Can anyone explain the vinyl renaissance?

[MattHooper]

you had me at obsolete.

You beautiful bastard. I was going to ask if they were yours but I see you've answered. I can appreciate this level of insanity from afar!

 

[Sal1950]

yup.
The TASCAM works great still. It is too bad that it won't take 10-1/2 inch reels, though.

The Pioneer's a 909. It is currently in need of rehab. If nothing else, the tape tension rollers need to be cleaned and the damping fluid in 'em refreshed. I got as far as procuring the silicone damping fluid of the correct density and reading the instructions.

An overall awesome collection of older gear.
Do you have many factory RTR Quad tapes to play on the TASCAM?
They're getting big money for them by traders.

 

[mhardy6647]

I don't think I have any quad tapes. I'll have to look.
I certainly haven't procured any 1) deliberately and/or 2) "recently" (i.e., in the digital era).

 

[Sal1950]

I don't think I have any quad tapes. I'll have to look.
I certainly haven't procured any 1) deliberately and/or 2) "recently" (i.e., in the digital era).

Sure, just wondered.
With just about everything done back then in Quad RTR now released on digital, only the
hard core collectors are still out there acquiring them. In a few cases only the RTR Quad tapes
(and some original Quad vinyl) had survived to be used as a sources for modern releases.

 

[theREALdotnet]

I rate a Guarneri cello even higher. Here is a picture of a concert with the cellist Rohan de Saram who played a piece by Zoltan Kodaly. An unbelievably good sound! I could personally compliment him on his great instrument.

View attachment 298947

Are you sure that’s a Guarneri? It would have to be a heavily modified one, with the huge metal endpin and long neck.

 

[Newman]

As soon as you compress the recording, - beyond what the microphone and preamps are doing - you have further changed the nature of the recorded music. The case can be made that nothing can match the live performance. I think this is especially true of live un-amplified instruments. Even with electronic instruments - electric guitar, bass guitar, synthesizer, etc - the live performance involves speakers and amps that add their own “sound” to what you hear. Nothing will be the same after being recorded. This could be more multiple reasons. First - can your microphone capture the dynamic range and frequency response of the live event. Second - what did the electronics do to both of these qualities before it gets digitized. Third - what kind of compression and DSP did the mastering engineers perform on the recording to meet “what they thought it should sound like”?
At this point, one may realize than “none of these recordings are really true to the source” and whether you listen to it on vinyl, streaming, CD’s, music server file playback, etc - your personal subjective preference is going to be the determining factor.

Yep.

Nup. Meaning 'no' to the claim that the sound of the live event is the goal, and the recording sounds best when it sounds most like the recorded music.

I have written to these points before. TLDR.1 is that the sound of the live event is mostly imagined, ie largely constructed by 'being-there-ness'. The sound waves are just a prompt to this constructed experience being kick-started. In fact, the sound waves themselves are often very ordinary at live events, including acoustic music. Hence, even if recording/playback tech was so good that the exact sound field we experienced at a live event was recreated at home, we would not think it sounded anything like as good. Wrong goal.

TLDR.2 is that the 'pure recording captured by the mics' is not going to be the best sounding. Putting aside multi-mic complexities, and simplifying it to an acoustic performance, captured 'live' at the ideal audience seat, with the optimal mic arrangement for the intended playback (headphones, or 2-channel, or multi-channel), the idea that the recorded file from the mic feed is ideal and any edits to it are a bad thing, is wrong. Sound engineer Mark Waldrep tried that approach and observed that listeners to the 'pure' mic feed file invariably reported the result as 'lifeless'. The sound engineer's job is to create something more sonically rewarding, and good ones do this. Yes, that means interpretation, and yes, that is why sound engineering is an art itself, but no, it is not all moving negatively away from 'pure'.

That is why the sophisticated audiophile's goal is to 'get' at home what the production team 'got' when they listened to the final studio master. It is a musical creation and an audio creation, intertwined, for absolute appreciation as a totality of experience. It is not a musical creation and an audio degradation and loss of musicality. Myth.

cheers

 

[Sal1950]

I rate a Guarneri cello even higher.

I wouldn't know a Guarneri from a 454 Chevy big block, but will say a cello is right near the top
of my most favored beautiful instruments to be heard played solo live. My second wife's kid sister played cello
very well and I used to love to listen to her practice. The tonal structure, overtones, etc are just awesome.
Likewise the reasons I love the solo piano so much, now if I could only learn to play the dang thing worth
a crap I'd be really happy.

 

[Bob from Florida]

Nup. Meaning 'no' to the claim that the sound of the live event is the goal, and the recording sounds best when it sounds most like the recorded music.

I have written to these points before. TLDR.1 is that the sound of the live event is mostly imagined, ie largely constructed by 'being-there-ness'. The sound waves are just a prompt to this constructed experience being kick-started. In fact, the sound waves themselves are often very ordinary at live events, including acoustic music. Hence, even if recording/playback tech was so good that the exact sound field we experienced at a live event was recreated at home, we would not think it sounded anything like as good. Wrong goal.

TLDR.2 is that the 'pure recording captured by the mics' is not going to be the best sounding. Putting aside multi-mic complexities, and simplifying it to an acoustic performance, captured 'live' at the ideal audience seat, with the optimal mic arrangement for the intended playback (headphones, or 2-channel, or multi-channel), the idea that the recorded file from the mic feed is ideal and any edits to it are a bad thing, is wrong. Sound engineer Mark Waldrep tried that approach and observed that listeners to the 'pure' mic feed file invariably reported the result as 'lifeless'. The sound engineer's job is to create something more sonically rewarding, and good ones do this. Yes, that means interpretation, and yes, that is why sound engineering is an art itself, but no, it is not all moving negatively away from 'pure'.

That is why the sophisticated audiophile's goal is to 'get' at home what the production team 'got' when they listened to the final studio master. It is a musical creation and an audio creation, intertwined, for absolute appreciation as a totality of experience. It is not a musical creation and an audio degradation and loss of musicality. Myth.

cheers

I think you are ignoring reality. Live music has little in the way of imaging - compared to what happens when the recording is mastered to produce effects that we interpret as "imaging". It all comes down to subjective personal preference for everyone. Audiophiles are basically "full of shit". It cuts both ways. You can be in the objective to the nth degree camp and completely miss that everyone is being subjective with what they like - including themselves. Subjectivists to the nth degree ignore the value of measurements often to their financial detriment. By the way, I did not claim that the goal was to recreate the "live event". I happen to believe that recreating a live event is not very easy if not impossible. If you can't record it with the dynamics present in the concert hall, well that should be your first clue that the experience cannot be repeated on a stereo system.
Spending time attending un-amplified live music is very eye opening.

 

[MattHooper]

Nup. Meaning 'no' to the claim that the sound of the live event is the goal, and the recording sounds best when it sounds most like the recorded music.

I respect that using live music as a reference does not suit your own goals for your own system.

But other people have other goals

In fact, the sound waves themselves are often very ordinary at live events, including acoustic music.

I strongly disagree.

Like I've said before, I have no expectations for a stereo system to sound indistinguishable from live instruments, but getting closer to that sound increases my enjoyment
of listening to a system.

Since as long as I can remember, I have paid very close attention to the sound of live unamplified instruments and voices. It's a habit for me to close my eyes in the presence of live instruments, voices, even just people speaking near me, to examine the characteristics. I've never heard a sound system reproduce the complexity
of the sound of a live instrument. (I've also done modest live acoustic instruments and voices vs reproduced comparisons as well). Like I've also written before, for me the REAL LIVE sound of even a cheap acoustic or classical guitar is more beautiful and tonally complex than a great recording of a guitar played back on any sound system I've heard. Too much seems lost in the translation, with artificiality added.

However, to my ears some systems get me closer to aspects I like in the real thing than others, and when that happens THAT system is the one that keeps my butt in the listening seat. Most other systems I can get up and walk away any time. It's possible, even probable, that your system might leave me cold. Which is why I seek to please myself.

That is why the sophisticated audiophile's goal is to 'get' at home what the production team 'got' when they listened to the final studio master. It is a musical creation and an audio creation, intertwined, for absolute appreciation as a totality of experience. It is not a musical creation and an audio degradation and loss of musicality. Myth.

cheers

I feel sorrow that I may not pass the Purity Test for the Sophisticated Audiophile, but somehow I'll manage to go on....

Cheers, back

 

[Sal1950]

Or: if along with the other aspects you like the sound quality of vinyl, spend your money on vinyl.

That's for a mis-guided preference, not any interest in High Fidelity.

digital though it was initially bad, on the contrary, I was satisfied with its complete constancy of parameters over time without wear and degradation of the media and 100% backupability in 1:1 quality..

Just a quick comment, Digital was not "initially bad". Yes it was new to many artists & engineers, and some mistakes on how to use it were made.
OTOH one listen to the 1985 CD release of Dire Straits - Brothers In Arms reveals one real truth.
As JGH said, all else is GASLIGHT.

That is why the sophisticated audiophile's goal is to 'get' at home what the production team 'got' when they listened to the final studio master. It is a musical creation and an audio creation, intertwined, for absolute appreciation as a totality of experience. It is not a musical creation and an audio degradation and loss of musicality. Myth.

100% on point Newman !
The "team" was a combination of the artists & engineers sitting in the studio deciding what they wanted the final product to sound like. This is likewise true for all genre's from hard rock to classical..and is the final deciding factor..
The goal, for the observed waveform of the flat master, and the output of the playback media, to be identical or nearly so.
With a digital medium, a distinct possibility.
From a vinyl source, absolutely impossible.
Can I get an AMEN

 

[MattHooper]

I think you are ignoring reality. Live music has little in the way of imaging - compared to what happens when the recording is mastered to produce effects that we interpret as "imaging". It all comes down to subjective personal preference for everyone. Audiophiles are basically "full of shit". It cuts both ways. You can be in the objective to the nth degree camp and completely miss that everyone is being subjective with what they like - including themselves. Subjectivists to the nth degree ignore the value of measurements often to their financial detriment. By the way, I did not claim that the goal was to recreate the "live event". I happen to believe that recreating a live event is not very easy if not impossible. If you can't record it with the dynamics present in the concert hall, well that should be your first clue that the experience cannot be repeated on a stereo system.
Spending time attending un-amplified live music is very eye opening.

I find the idea of ignoring any comparison of reproduced sound to real sound to be very odd.

For one thing, that was the original goal of high fidelity sound - to recreate the sound of the instrument or voice in front of the mic at the output of the speaker, preferrably
in a way that would be indistinguishable. That goal drove much of the forward momentum in refining audio equipment over time, at least until the studio itself and added effects started to become more widely used as a palette. But much of the old Hi-Fi system advertisements spoke to "life like" recreation of sound "bring the symphony home!"
I mean, why bother engineering gear, be it the capability of microphones, tape or vinyl grooves (and eventually digits), amplifiers, speakers trying to capture the clarity, timbre, dynamics etc of what you are trying to record, e.g. an orchestra, in the first place, if it isn't to attempt to capture and reproduce important characteristics heard in the actual sounds themselves? Why care about any dynamic range advance in CDs? Or quiet noise floor when they came along? Well, because that better recreates the dynamics (and lack of noise artifacts) of real orchestras.

If we are perusing various sound systems, say at a show, we never have in-room/speaker measurements at hand to know "this is measuring perfectly neutral." But if you hear a voice sounding particularly natural, or a piano coming from a system sounding particularly "like a piano as you are familiar with them," that's one measure of impressive sound quality.

 

[Sal1950]

If we are perusing various sound systems, say at a show, we never have in-room/speaker measurements at hand to know "this is measuring perfectly neutral." But if you hear a voice sounding particularly natural, or a piano coming from a system sounding particularly "like a piano as you are familiar with them," that's one measure of impressive sound quality.

All that is only possible IF the audio chain is transparent.
No matter how perfect the source, it will never deliver that to the listener if you use a distorted playback source.
Playing God with the playback tone controls to please your preferences will never return a honest "is it real or memorx" moment.
LOL

 

[MattHooper]

All that is only possible IF the audio chain is transparent.

But you accept the point I was making, I presume?

That said...

No matter how perfect the source, it will never deliver that to the listener if you use a distorted playback source.
Playing God with the playback tone controls to please your preferences will never return a honest "is it real or memorx" moment.
LOL

Sal, you seem unaware of how much manipulation goes on in sound production/post production in order to make things sound more natural.

The idea that any manipulation or distortion introduced to the original recording entails a loss of naturalness/realism, is naive.

 

[Sal1950]

But you accept the point I was making, I presume?

This ?

But if you hear a voice sounding particularly natural, or a piano coming from a system sounding particularly "like a piano as you are familiar with them," that's one measure of impressive sound quality.

That's simply a guess, a subjective impression we totally discount without measured evidence.

Sal, you seem unaware of how much manipulation goes on in sound production/post production in order to make things sound more natural.

Not unaware Matt, it's simply irrelevant. They did what they did in production to give you a product they wanted to
sound like X. The idea is High Fidelity, to reproduce that "production" in the home as closely as possible. Their goal may
have been to reproduce a live event, it can also be something entirely different, things that never occured in that way, think Tubular Bells or Dark Side Of The Moon. The artists had something in mind they wanted you to hear and between them and the production team, that is what they attempt to put on the original flat master. With the idea that we would do
our best to reproduce it at home.
What part of this do you not understand?

 

[MattHooper]

This ?

That's simply a guess, a subjective impression we totally discount without measured evidence.

So, if you heard sound reproduction that sounded to you especially realistic, a voice, a piano, a cello, a guitar or whatever...you'd have to consult measurements before
recognizing this?

Not unaware Matt, it's simply irrelevant. They did what they did in production to give you a product they wanted to
sound like X. The idea is High Fidelity, to reproduce that "production" in the home as closely as possible.

Different subject.

We were talking about the impression of realism from a sound system. To what degree that is possible or desirable.

You implied that realistic/natural sound (e.g. the previous piano example) would only follow from a "transparent" audio chain. That is to naively equate sonic neutrality/transparency with "realism/natural sound." Virtually no end to end chain is transparent (from mic colorations through to colorations produced by speakers/stereo).
Therefore pretty much any sound reproduction will be compromised - already colored or innacurate to some degree - in reproducing fully realistic sound.

Which means it may take some manipulation of the recording in order to sound more natural. (Or it could be done at the reproduction end, depending on the issue).

It's simply false to think that the only route to making sound more natural/real sounding is via some fully transparent audio chain (which pretty much doesn't exist
to begin with). This is pretty basic stuff for anyone who records sound/works in studios.

All day long I manipulate recordings to sound more real. There's all sorts of tricks in manipulating sounds. If we were stuck having to find or create only
"perfectly transparent recordings" we'd be up sh*t's creak. But fortunately...that's not how it works.

Likewise, in principle, some coloration in your sound reproduction could add to or restore some more "natural sounding" elements. (Even adding more sidewall reflections for a more believable spacious acoustic sensation, where the sound seems less stuck in the speakers, can be part of that as well).

 

[Mart68]

Recording may be about trying to capture an original performance as closely as possible, or it may not. Usually not.

Replay (Hi-fidelity replay) is about getting as close to what was recorded as possible.

It's not really a subtle distinction but this basic misunderstanding has led many audiophiles up blind alleys and resulted in many very poor (but expensive) loudspeakers.

Then you get complaints about how bad most recordings are, how cloth-eared and incompetent recording engineers are, how the 'better' the system gets the more recordings become 'unlistenable' and so on.

All audiophiles should be taken to a studio (at gunpoint if necessary) and shown how a recording is made,. then maybe the nonsense would stop.

Sorry but it is a pet peeve.

 

[Mart68]

One of my favourite 'reviewer speaks' which sadly you see repeated a lot 'A greater sense of the musicians playing together'

But wait! The drums were recorded in London and the guitar parts in New York three months later! Please stop with this utter balls.

 

[Newman]

I think you are ignoring reality. Live music has little in the way of imaging - compared to what happens when the recording is mastered to produce effects that we interpret as "imaging".

The ventriloquist effect means that live music seems pinpoint-imaged to the observer, placing every identifiable sound exactly where the player is placed. Even when the sound field itself has little separation.

Recorded music, heard without the ventriloquist effect, is just a 'mash in the middle' in mono or when using stereo to preserve the sound field's inherently limited separation. Hence you get a much more realistic effect of separation/individuality of sound sources when the audio team deliberately spreads them out using stereo or MCH.

Perhaps you have been ignoring reality. (I only say this because you said it )

It all comes down to subjective personal preference for everyone. Audiophiles are basically "full of shit". It cuts both ways. You can be in the objective to the nth degree camp and completely miss that everyone is being subjective with what they like - including themselves. Subjectivists to the nth degree ignore the value of measurements often to their financial detriment.

As Toole has shown with carefully controlled experiments, everyone without severe hearing damage clearly prefers uncoloured reproduction. And it's logical too: everyone has daily experience of real-life sound sources, and when it differs from that it sounds 'off'.

It is only when we throw away the listening controls and enter into sighted listening, that suddenly everyone has "unique subjective personal preferences" - because they are reacting to the non-sonic factors (which are perceptually dominant) and misattributing this to the sound waves themselves.

By the way, I did not claim that the goal was to recreate the "live event".

Good, because you kept repeating that this, that and the other can never be "the same as live", so it was easy to get the impression that you wish it was. Meaning the goal.

I happen to believe that recreating a live event is not very easy if not impossible. If you can't record it with the dynamics present in the concert hall, well that should be your first clue that the experience cannot be repeated on a stereo system.

Agree, except the primary reason is my TLDR.1, compared to which the inability to preserve dynamics is not a big factor (for digital audio).

Spending time attending un-amplified live music is very eye opening.

Done plenty of that. Sometimes it's eye-opening, sometimes it isn't.

 

[Sal1950]

So, if you heard sound reproduction that sounded to you especially realistic, a voice, a piano, a cello, a guitar or whatever...you'd have to consult measurements before
recognizing this?

I'd absolutely desire to go to the meters to determine if the effect was the result of superior technical performance or just the happy accidental result of some distortion. It's easy to use distortion to give a signal a pleasant tint.

It's simply false to think that the only route to making sound more natural/real sounding is via some fully transparent audio chain (which pretty much doesn't exist
to begin with).

From that approach you really learn nothing of the science of recording or move the goal posts for true High Fidelity reproduction forward.. If you ever hope to hear a system that can actually suspend belief in the Live vs Memorex test, it won't come from adding euphonic distortions.

 

[computer-audiophile]

Are you sure that’s a Guarneri? It would have to be a heavily modified one, with the huge metal endpin and long neck.

Yes sir, I am sure. Why should I not believe such a serious musician when he tells me. I talked to him about his precious instrument and how he handles it, especially when traveling. By the way, it was a high quality concert recorded by Südwestfunk SWR Germany.