Does anyone still use or like vinyl?

[Dave2002]

I have a few hundred I'd like to see go to a good home.

Maybe you've been inundated with requests for listings. Your inbox is full.

bws, Dave

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Oh, right. I'll sort that out. I'm a bit surprised as I deleted loads of messages recently.


Edit: now sorted.

[umslopogaas]

Eine Alp, if you havent already sold them, I might be interested, but I'll need some more information. If you are interested, could you send me a PM indicating how many, what sort of composers, and a sample of labels (hopefully Columbia SAX and 33CX, HMV ASD, Mercury AMS, DG SLPM etc)? I'm assuming they are classical music and in good nick, no scratches and not played with dodgy needles. Also they would need to be original issues, Decca Eclipse, Classics for Pleasure and that sort of thing are not collectible.

[pastoralguy]

The earlier ones are heavier, LPs from the seventies and eighties were much thinner..

I recently inherited my great aunt Mary's record collection that she started in the late 50's/early 60's. The discs are noticeably heavier compared with the shoddy products that were being foisted on the public in the 70's and 80's with the resulting lack of sound quality. No wonder CDs were welcomed with open arms despite their high price!

What I do find very sad is the modern trend for melting lps into bowl shapes. A sad end to what may once have been someone's treasure.

[umslopogaas]

The early ones could be very fine quality, if you can find an undamaged specimen and you have good equipment to play it. The later ones werent necessarily shoddy, but they were very prone to distortion due to heat damage, unequal pressure in storage and that sort of thing. I think the main reasons why CDs swept the board were their relative indestructibility, their greater storage capacity and the fact that you could play them in the car. The sound quality wasnt necessarily superior, because the LPs they replaced in the early 1980s were also digitally recorded.

It would terrible vandalism to turn a collectible classical LP into a plant pot, but I can think of plenty of musical dross for which that would be an appropriate fate! I guess, also, that it would be an appropriate end for LPs that are damaged or worn out beyond the possibility of playing. In my time I must have wrecked many before I finally got equipment that would track them properly without damage.

[pastoralguy]

For me, the low point of vinyl was an RCA Red Seal Lp of Perlman playing the Tchaikovsky concerto that resembled one of those bendy discs that were given away free with pop magazines. It sounded appalling and distorted on any music that was over mezzo forte. I avoided Perlman for years afterwards having been so dissapointed with that record. I suppose, inevitably, that the depth of ones pocket would make a difference but as a teenager in the 70' & 80's I had very modest equipment.

Having said that, I still have the first cd I ever bought (Uchida and Tait playing Mozart's 20th & 21st piano concertos with the ECO) and it sounds just as terrific as when I first bought it. I do remember hearing it played on a £100,000 Linn system and my jaw hit the floor! All that sound from a little polycarbonate disc! Pure magic.

[umslopogaas]

Well yes ... for a hundred thousand quid it certainly should have sounded good! I have always found that whenever I have decided to upgrade my hifi, the biggest improvements are from better speakers, closer followed by a better cartridge. Having got a good amplifier, CD player, record deck and tuner, I cant see much advantage in spending more. My hifi shop is always trying to persuade me to "upgrade" to a more expensive deck, but my response is always, mine goes round at thirty three and a third and doesnt rumble, what more do I want? And though a more expensive amplifier might sound better, I suspect it would be a lot of extra money for not much improvement. I did recently buy a more expensive CD player and to be frank (hope my dealer isnt reading this) I cant hear much of an improvement. But speakers and cartridges, yes, spend more there and you will hear improvements.

[umslopogaas]

pastoralguy, can you remember who was conducting on that RCA LP? I have a 1968 RCA Red Seal (SB 6768) with Perlman playing the Tchaikovsky concerto with the Boston SO conducted by Leinsdorf, and its a very good quality item, not in the least bendy. But yours may have been a later reissue, when they were skimping on the vinyl.

[pastoralguy]

pastoralguy, can you remember who was conducting on that RCA LP? I have a 1968 RCA Red Seal (SB 6768) with Perlman playing the Tchaikovsky concerto with the Boston SO conducted by Leinsdorf, and its a very good quality item, not in the least bendy. But yours may have been a later reissue, when they were skimping on the vinyl.

Yes, that was the one! It was probably a re-issue but this was a very shoddy item indeed. Of course I avoided RCA like the plague for a long time afterwards so the few penny's RCA saved on low production value was a false economy. I also had a cassette on RCA which had a break in the last movement of a Brahms symphony.

I've popped the Perlman Tchaikovsky cd in and have to admit it sounds terrific.

[umslopogaas]

It certainly was a false economy by RCA, because up until then RCA had a very high reputation for quality. Many of the earlier stereo recordings were actually made by Decca, who hifi buffs regard as leaders of the pack in terms of sound quality. The earlier SB 2000 series are very collectible, though the later SB 6000s are not, for some reason: they sound fine to me.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

It certainly was a false economy by RCA, because up until then RCA had a very high reputation for quality.

I recall RCA proclaiming the thinner discs as a virtue - the extra "squeeze" by the presses eliminating air bubbles. A few people actually believed this.

[visualnickmos]

I recall RCA proclaiming the thinner discs as a virtue - the extra "squeeze" by the presses eliminating air bubbles. A few people actually believed this.

I did buy one or two at the time; they were truly awful sound qulaity-wise, and looked very 'wobbly' as they spun! After that, I avoided them altogether. Thank goodness CDs came along....

[Bryn]

One of the very worse RCA LPs, in my experience, was a red vinyl pressing of a digital recording of Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra (Philladelphia/Ormandy).

[richardfinegold]

The early ones could be very fine quality, if you can find an undamaged specimen and you have good equipment to play it. The later ones werent necessarily shoddy, but they were very prone to distortion due to heat damage, unequal pressure in storage and that sort of thing. I think the main reasons why CDs swept the board were their relative indestructibility, their greater storage capacity and the fact that you could play them in the car. The sound quality wasnt necessarily superior, because the LPs they replaced in the early 1980s were also digitally recorded.

It would terrible vandalism to turn a collectible classical LP into a plant pot, but I can think of plenty of musical dross for which that would be an appropriate fate! I guess, also, that it would be an appropriate end for LPs that are damaged or worn out beyond the possibility of playing. In my time I must have wrecked many before I finally got equipment that would track them properly without damage.

I've written this before but it bears repeating. I worked in a record shop in a Collage town in the 70s. We used to send back large amounts of inventory as unplayable, untrackable lps. During that time old vinyl was melted down to make new and the lps were also made thinner. The product was terrible. CD was welcomed as a breakthrough technology. I remember buying a Debussy record that was unplayable, being so angry I could spit, and then a year or so later after having bought my first CD player buying the same album as my first CD, having it play flawlessly, with increased range (readily apparent on what was probably a 14 bit player) and thinking I had landed in Heaven.
A CD replayed on an uber system will sound great, but if a warped lp won't track, even a turntable costing 100 grand can't fix that.
I have invested in a vinyl replay system. When I buy lps-which is virtually never now, as I have a few neighbors that give me some of their collections--I always try to avoid anything from the 70s.

[umslopogaas]

Bryn #238, I think this is another case of that particular pressing run being rubbish, rather than the LP per se. I have Ormandy and the Philadelphia playing the Concerto for Orchestra on a CBS LP SBRG 72282; the vinyl is standard black with a blue label, not in the least floppy and sounds fine. It is dated 1965, whereas I suspect yours dates from the early/mid 1970s, when the manufacturers were skimping on vinyl.