What happened to vinyl? (quality of newer pressings)

[Disco Volante]

I've been buying records, LP's, for 30-35+ years. Never had a reject or faulty one. Even the flimsy 90's specimens still sound good. Even the very partied ones. Some of the 50's and 60's classical recordings are almost unlistenable but only due to the hard compression used.
Then lately, as of maybe the last couple of years, some, like one in 10, brand-new, "audiophile 180 gram virgin vinyl blah blah" sounds like they have tracking faults, hissing, intermittent distortion, pops, crackles. Got a few replaced to no good: all the copies have *the same* faults in *the same* places??
This happens not only on reissues but also on new music. From e.g. ECM and Blue Note.
If that's "audiophile" I prefer the cheap 90's goods, maybe with a good clamp...

Any of you lathe-heads care to comment?

I have of course tried different gear. Same results using two different MC cartridges (Denon 103R and Ortofon MC30 Supreme), correctly aligned and adjusted, on a SME3009/Thorens TD124.

Cheers, V!

 

[JohnRoberts]

they sold something like $1B last year so somebody is happy...

I recall getting bad vinyl back when I was still buying it, but not for several decades now.

JR

 

[Gold]

If the pressing is noisy as in pops and clicks it is most likely the pressing. If there are pops that happen the same way in the same place every time it is most likely plating. If it is an audio problem related to the music it is most likely mastering. You have possibly described all three.

There is good work and bad work out there. Sometimes there is bad work from good places and good work from bad places. The difference is the good places will fix it while the bad places will blow smoke up your ass.

 

[elskardio]

When Radiohead's Amnesiac was released on a 2LP 180gram 45 RPM, I was overexcited! But it turned out to be a big disappointment.

The best pressing I bought recently were from small independent artists. One in particular went through 3 pressing tests before massive production.

 

[midwayfair]

Obviously they're adding in flaws to mimic the vinyl plugins that do the same thing! Really gives it that good ole analog-imitating-digital-imitating-analog sound!

 

[Rusan]

I recall getting bad vinyl back when I was still buying it, but not for several decades now.

I sold my turntable and left the whole audiophile thang behind in the mid-90s, but I remember how even back then vinyl had a dud or two here and there. I had a few new LPs of recent music with some weird EQ stuff going on, and maybe 3 or 4 older ones than sounded dull and/or had extensive clicks and pops even when brand new and first taken out of the sleeve. OTOH all but those few were fine, and a small handful of records sounded magnificently glorious.

I suspected that the resurgence of vinyl's popularity would be accompanied by poor quality, and the chatter on various audiophile forums seems to indicate this indeed holds true for much (but not all) of the current vinyl production. With vinyl being such a niche market compared to digital downloads, and audiophile listeners being an even smaller niche within that niche, they probably don't see the need to produce top-notch quality.

 

[JohnRoberts]

For today's TMI about vinyl, back when I was still promoting my (Phoenix Systems) audio kits using construction articles in Popular Electronics (1980s), they made me an offer I couldn't refuse. They dangled a cover article in the December issue if I could deliver a CX*** record decoder kit within a few weeks. CBS records granted me a CX license gratis for all the free publicity they would get.

I received the full licensee packet with pro forma decoder circuits from CBS. Of course it was against my preference to just copy the provided circuits. Instead I substituted an improved OTA chip and made a few other improvements gleaned from my years designing companding NR. For an anecdote to make this a little more interesting (perhaps?) I found a decoder RC time-constant error in their pro forma circuit design. The licensee packet included a copy of the (Urie?) encoder circuit design, so I could see that it was accurate to the published encode/decode time-constants.

It was not a big deal to make the decode time constant correct but since I was operating under a tight time deadline I submitted my kit article to the magazine with the correct RC. Simultaneously I notified my contact at CBS records about the mistake in their published pro forma encoder design. They never got back to me with a reply.

A few days later I attended the NYC AES show like I typically did every fall. I introduced myself to guys in the Urie booth and told them about the CX mistake. They laughed and said "so you're the guy". Since CBS had provided that erroneous pro forma design to multiple licensees, who copied it verbatim without noticing the error, there were tens of thousands of decoder SKUs out in the market all with the wrong decode time constant. CBS records decided to change the standard and time constant in the one encoder to agree with the incorrect pro forma circuit, but didn't bother informing me, making me the odd man out and now wrong . As soon as I got home from the AES show I called the editor at Popular Electronics and changed the resistor value in my kit to get back in agreement with the changed encode/decode standard. I have no love for CBS

I sold enough CX kits to justify the effort, I still have some CX encoded records in my record pile. I no longer have a working decoder handy.

JR

*** CX was an encode/decode noise reduction system not unlike Dolby tape NR. The playback decode used a 1:2 below threshold expander with the range limited so playing back records without decoding would just sound a little compressed. CBS did not have much respect for the audience's sound quality judgement and ASSumed they wouldn't notice/mind.

 

[cyrano]

Vinyl certainly wasn't always perfect before CDs came along. Even review copies (the "not for sale" stuff) wasn't always OK. Mind you, the postman plying the boxes they came in to get them in the letter box was even worse...
Another thing that got way better with CDs.

 

[scott2000]

then there are cds released from vinyl recordings...

 

[JohnRoberts]

then there are cds released from vinyl recordings...

I am not aware of that happening with any frequency but they now have modern de-click and de-pop single ended NR systems to clean up old vinyl that isn't too trashed (like some of my old records are).

In the early days of CDs, I recall some issues with new releases that were not equalized for the relatively flat CD format ending up with too much HF content anticipating vinyl's typical HF losses and ending up sounding shrill.

JR

 

[emrr]

All I know is the half dozen or so test pressings I’ve QC’d of my own work have all been disappointing. There’s a mix of practical expediency and materials and equipment shortages playing in. I can’t speak to how engineers felt years ago, but have heard similar old-timer rumblings.

 

[Gold]

In the early days of CDs, I recall some issues with new releases that were not equalized for the relatively flat CD format ending up with too much HF content anticipating vinyl's typical HF losses and ending up sounding shrill.

That's about the worst thing you can do in that situation. Shows a total lack of understanding of how records work. Maybe if we go faster the car will break through the brick wall.

 

[JohnRoberts]

That's about the worst thing you can do in that situation. Shows a total lack of understanding of how records work. Maybe if we go faster the car will break through the brick wall.

My comment was about early CDs not mature vinyl pressings... I am also talking about 4+ decades ago. I recall hearing anecdotes about CD releases that used hot "sweetened" master tapes as is and that was responsible for them sounding harsh... People back then were all too willing to blame the new CD technology that had much flatter frequency response and lower distortion than vinyl.

JR

PS: The car going faster will have a better chance of breaking through the brick wall. Kinetic energy increases with velocity squared.

 

[Gold]

My comment was about early CDs not mature vinyl pressings...

My point was that I think this is more urban legend than truth. Any good cutter knows adding top end to make up for HF loss makes things worse not better. Lets try this analogy. The cup is only so big. Adding more will only make it spill.

PS: The car going faster will have a better chance of breaking through the brick wall. Kinetic energy increases with velocity squared.

Car breaks through wall. Driver dead.

 

[JohnRoberts]

My point was that I think this is more urban legend than truth.

what? That lacquers relax and lose HF from sitting after cut? I thought that was common knowledge... IIRC some cutter would refrigerate the lacquer to slow the relaxation. Then metal plating fixes the relaxation.

‘I always say to my customers that as soon as you’ve cut a lacquer put it in the fridge. As an experiment, a few years ago, I cut a range of identical tones on two lacquer discs from the same box. One was placed in an ordinary domestic fridge on a Friday and the other left in the reception area. On the Monday I played the two back – the disc from reception was 2.5dB down at 15kHz in comparison to the one in the fridge, which is significant.’
‘Copper doesn’t relax – part of the success of DMM in maintaining brightness is not only its inherent properties but the fact that you can

DMM "direct metal mastering" cuts directly to metal so avoids the squishy lacquer step. Caveat... I am not the mastering expert here.

old article
====

My dad was a recording engineer for RCA in NYC, but he died in the 50s so I didn't get to pick his brain. I recall the one time he took me into work with him in the city on a Saturday. His technicians were melting wax on microscope slides to study the grooves being made by their cutters.

Decades later a friend with a recording studio has his own cutter and mastered records.

Back in the 80s in my magazine column I was sucked into defending early digital audio and CDs to the recording community who didn't trust that new fangled digital technology.

Any good cutter knows adding top end to make up for HF loss makes things worse not better. Lets try this analogy. The cup is only so big. Adding more will only make it spill.

Of course you don't boost HF when the cutter is already on the edge of saturation. Any corrective EQ needs to account for total available dynamic range and headroom.

Car breaks through wall. Driver dead.

But wall is broken through, its just physics.

JR

 

[Gold]

what? That lacquers relax and lose HF from sitting after cut? I thought that was common knowledge... IIRC some cutter would refrigerate the lacquer to slow the relaxation. Then metal plating fixes the relaxation.

Research shows that 90% of springback happens within two hours of cutting lacquers. Refrigerating does nothing to alter that. Basically every record ever made has this.

DMM "direct metal mastering" cuts directly to metal so avoids the squishy lacquer step. Caveat... I am not the mastering expert here.

DMM doesn't suffer springback. Unfortunately it can't alter the playback stylus shape which defines HF response and distortion. The distortion doesn't happen in the cut. It happens on playback.

 

[JohnRoberts]

Research shows that 90% of springback happens within two hours of cutting lacquers. Refrigerating does nothing to alter that. Basically every record ever made has this.

that is in direct contradiction with article I linked to... Are people still cutting lacquers this century..?

I recall my dad would cut lacquers of popular TV show theme music for us kids to play on the record player at home. Children were easily amused back in the 50s.

DMM doesn't suffer springback. Unfortunately it can't alter the playback stylus shape which defines HF response and distortion. The distortion doesn't happen in the cut. It happens on playback.

No spring-back in digital audio....

JR

 

[Gold]

that is in direct contradiction with article I linked to...

I have done that experiment with the opposite results. Hard to know what he did. I'll take the internal research papers i've read from RCA and Capitol over a non scientific article. Capitol used to manufacture lacquer blanks and did a lot of research.

Are people still cutting lacquers this century..?

Yes. Lots.

 

[Brian Roth]

Amen! I am part of a company that requires lacquer transfers to make metal parts for pressing. The lacquer cutting equipment here came from Doug Sax's Mastering Lab and it's all a bit cranky.

Part of the "deal" here is that the new lacquer can be easily driven across town and immediately plated at the pressing plant.

I am NOT any sort of lacquer expert....that is the domain of the guy(s) actually doing the cuts. I just try to keep all the surrounding electronics working.

Bri

 

[scott2000]

Gather from watching and comments that some people are upset that there has been a digital step in MOFI all analog transfers ..?