Vinyl sales much ado about nothing?

[FunkyMonkey]

So in 2014 album downloads surpassed CD album sales. Just.
But add in vinyl and cassette sales and I think physical just beat it.
Which means that vinyl sales were at least an order of magnitude smaller than CD sales.

With cheapo vinyl players being bought cos people figure they can use the Usb port to rip vinyl, people aren't enjoying the vinyl to its utmost. Not anywhere near.

And with the albums undoubtedly being re-mastered if not recorded in digital, one wonders where the honey is for the ears at least.

So in the context of hifi, vinyl sales matter less so than the onward surge of downloads.

Roll on high def downloads, SACD, and Blu Ray.

Far superior listening than vinyl, if not so romantic.

 

[chris_bates1974]

For me, the issue with vinyl is cost. I love listening to it, but the last albumn I bought (Royal Blood) was a quarter of the vinyl price on CD... Now, if the vinyl included download costs, I would have at least given it more thought, but it didn't... I mainly use my tunrtable for listening to old vinyl from my childhood, or car boot sales etc.

 

[Al ears]

For me, the issue with vinyl is cost. I love listening to it, but the last albumn I bought (Royal Blood) was a quarter of the vinyl price on CD... Now, if the vinyl included download costs, I would have at least given it more thought, but it didn't... I mainly use my tunrtable for listening to old vinyl from my childhood, or car boot sales etc.

I think, in the end, it all depends on what sort of system you have, whether or not you a serious listener, and ultimately how much you are prepared to spend on your music collection.

I will not tarry too long on the benefits of any particular format as there are adherrents here that strongly believe in one or the other. I know which I prefer but each to their own.

Although vinyl cost may appear high you have to consider also the cost of a hi-res album download which, in some cases approaches that of vinyl. Bearing in mind also that with vinyl you do actually own a physical object with full rights to sell it on at some point in the future. You do not have this luxury with downloads.

At the end of the day you get what you pay for and it is for each of us to make that choice.

 

[drummerman]

What a lot of cobbles ...

 

[Al ears]

What a lot of cobbles ...

Cobbles? Shurely you mean 'shoe-repair artisans' ..... (Ed.)

 

[drummerman]

What a lot of cobbles ...

Cobbles? Shurely you mean 'shoe-repair artisans' ..... (Ed.)

gobbledigoogs

 

[Frank Harvey]

With cheapo vinyl players being bought cos people figure they can use the Usb port to rip vinyl, people aren't enjoying the vinyl to its utmost. Not anywhere near.

I agree there are many people out there not enjoying vinyl to its max, but that has been the case for over 50 years anyway. The quality that a £500 deck is capable of nowadays is stunning, with very little background noise, so it just needs a bit of education from the hi-fi industry and retailers to make people aware of how good their vinyl can sound.

I remember doing a comparison of a Pioneer PL12D (which was a sub £40 deck in its day) against one of the popular £1,000 CD players at the time (early 90s), and those present, whilst appreciating the CD player was technically better, preferred the sound of the PL12D. As I say, something like a Rega RP1 far outstrips this nowadays, and an RP3 would be a major leap forwards.

And with the albums undoubtedly being re-mastered if not recorded in digital, one wonders where the honey is for the ears at least.

Many albums are being remastered from the original master tapes, and the digital masters vinyl are pressed from are very high resolution ones, not compressed in the same way CD usually is.

Roll on high def downloads, SACD, and Blu Ray.

I can't see Bluray music taking off, much in the same way as SACD didn't. With many people wanting to reduce their speaker count, I'm not sure people also want to add extra boxes like a Bluray player in order to play Bluray audio. And those that do will probably add some half inch tall fancy looking entry level thing with cheap DACs. If you're going to do something, do it properly.

Far superior listening than vinyl, if not so romantic.

I think you'd be hard pushed to hear any drawbacks on a well produced record in comparison to CD or hi-res music.

 

[Frank Harvey]

For me, the issue with vinyl is cost. I love listening to it, but the last albumn I bought (Royal Blood) was a quarter of the vinyl price on CD... Now, if the vinyl included download costs, I would have at least given it more thought, but it didn't... I mainly use my tunrtable for listening to old vinyl from my childhood, or car boot sales etc.

This goes back to what I've said before, that the CD format is more or less worthless now. CDs will initially be £10-15 (no different to a record really), and drop quickly after a short period of time, much like Bluray now.

Many do come with a download code nowadays, and the inclusion of the CD copy is slowly rising.

 

[chris_bates1974]

Sadly, I don't think it is the case with enough records - in fact the only vinyl LP I've had codes in (OK, it may only have been from a total of about 15 in the last few years) has been one bought in Canada in 2012 (Young Prisms - check them out, very good).

The film industry seems to have a much better grip on this, as a high proportion of blurays now seem to have either a dvd, or a download code, or both! A much better way of doing things.

I've certainly never seen an album with a cd included - if they did have, I would go for vinyl every time.

Of course the other massive advantge that cd has is that I can play it in my car... I don't have the ability to play from another source.

 

[The_Lhc]

For me, the issue with vinyl is cost. I love listening to it, but the last albumn I bought (Royal Blood) was a quarter of the vinyl price on CD... Now, if the vinyl included download costs, I would have at least given it more thought, but it didn't... I mainly use my tunrtable for listening to old vinyl from my childhood, or car boot sales etc.

Err, yes it did, I bought the Royal Blood album on vinyl and it came with a download voucher for mp3 copies , which I currently have on my phone.

 

[chris_bates1974]

That's annoying - my friendly local record store owner told me it didn't (and was £18).

So sadly HMV took my £5 and I have the cd...

 

[iMark]

A couple of myths are perpatuated here. The first one is that sound on CDs is compressed. It's not. And it's more than good enough for HiFi standards. The fact that some vinyl/SACD/Bluray Audio sounds better than CD is to with the atrocious mastering of some CDs.

The other myth is that you need loads of speakers to enjoy SACD or Bluray Audio. You don't. Some of the discs are stereo only. Some SACD players are stereo only.

We can play a lot of different formats on our system but it comes down to the mastering. We have heard good and bad in all formats. It becomes very interesting when there are different masters of the same record available and the loudness wars come into play. Without the loudness, noone in their right mind would and could claim that CDs aren't a great format and more than good enough for most purposes. Personally I like listening to vinyl records. But I know more than enough about the the technology behind records to know that there is a lot of distortion added to the music during the production and playback. I can't understand why audiophiles rave about playing records when they must be fully aware of all the distortion, hiss, rumble and wow and flutter.

I'm old enough to remember the switch from analogue to digital recording for classical music. The recording engineers at the time were not happy with the fidelity of analogue recordings and embraced digital recordings because of the lack of tape hiss and other distortion. The audiophiles at that time embraced the digital recording that were transfered to vinyl (in the days before CDs) and concluded that the digital recordings sounded better than the analogue ones on vinyl. A couple of years later these digital recordings were released as CDs and most people at the time concluded that they now had a perfect copy of a studio master on a little shiny disc. Recording should be about faithful reproduction and therefore eliminating as much distortion as possible. Unless of course distortion is part of production.

Why does everyone seem to have forgotten the history of sound recording?

 

[cheeseboy]

Why does everyone seem to have forgotten the history of sound recording?

probably because there's quite a few audiophiles who actually don't have a clue as to what goes in to recording, and if they did, it would clash with their beliefs too much. Even when you explain to some of them, they can, and do, chose to ignore what you've said, or just go lalalala I'm not listening. At least that's my experience of it.

 

[FunkyMonkey]

It's quite simple really. If you like vinyl that's good.

But please don't for a second think it is better quality than high res downloads or blu Ray or Sacd or even a well mastered CD.

Definitely better looking product than all of the above and actually very efficient to store. Large area but thin.

In conclusion, I understand that customers like vinyl for real reasons, but this fuss is just marketing to sell an outdated format.

 

[iMark]

Actually, you need quite a bit of space to store records compared to CDs.

I do recognize the attraction of playing records compared to streaming (not to CDs). As a listener you stand in front of records and have to make a conscious decision about what you'd like to hear or play for your friends/family. Then you settle with a great album cover. I think the ritual of playing records and the more consious listening make the recordings sound better. It's more to do with the ritual than the sound quality. There are many formats that sound better than LPs but no other format is as good looking and tactile. Because the records are expensive and prone to damage, people take care of them and value them more.

 

[The_Lhc]

That's annoying - my friendly local record store owner told me it didn't (and was £18).

So sadly HMV took my £5 and I have the cd... 

It should have been in the sleeve, was it still shrink wrapped?

 

[Covenanter]

A couple of myths are perpatuated here. The first one is that sound on CDs is compressed. It's not. And it's more than good enough for HiFi standards. The fact that some vinyl/SACD/Bluray Audio sounds better than CD is to with the atrocious mastering of some CDs.

The other myth is that you need loads of speakers to enjoy SACD or Bluray Audio. You don't. Some of the discs are stereo only. Some SACD players are stereo only.

We can play a lot of different formats on our system but it comes down to the mastering. We have heard good and bad in all formats. It becomes very interesting when there are different masters of the same record available and the loudness wars come into play. Without the loudness, noone in their right mind would and could claim that CDs aren't a great format and more than good enough for most purposes. Personally I like listening to vinyl records. But I know more than enough about the the technology behind records to know that there is a lot of distortion added to the music during the production and playback. I can't understand why audiophiles rave about playing records when they must be fully aware of all the distortion, hiss, rumble and wow and flutter.

I'm old enough to remember the switch from analogue to digital recording for classical music. The recording engineers at the time were not happy with the fidelity of analogue recordings and embraced digital recordings because of the lack of tape hiss and other distortion. The audiophiles at that time embraced the digital recording that were transfered to vinyl (in the days before CDs) and concluded that the digital recordings sounded better than the analogue ones on vinyl. A couple of years later these digital recordings were released as CDs and most people at the time concluded that they now had a perfect copy of a studio master on a little shiny disc. Recording should be about faithful reproduction and therefore eliminating as much distortion as possible. Unless of course distortion is part of production.

Why does everyone seem to have forgotten the history of sound recording?

+1

Chris

 

[chris_bates1974]

It was shrink wrapped. Perhaps the store owner thought that as nothing was emblazoned on it, there was no code inside. He looked at the packaging and didn't see anything... Nevermind...

And I'd have to agree about the history of music thing mentioned. I remember as a young cd buyer in the early nineties being told to look for the three letters on a CD to see how the recording had been done and mastered. Can't remember exactly what they were, but seem to think I was advised that DDD were the ones to go for as all digital.

I've also found some awful sounding classical cds - so bad in fact I have simply binned them, and replaced with a different recording.

 

[iMark]

In the early years of CD there was a three letter code, the SPARS code, on them. It could be: AAD, ADD or DDD.

From Wikipedia:

"The SPARS Code[/b] is a three-position alphabetic classification system developed in the early 1980s by the Society of Professional Audio Recording Services (SPARS) for commercial compact disc releases. The code denotes which parts of the recording process were completed using analog equipment and which were completed using digital equipment, encompassing three areas: recording, mixing and mastering. The first two positions, representing recording and mixing respectively, may be either an "A" for analog or a "D" for digital; the third position, representing mastering, is always "D" on digital CDs.

The system was first implemented in 1984. Due to increasing complexity of recording and mixing processes developed over the code's first decade of use, SPARS decided to withdraw endorsement of the code in 1991 because they felt the code was overly simplistic and did not accurately reflect the complexity of typical recording and mixing processes in use at the time. However, many record labels continued to use the code and SPARS decided to re-endorse the SPARS code in 1995."

It's funny to think that 30 years after the introduction of the CD there are 'serious' audiophiles who think that distorted analogue is better than recordings that remain in the digital domain. Obviously there are horrible sounding DDD CDs, but that's mainly due to bad engineering and microphone balance. In the early years of the CD some analogue to digital transfers weren't great, giving AAD CDs a bad reputation. I still think that when these transfers are done well, CDs are a better consumer copy of the original mastertape than LPs. And they don't deterioate over time.

Remember that all classical labels started recording digitally as soon as they could for pretty obvious reasons: no tape hiss, no wow and flutter or other distortions and a flat frequency response. And of course the complete absence of tape drop outs. It's fascinating that the recording engineers of the early eighties obviously knew that CD quality recordings, either 16/44.1 or 16/48 were more faithful reproductions of classical (and jazz) performances than even the best tape recorders. People that claim tape sounds better, should have their hearing checked. It took a while for popular recordings to go digital but had more to do with fact that it took more time to develop digital mixing consoles.

Many people may like analogue sources, but they're definitely not more faithful reproductions of the original performance. But adding noise certainly does something for a lot of people.

Incidently, I also have some great sounding DDA LPs from the early eighties.

 

[Al ears]

I still buy vinyl and also use most other formats as well and I think I would agree with at least one well reknown recording professional who states that only now is some digital format reaching the quality of analogue.

And I don't think he's referring to CDs or mp3's.

 

[Frank Harvey]

A couple of myths are perpatuated here. The first one is that sound on CDs is compressed. It's not. And it's more than good enough for HiFi standards. The fact that some vinyl/SACD/Bluray Audio sounds better than CD is to with the atrocious mastering of some CDs.

Define compressed. Is CD a wide frequency range medium? How wide? Is it exactly the same as the master?

The other myth is that you need loads of speakers to enjoy SACD or Bluray Audio. You don't. Some of the discs are stereo only. Some SACD players are stereo only.

Even the 2.0 and 5.1 mixes vary in quality and compression.

Personally I like listening to vinyl records. But I know more than enough about the the technology behind records to know that there is a lot of distortion added to the music during the production and playback. I can't understand why audiophiles rave about playing records when they must be fully aware of all the distortion, hiss, rumble and wow and flutter.

How different a vinyl pressing will sound to the master it came from will depend on the record deck it is played on.

A couple of years later these digital recordings were released as CDs and most people at the time concluded that they now had a perfect copy of a studio master on a little shiny disc.

At the time, digital was heralded (and marketed) as "perfect", which at the time, it certainly wasn't. It has matured somewhat though.

 

[BIGBERNARDBRESSLAW]

I've certainly never seen an album with a cd included - if they did have, I would go for vinyl every time.

I've had quite a few over the last year or so. Pixies - Indie Cindy and Flaming Lips - With A Little Help From My Fwends come immediately to mind, but I'm sure there's been others.

 

[Covenanter]

A couple of myths are perpatuated here. The first one is that sound on CDs is compressed. It's not. And it's more than good enough for HiFi standards. The fact that some vinyl/SACD/Bluray Audio sounds better than CD is to with the atrocious mastering of some CDs.

Define compressed. Is CD a wide frequency range medium? How wide? Is it exactly the same as the master?

The other myth is that you need loads of speakers to enjoy SACD or Bluray Audio. You don't. Some of the discs are stereo only. Some SACD players are stereo only.

Even the 2.0 and 5.1 mixes vary in quality and compression.

Personally I like listening to vinyl records. But I know more than enough about the the technology behind records to know that there is a lot of distortion added to the music during the production and playback. I can't understand why audiophiles rave about playing records when they must be fully aware of all the distortion, hiss, rumble and wow and flutter.

How different a vinyl pressing will sound to the master it came from will depend on the record deck it is played on.

A couple of years later these digital recordings were released as CDs and most people at the time concluded that they now had a perfect copy of a studio master on a little shiny disc.

At the time, digital was heralded (and marketed) as "perfect", which at the time, it certainly wasn't. It has matured somewhat though.

You do talk the most absolute nonsense!

Chris

 

[knaithrover]

Sadly, I don't think it is the case with enough records - in fact the only vinyl LP I've had codes in (OK, it may only have been from a total of about 15 in the last few years) has been one bought in Canada in 2012 (Young Prisms - check them out, very good).

The film industry seems to have a much better grip on this, as a high proportion of blurays now seem to have either a dvd, or a download code, or both! A much better way of doing things.

I've certainly never seen an album with a cd included - if they did have, I would go for vinyl every time.

Of course the other massive advantge that cd has is that I can play it in my car... I don't have the ability to play from another source.

Modern Vampires of the City by Vampire Weekend has a free cd included with the vinyl album. I'd had it for about a month before it dropped out of the sleeve - i had no idea it was included

 

[Frank Harvey]

You do talk the most absolute nonsense!

Chris

What, so 2.0 and 5.1 mixes don't vary in quality/compression? A record will sound exactly the same on every deck? Vinyl doesn't have a wider frequency range than CDs? And CD is, and always was, perfect?

Just stating that someone talks nonsense on a forum doesn't make it the truth.