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Sony plans to make vinyl records again

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#191

Post by eanzenberg »

bcrescimanno wrote: post #144

As someone who started collecting vinyl about 3 years ago, it's about the difference between passive and active involvement in music. So much of our music consumption these days is a largely passive activity. We have music in our headphones while we work. We have music on in our cars while we drive. We have music on in the background of social events. While modern digital formats have given us true ubiquity of music…

I dunno.. digital music just sounds better, is more consistent, portable, and all around easier to play than vinyl.

Why stop there? Do you also churn your own butter, milk your own cows, shave with a straight razor?

Personally, I think it's just silly hipster bias.

Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#192

Post by kazinator »

Frank Zappa on vinyl, BAM (Bay Area Music magazine) [1987]:

http://www.afka.net/Articles/1987-01_BAM.htm

BAM: Working with a computerized synthesizer, do you find that vinyl is no longer the most desirable way to present your music? Will you be releasing CD-only recordings?

FZ: Well, vinyl never really was all that terrific a medium anyway. Some people cling to the belief that vinyl sounds better. I don't know. Not to my ear. I like it on digital tape myself.

BAM: There's supposed to be a warmth to vinyl.

FZ: Well, let's analyze what the word warmth is. Does warmth mean a lack of top end, or an extra bunch of frequency bulge at 300 cycles. What the fuck is warmth? How do you quantify that in audio terms?

BAM: Critics don't have to quantify in audio terms. We use words like warmth.

FZ: Yeah, well, you know, you can demonstrate pseudo-warmth in a technical way in the studio by using a broad-band equalizer and boosting things around 300 cycles, you know. It just gets pudgier. And you roll off the top end a little bit, and things start to sound, you know, warm! – if that's the kind of sound that you like. I don't particularly care for that sound.

--

Mix Magazine [1983]:

http://www.afka.net/Articles/1983-06_Mix.htm

Mix: The complaint has been that the digital tape sounds great, but when you transfer it to an analog medium you get a whole different sound.

FZ: You do get different stuff, and the reason you do is that the dynamic range of the digital tape is 90 dB and the dynamic range of a record is about 45 to 50 dB. So you can't let all the peaks go where they would normally go – you have to compress it. But if you're going to plan for the future, I think ultimately records are going to be released on compact discs, little laser discs, and they've got 90 dB. There's a way to do it. I'll compensate to get it on a piece of vinyl and still have the right thing digitally.

Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#193

Post by bitJericho »

eanzenberg wrote: post #191
bcrescimanno wrote: post #144

As someone who started collecting vinyl about 3 years ago, it's about the difference between passive and active involvement in music. So much of our music consumption these days is a largely passive activity. We have music in our headphones while we work. We have music on in our cars while we drive. We have music on in the background of social events. While modern digital formats have given us true ubiquity of music…

I dunno.. digital music just sounds better, is more consistent, portable, and all around easier to play than vinyl. Why stop there? Do you also churn your own butter, milk your own cows, shave with a straight razor? Personally, I think it's just silly hipster bias.

I agree, for sure. That said, there's a lot to be said about listening to an entire album. I'm a huge fan of CDs for this reason. It's a good mix of Vinyl vs Digital. I know I'm getting perfect, uncompressed digital audio. My setup is designed for involved listening if I want it, and I do that mostly with CDs, rather than records. At the same time, if I want something new, or a cd I don't have, I just put on Spotify. There's no reason why you can't have it all.

Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#194

Post by gmarx »

dragonwriter wrote: post #181
gmarx wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love that you call it a "hi-fi" which is what it would have been called the generation before mine. We always called it a "stereo". I've always been amazed by how rare it is for a person to be interested in a system that makes the music sound better. The difference between an iPhone with the default earbuds and a $5000 stereo rig with speakers is astounding but only a tiny fraction of the listening public cares

> The difference between an iPhone with the default earbuds and a $5000 stereo rig with speakers is astounding but only a tiny fraction of the listening public cares Without optimum room design, even half-decent earbuds are better than pretty high-quality speaker systems, if you don't need multiple simultaneously listeners. And I don't think it's that most people don't care, I think it's just that most people have a…

optimum room design is great to get the best out of your gear but a $5000 stereo set up in your current living room will be significantly better than the earvuds

Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#195

Post by treehau5 »

eanzenberg wrote: post #191
bcrescimanno wrote: post #144

As someone who started collecting vinyl about 3 years ago, it's about the difference between passive and active involvement in music. So much of our music consumption these days is a largely passive activity. We have music in our headphones while we work. We have music on in our cars while we drive. We have music on in the background of social events. While modern digital formats have given us true ubiquity of music…

I dunno.. digital music just sounds better, is more consistent, portable, and all around easier to play than vinyl. Why stop there? Do you also churn your own butter, milk your own cows, shave with a straight razor? Personally, I think it's just silly hipster bias.

Why stop there? Do you write your own libraries, generate your own grammars, go through the logic of your program in your head? Personally, I think it's just silly hacker bias.

Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#196

Post by Gracana »

kazinator wrote: post #188
bcrescimanno wrote: post #144

As someone who started collecting vinyl about 3 years ago, it's about the difference between passive and active involvement in music. So much of our music consumption these days is a largely passive activity. We have music in our headphones while we work. We have music on in our cars while we drive. We have music on in the background of social events. While modern digital formats have given us true ubiquity of music…

You can walk across the room, thumb through a CD collection, pull a disc out of the case, and put it into your 2U rack-sized CD player.

True. But vinyl album art is bigger, which is nice if you are interested in having a cool collection of art/objects.

Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#197

Post by kasey_junk »

eanzenberg wrote: post #191
bcrescimanno wrote: post #144

As someone who started collecting vinyl about 3 years ago, it's about the difference between passive and active involvement in music. So much of our music consumption these days is a largely passive activity. We have music in our headphones while we work. We have music on in our cars while we drive. We have music on in the background of social events. While modern digital formats have given us true ubiquity of music…

I dunno.. digital music just sounds better, is more consistent, portable, and all around easier to play than vinyl. Why stop there? Do you also churn your own butter, milk your own cows, shave with a straight razor? Personally, I think it's just silly hipster bias.

I'm not normally considered a hipster and I agree the advantage to vinyl is that it encourages active participation with music (and the art is better).

I consume most of my music digitally essentially in the background but if I want to have a music listening session, alone or with friends, I reach for vinyl.

Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#198

Post by ovao »

eanzenberg wrote: post #191
bcrescimanno wrote: post #144

As someone who started collecting vinyl about 3 years ago, it's about the difference between passive and active involvement in music. So much of our music consumption these days is a largely passive activity. We have music in our headphones while we work. We have music on in our cars while we drive. We have music on in the background of social events. While modern digital formats have given us true ubiquity of music…

I dunno.. digital music just sounds better, is more consistent, portable, and all around easier to play than vinyl. Why stop there? Do you also churn your own butter, milk your own cows, shave with a straight razor? Personally, I think it's just silly hipster bias.

I think there's an argument for doing those things yourself if it's genuinely cheaper or of higher-quality, but you can't realistically make that argument with vinyl.

I think with vinyl people are looking for more of a sense of ownership. It doesn't feel like you own an album, and don't get the feeling that it contributes to some part of you, when you click "save" in Spotify. It doesn't take any effort or any sacrifice (money) to do that, so it comes with no opportunity cost. But buying a record is more deliberate and usually means that your ownership of it comes at the expense of something else you'd instead buy with that money.

I admit it's a pretty wishy-washy argument, but for most people, the prospect of buying a vinyl record has to be rooted in something psychological because objectively speaking there aren't very many good arguments for it.

Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#199

Post by Animats »

Then people play vinyl records through a turntable that outputs via an A/D as a USB device.

Some DJ use vinyl records which contain nothing but a time code track. This feeds a system which plays out the proper audio segment from downloaded data.[1]

[1] http://djtechtools.com/2014/03/20/building-a-dvs-timecode-dj...

Re: Sony plans to make vinyl records again

#200

Post by kazinator »

Gracana wrote: post #196
kazinator wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can walk across the room, thumb through a CD collection, pull a disc out of the case, and put it into your 2U rack-sized CD player.

True. But vinyl album art is bigger, which is nice if you are interested in having a cool collection of art/objects.

If you scan a 5" CD album cover at 2400 DPI, you get a 12000x12000 image, from which you can probably render a reasonable poster, if you like.
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