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Can anyone explain the vinyl renaissance?

MattHooper

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What a wall of strawmen - at least if you are attempting to describe most of the people here who listen to vinyl.

As I've pointed out before: It's common for someone to attribute their own choices to reason and the other guy's choices to psychology.

"After all, since I have made reasonable choices and theirs differ from mine, there must be some other explanation to their choice than using reason."

When trying to psychoanalyze people who have made choices you don't agree with, you will usually get it wrong for the above reason.
 

egellings

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I often profess this point of view that people opt for records and turntables completely emotionally, completely libido driven, as a lifestyle choice, not audio source choice. After that choice has been made, comes the effort at rationalization. Very few people are big enough to admit their totally irrational and libido driven decisions let alone marketing driven decisions, so they start the "endlessly creative "argument" factory". Maybe it's an illusion coming from the fact that I've been following the development of such arguments from the 90' so I just think that there was a chronological order to them, like, first came the "digital=harsh/analogue=natural sound" argument, then the warmth, the "as artist intended" the "band in your living room" and so on.

Very often I also see this niche reluctantly admitting to shortcomings, sometimes without words, all of a sudden you just see a meter long tone arm mounted on an adjoining stand to counter tracking error, producers not putting the heavy bass song for the last one on the record etc.

Sometimes I have a feeling that, no matter how much vinyl-folks hate it when you face them with some facts, they actually use what you say for improvements. Objectivists, who have no problems seeing records for what they are and have no need to spread myths about warmth, natural sound or such, often are the source of improvements for the record lovers.

For the longest time, objecitivsts used to warn about the BS of record weights. It's two fold; it can flatten only one side and it's heavy and shouldn't be added as extra weight on your turntable. Objectivists used to say, use a light clamp only where needed - if the middle is bulging you can flatten it with a clamp. But if the outer rim is rising, clamp (nor weight) is no good.

So now we have the next step in evolution of the "endlessly creative "argument" factory". Meet the outer clamp:
View attachment 255790

And yes, you put it after you place a record on the TT and it lowers the rising outer rim of the record. Sure why not. I don't think you'll have any problems guessing my question; why not simply use a well produced CD as a source. Keep investing large sums of money to make it less like records and closer to CD... Just use CD.

Mind you, a lot of these shortcomings are what vinyl-heads claim they like about the olden technology. OK, why eradicate them? Fight the WOW and flutter, fight tracking error, fight the lack of range, fight the pops and crackle, fight it, fight it, fight it... The answer is at hand. You could even keep the records to look at the sleeve and just play a CD, right?

So far, the listening room looks like a steam-punk altar. You have your weight, you have the outer clamp, you have your meter long tone arm, double decoupling decks, removed belt driving motors, standalone TT stand (heavier and more expensive than the entire system), tube phono pre-amp more expensive than the TT stand...

I mean... What I'm asking is do you:
a) like it for what it is?
b) want to make it sound like CD and just be able to still say it's a record?
c) pretend you like and enjoy the shortcomings just as long as they don't get solved and then get the solution just so that you can keep saying you're a vinyl person?
I absolutely listen to vinyl for the nostalgia. I run it through a DAW to get rid of the pops and clicks (but not the noise) and to take advantage of my room correction.
I also listen to it because it forces a certain type of engagement. I’m too lazy to play 45s, so it is always about which 20-25 minute collection of music do I want to listen to. I can do that with streaming (which is how I listen most of the time), but I tend not to, particularly as I listen to “radio stations” and skip songs. Because I can.
I’m a photography professor. I shot 4x5 film for years and years. When digital got good/affordable enough I got a good DSLR. I went from shooting 300-400 images a year to shooting 10k+. Because I could. Didn’t make any more “good images” though. I had to go back to shooting my DSLR like it was a 4x5, in order to make the work I wanted. Digital could totally do it, and better, but the default of the technology points in other directions.
As for vinyl being musical masturbation. I’m cool with that. I like to masturbate. I also like to have sex with other people. Pretty sure Kinsey eat al. found almost everybody does both, but they lie about it.
Don't understand the use of the word "libido" in that context. I associate libido with sexual desire, not an urge to own audio equipment.
 

MattHooper

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I often profess this point of view that people opt for records and turntables completely emotionally, completely libido driven, as a lifestyle choice, not audio source choice. After that choice has been made, comes the effort at rationalization.

What about the point of view that "Vinyl critics attribute irrational motivations to vinyl buying in order to make themselves feel superior?"

Are you open to that point of view?

Very few people are big enough to admit their totally irrational and libido driven decisions let alone marketing driven decisions, so they start the "endlessly creative "argument" factory".

Very few people are big enough to admit they are denigrating the motives of others to elevate their self-esteem as more rational and not following the herd.

Maybe it's an illusion coming from the fact that I've been following the development of such arguments from the 90' so

Maybe it's an illusion coming from seeing the same facile analysis coming from vinyl naysayers.


Sometimes I have a feeling that, no matter how much vinyl-folks hate it when you face them with some facts,

Sometimes I have the feeling that no matter how many times someone here admits vinyl is technically inferior, vinyl nay-sayers will still be pissed off seeing posts about vinyl.

;)

.

I mean... What I'm asking is do you:
a) like it for what it is?

Yes. But what it "is" isn't set in stone. "It" is variable. Depending on your choice of cartridge/settings/tracking etc you can nudge the sound to your own taste
if you want.

b) want to make it sound like CD and just be able to still say it's a record?

No. I like the sound of vinyl. I can improve the sound of vinyl (for instance with the choices above) yet it still sounds like vinyl.

c) pretend you like and enjoy the shortcomings just as long as they don't get solved and then get the solution just so that you can keep saying you're a vinyl person?

Depends what you take to be 'shortcomings.' Maybe to you the physical necessities of owning a physical record, storing it, using a turntable, having to get up to change the record sides etc are shortcomings. To others those are part of the pleasure not something to be overcome. Nobody is "pretending."

I also don't "pretend" to enjoy record noise like ticks, pops, background hiss. I try to minimize those. But ultimately I do not find that issue bad enough to ruin the listening experience for the vast majority of records I own.

I mean, I can see it's not possible in your limited taxonomy of psychological motivations that: I simply enjoy the sound of vinyl, enjoy the physical format, enjoy the aesthetics and engineering in turntables, which makes it totally reasonable to buy records and a turntable. If that makes my reasons "completely emotional" then it would make yours and everyone else's "completely emotional." Like the "completely emotional" desire for equipment that measures one way vs another?
 

aslan7

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You guys are very hard on our brethren who like LPs. Don't get me wrong--I wouldn't buy anything that didn't pass muster with Amir. My cousin owns an old Victrola in perfect, restored condition with all the accessories. I am amazed at how good those old 78s sound on it. Did you ever hear a Telefunken or Brunswick 78? Really remarkable, and lots of fun to use. I remember back in the 1950s old timers told me that the new LPs were junk compared to a good 78. My father, a big classical music fan, preferred mono to stereo, and to this day listens to one big speaker. Let people enjoy their amusements and turn a deaf ear to their wild pronouncements that defy science.
 

MCH

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The Italian Renaissance endured for well over a century in art so watch out.
Well, that was a Renaissance from classical antiquity, that had ended like 10 centuries before, besides that, the period without vinyl seems even less significant :D
 

RichB

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We are sorely lacking in renaissance. Where is the cassette, 8-track, and reel-to-reel renaissance? :)
I suppose if you could make really cool 20+ pound cassette players, they might come back too.

Seriously (IMO of course), here is what the vinyl renaissance is about:

- People with existing collections
- Esthetics, there are some very beautiful turntables
- Nostalgia
- Tactile experience of selecting actual media and album art
- Absurdly bad digital mastering that can lead to a superior recording on vinyl (this may be getting better)

One thing I love about QOBUZ/Roon is the ability to discover music by letting Roon select artists/tracks.
This produces a different kind of renaissance (a revival of or renewed interest in something).

Digital Audio has its own travails, digital clipping, over-compression, weird reconstruction filters (I'm looking at you MQA), etc.
Rather than focusing on the components that create a good master, High-dynamic Range could have been presented as an option, but instead we got HD-Audio.
HD-Audio has more bits but can have a master that is as bad as the CD quality.

- Rich
 
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aslan7

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Well, that was a Renaissance from classical antiquity, that had ended like 10 centuries before, besides that, the period without vinyl seems even less significant :D
In the period between classical antiquity and the Italian Renaissance there were a number of renaissances--Charles Homer Haskins wrote about the "Twelfth Century Renaissance" and Erwin Panofsky published a collection of essays called "Renaissance and Renaissances in Western Art." To get back to the point, vinyl people are going to be around a long time, with the usual ups and downs.
 

aslan7

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We are sorely lacking in renaissance. Where is the cassette, 8-track, and reel-to-reel renaissance? :)
I suppose if you could make really cool 20+ pound cassette players, they might come back too.

Seriously (IMO of course), here is what the vinyl renaissance is about:

- People with existing collections
- Esthetics, there are some very beautiful turntables
- Nostalgia
- Tactile experience of selecting actual media and album art
- Absurdly bad digital mastering that can lead to a superior recording on vinyl (this may be getting better)

One thing I love about QOBUZ/Roon is the ability to discover music by letting Roon select artists/tracks.
This produces a different kind of renaissance (a revival of or renewed interest in something).

Digital Audio has its own travails, digital clipping, over-compression, weird reconstruction filters (I'm looking at you MQA), etc.
Rather than focusing on the components that create a good master, High-dynamic Range could have been presented as an option, but instead we got HD-Audio.
HD-Audio has more bits but can have a master that is as bad as the CD quality.

- Rich
I think a lot of people still laud the supposed advantages of reel-to-reel. I certainly preferred setting up a dust bug and using a zero stat gun back in the day to splicing tape.
 

fpitas

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I still think vinyl aficionados like the background groove noise, vs the "solid black" background of a digital recording.
 

Inner Space

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I still think vinyl aficionados like the background groove noise, vs the "solid black" background of a digital recording.
I agree. In the 1980s I was involved with a major record-company level vinyl -vs- CD comparison, and I privately concluded that the forward-moving groove noise added a sense of progress and momentum for many listeners - as if the music was being carried along on a subliminal rush. Hard to isolate and test, but listening between the lines to listener reaction, I think it was a factor.
 

fpitas

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I agree. In the 1980s I was involved with a major record-company level vinyl -vs- CD comparison, and I privately concluded that the forward-moving groove noise added a sense of progress and momentum for many listeners - as if the music was being carried along on a subliminal rush. Hard to isolate and test, but listening between the lines to listener reaction, I think it was a factor.
That's an interesting take on it. It may cover up minor flaws in the reproductive chain, too.
 

OldHvyMec

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I like vinyl because I have always used vinyl. There is nothing difficult to understand. I started with late 78s, 45s and some 33.3. My wife whom I met
when I was 19 was a real vinyl head. I was going for the gusto at the time and collected a few 4 track and a lot of 8 tracks. I noticed a sudden lack of
interest in playing music from my (now) wife and myself. On the weekends we would listen to vinyl and had to be drunk to enjoy 8 tracks
blaring out of Crag 8 track player in our noisy hotrods.

I was very picky because I had and still have concussive hearing issues. I don't like a lot of air moving in a IB room (sealed). An open venue is a whole different thing.
Natural amplification via Ampa style settings is the way I like sound. I also love the old "Opry" sound of the 50-70s. Just like the early Stones as bad as the recording
were had a sound that only an empty studio and reverb could produce. It was horrible quality but a sound that has followed the Rolling Stone since their beginning.
I'm positive, vinyl, mag tape or digital the Stones make the same type of music and it sounds the same way. A controlled repeatable performance over and over that makes bad sound good. It's like Iggy Pop, or the Ramones. I've heard both of them at their best and worst and both ways sound pretty close. :)

The actual medium is as good or as bad as a person is willing to exploit it. IF you spend enough time with TT and then tonearms and different cart setups you learn
quickly you can go completely overboard for a .5% change that only you can hear but cost you a quick 1000.00 dollars. 5, 10, and 20k carts are not uncommon. But
a 200.00 record player is what a lot of people try to compare with todays streaming services and say "SEE what I was talking about". LOL

Personally I'm in no way a purest. I like what my ears like in spite of the general publics opinion. I've NEVER followed a trend when it comes to listening to music
the exception is in the ditch working my tail off and all there is, is a lousy boom box.. I'll take it with cassettes, CD, or a radio. Music is music at the end of the day, Mate!

Redards
 

levimax

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I struggle to understand why anyone would care about how someone else listens to music . It seems like the argment is that impracticallity is bad and needs to be eliminated. If practcallity were the criteria then anything besides the readily available "free" speakers with their allready included unlimited music library accessed by voice commands should be eliminated. While that would no doubt be practical I don't think it would make the world a better or more interesting place to live.
 

MattHooper

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I still think vinyl aficionados like the background groove noise, vs the "solid black" background of a digital recording.

Not me.

I seek as "black a background" as I can get for vinyl (or anything else). The more background noise I can hear the more it tends to "blanch" tonality.

Last night I had been listening to a bunch of my (ripped) CDs and some internet radio stations on my system. Afterward I grabbed an old Level42 (jazzy/funky early 80s) album which I'd been given from someone else's collection. The cover looked a mess, but the vinyl not bad. I ran it through two ultrasonic cleaning washes (Degritter machine) put it on and...it sounded utterly spectacular. It ticked every single "great sound quality box" I could think of - spacious, all elements easily discernible, vivid, punchy, dynamic, rich. Record noise between the tracks was just barely discernible if I listened really hard from my listening position, and not discernible at all when any music was playing. I couldn't note any difference in that respect from the digital music I'd been listening to previously.

Some albums I have are quiet enough I can't hear anything between the tracks from my listening position.

I think whatever makes vinyl sound like vinyl - at least the aspects I like - has to do with different characteristics than mere background noise, especially given the level of background noise is so variable, yet even quiet vinyl sounds like vinyl (to my ears).
 

OldHvyMec

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I struggle to understand why anyone would care about how someone else listens to music . It seems like the argment is that impracticallity is bad and needs to be eliminated.
I think you have hit the nail on the head. Why someone else is upset about the way you listen to music. As long as someone selection of music is in
"their space" and not in mine. If I don't like the Genre playing it could easily be conveyed as noise vs music. One is pleasing and one is NOT.
Normally SPL is a good guide. When the rear license is flappin' so hard it's put on a henge to keep it on. That is loud. Usually that requires an EMT
cannon and a 1 second burst. I let the tow truck drivers tow the real loud ones away. Of course I'm blastin' my Kenny Rogers and "Ruby" with 20,000
watts of horrible pro amps/12 12" HE drivers pointed at the drivers head. I try to explode their heads. I'll settle for an occasional nose or ear bleed.
Noisy Boog-A-lee kids. <------ that is a bad thing if you didn't know. Just sayin'

Regards
 

Angsty

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Soon they will make a dac with a filter which emulate the sound. Suprised they haven't already.
The Topping D90LE has “valve” and “transistor” modes that seek to emulate specific distortion patterns.
 

fpitas

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I agree. In the 1980s I was involved with a major record-company level vinyl -vs- CD comparison, and I privately concluded that the forward-moving groove noise added a sense of progress and momentum for many listeners - as if the music was being carried along on a subliminal rush. Hard to isolate and test, but listening between the lines to listener reaction, I think it was a factor.
I've heard the difference too. On some tracks the totally quiet background can be a little eerie. On some though, it's kind of cool. I can see though that the early producers counted on the background noise, or at least it was a factor.
 

jsrtheta

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I still think vinyl aficionados like the background groove noise, vs the "solid black" background of a digital recording.
We generally like things that are familiar, comforting. Vinyl fills that need for some.

Unlike a speculation that appeared above, I do not think vinyl will continue to be viable once the last of those who grew up with it pass on. There are many, many reasons why.

For the last couple of years, I've been watching a lot of film noir on broadcast television. These are digital recordings - no one is setting up an old 16mm or 35mm projector back at the studio and clicking it to "run". No matter how nifty that might seem.
 

fpitas

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We generally like things that are familiar, comforting. Vinyl fills that need for some.

Unlike a speculation that appeared above, I do not think vinyl will continue to be viable once the last of those who grew up with it pass on. There are many, many reasons why.

For the last couple of years, I've been watching a lot of film noir on broadcast television. These are digital recordings - no one is setting up an old 16mm or 35mm projector back at the studio and clicking it to "run". No matter how nifty that might seem.
Don't give people ideas ;)
 
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