and by quite some margin) any form of analogue recording (tape, vinyl, or whatever) in every possible measureable technical quantity: signal-noise, headroom, linearity, distortion, wow and flutter, bandwidth and so on.

Quite simply, whatever you put on digital you get back the same way. It doesn't come back with wobbly pitch, or added harmonic distortion, or transient distortion, or tracking distortion, or noise modulation, or added noise come to that...

Clearly, some people like all those things -- just as some people like sepia-toned photographs -- and that's fine. We are talking about musical art here after all. But the technical argumetns are entirely pointless because the case has already been proven absolutely and completely.

I have several hundred vinyl records. I play some of them occasionally/ I love the scale of them, the cover art, the very tactile quality of loading the record onto the turntable adn lowering the cartrdige. I quite enjoy tinkering with the VTA and raking weights too -- it's all part of the fun.

But I also know that if I swapped the cartridge for another make it would sound completely different. Same applies to swapping the turntable itself. It is not a reliable, consistent or accurate medium. End of story.

hugh

---

Hugh I agree with you (mostly) about digitial reproduction in the studio, but not the home. You seem to suggest that all CD players sound the same (the inference taking from your cartridge change on your turntable), surely you cannot be suggesting that every CD player will make a CD sound exactly the same if played through the same amp and speakers? Probably a slip of the digit with your typing. My personal experience in blind tests (which is how I chose my current CD player and amp) is that CD players do sound different, some more than others in the same way that turntables do.

The other problem is that D/A A/D converters and digital converters in digital desks do not all sound the same so what ends on on a hard disk does not always sound like the original instrument or singer, especially if it was not a digital instrument which is why there are budget converters and high end converters, desk etc.

Me, I'm happy so long as I like the music, but agree that playing with turntables is fun once in a while and can sound nice to many of us who grew up having no choice as CD had not been invented.

One more thing, drag a nail across a record and then, do the same to the CD version of the release. Let me know which one sounds better then.

Quote Jon Dickinson:

---

As for vinyl being better than CD, I prefer to concentrate on the emotion of the music

---

I agree with that bit.

Quote maaszy:

---

Us humans listen to everything analogue - we certainly don't have ears with ADDA converters.

---

Er.. yes we do. The nerve cells in the inner ear send digital pulses to the brain.... The ear is a very sophisticated (and extremely non-linear) A-D converter.

Quote:

---

Surely the point is that we generally like the sound of analogue recordings because they are in fact "coloured" by the recording process itself, and the holy grail of making digital sound like analogue is actually a quest to mimic those "colourations".

---

I think you have a good point here.

hugh

--------------------
Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

is it true that vinyl/tape can provide a greater frequency range than a cd.

Quote Chickenjohn:

---

I think your missing my point, on analogue tape the sound is still there in a captured magnetic form as analogue waves of magnetism on the tape.

---

Magnetic recording is a digital medium. You can only have two states: N-S or S-N -- that is a Binary state. it is a digital medium.

With 'analogue recording' on tape, there are a huge number of available magnetic 'cells', and the relative proportion of those biased N-S as opposed to S-N is used to encode the required 'analogue' signal state -- just as in a digital medium it is the balance of 1s and 0s. Your argument is fatally flawed I'm afraid.

Hugh

--------------------
Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

Quote Hugh Robjohns:

---

Quote:

---

Surely the point is that we generally like the sound of analogue recordings because they are in fact "coloured" by the recording process itself, and the holy grail of making digital sound like analogue is actually a quest to mimic those "colourations".

---

I think you have a good point here.

---

In a world of many thumbhits, sometimes the hammer strikes a nail fairly squarely, very good point.