Pros, Cons, Comments, Critiques, Opinions, and Experiences
Why are vinyl records are so great?
The technology behind vinyl records (that is to say, music etched in a groove — originally on a cylinder — and “read” by a needle or stylus) has been around since before the oldest person you know was born. From before the Depression until the mid- to late-eighties a vinyl record was the de facto way to own music. Although vinyl records nearly went out of production in the 90s when the Compact Disc gained ubiquity, they hung on like the dry, brittle shrinkwrap that wraps an unsold LP and slowly started making their way back into the mainstream by the 2010s. Now, as before, they are the most popular form of physical music around.
Records provide a way for the end user to tangibly interact with the music. This is due in part to things like an album’s larger canvas for artwork and liner notes and the ritual of pulling out, cleaning off, and resting the record on the player. Even the experience of shopping for a record — especially in an independent record store — is a unique experience.
Listening to a record feels somehow more engaging, like it’s actually something important. Due to the inherent aspect of how the needle interprets the grooves — wherein lies dust, scratches, nicks, fingerprint residue, etc. — no two records sound precisely the same. That can’t be said about any other form of media that I can think of.
Since records have been in production for such a long time there is a huge community of collectors and there are certain pressings of certain albums that can fetch tens of thousands of dollars. I was still buying records in the 90s during the period when the industry witnessed its weakest sales numbers. Fast forward to the last few years when I dusted off my collection and got back into vinyl, I started to sell off some titles that I wasn’t terribly interested in anymore. I collected well over a thousand dollars myself during this process. For example, I had original pressings of Pearl Jam’s Ten and Alice in Chains’ Jar of Flies, and those alone fetched me over $500 combined.
Records are a ritualistic pursuit. It’s a unique feeling — kind of like getting a surprise birthday present — when you come home with a record or two. That feeling you get when you take the shrinkwrap off and inspect the details in the art, the liner notes, the color of the disc, and finally drop the needle and sit back… It’s a special feeling.
Why is streaming digital so great?
As popular as records are, streaming is way bigger. More music is consumed today via streaming than any other format. Apple, Amazon, and Google all have streaming music platforms designed to battle industry leader Spotify’s own platform. All told, there are several dozen, maybe even over a hundred, ways to stream music.
Much of what is streamed is highly compressed (think MP3 format — kind of like JPEG compression for photographs) that is still very high quality with good dynamic range. Most people would have a hard time recognizing the compressed version against the non-compressed hi res version. For those who can (or think they can) tell the difference, there are several options for streaming or downloading hi res digital files. Tidal and Qobuz are probably the best known alternatives but Apple and Amazon also offer hi res streaming tiers in their subscriptions. Spotify has been rumored to be launching a hi res tier for years, but has yet to do so.
Where turntables and record collections are physical entities that need space in your home, and are not easily portable, streaming media is innately portable. Streaming media requires no extra storage space in your home, car, or person. It takes up a negligible amount of space on your streaming device (i.e. your phone). If you hear music out in public — coming from a car, a Bluetooth speaker, in a store, maybe even from a radio — it is probably being streamed.
And there is almost nothing that isn’t available to be streamed. Certain artists have pulled their catalogs from Spotify due to questions over fair payment of royalties (Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, and Joanna Newsom come to mind) but these artists’ streams are available on the other major services.
So, say you’re on a bike ride and out of nowhere the urge to hear “Falling Elevators” by MC 900 ft Jesus overcomes you. Or you’re on a road trip and your dog just made a sound that reminded you of the guttural utterance at the absolute very beginning of “Never Said” by Liz Phair. Or, in case there needs to be a finer point put on this, you are sun bathing on a beach in Guam and you’ve had one of those daydreamy trains of thought where you’ve gone from considering new methods for folding paper into airplanes to wondering whether plants have muscular systems to pondering theological philosophy because you had recently read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and you now need to hear the dream-like singing and piano playing of Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru. Well, you can. Right now. With little effort. All for less than around twelve dollars a month.
Why did I sell all of my records and become monogamous to digital?
The decision was not made overnight or without perseveration. And to be very clear, everyone’s situation is different. In the end, I wanted to divorce myself from a hobby that left me feeling anxious a lot of the time. What? How? There is the set-up and maintenance that brings a lot of variables to the table with regards to turntable/cartridge/tonearm adjustments. Too many to mention, actually. Anytime I would be listening to a track where the vocals are a little off-center or exhibited sibilance, I couldn’t help wondering if that was intentional (or due to poor mastering or engineering) or if my tracking angle or anti-skate was off, for example.
And then there was the endless pursuit of the perfect pressing. Take, for example, Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours. It is obviously one of the best selling albums of all time. Currently on Discogs there are 423 separate vinyl pressings listed. Four hundred twenty-three. Which one sounds the best? Are there pressings that are good enough? I don’t fucking know.
OK, that’s Rumours, but even a relatively obscure title, say, Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart by Camper Van Beethoven from 1988 has eight pressings in existence. New pressings of new and old albums are dropping all the time. One of the last ones I bought before I sold everything was a supposedly great sounding live recording of Gram Parsons and the Fallen Angels with a young and mostly unknown Emmylou Harris, from just a few months before Parsons died. It was a soundboard recording that had a great write up. So I bought it. Alas, it did not sound great.
Or sometimes records get scuffed up in shipping and that causes them to sound like shit. Honestly, it is such a miracle to find a record that sounds and tracks perfectly that when I did it felt like hitting a jackpot and then I’d listen more to that recording than most others, like I’d discovered some heretofore unknown gem which kills the novelty very quickly.
What I realized when I started to trial different streaming platforms and delivery systems (like Roon) is that once I found the set-up that worked for me, most of the time, I stopped worrying about anything else and simply enjoyed the music. If something didn’t sound so great, it’s probably in the recording or mastering. I by no means have what most would consider a super high end system, but I’ve got a few grand invested in it and it sounds fantastic to me, so, again, if something doesn’t sound great, it’s not because of my system.
Most importantly, for me, I can now sit down and be listening to something within seconds, switch to another album altogether in just another second or two, and do this ad infinitum. I don’t have to worry about keeping needles or records clean, aligning cartridges and maintaining other adjustments, and proper storage shelving and the space that comes along with that. I just sit and listen. And, with my streaming subscription, I own everything. There is no deliberating over whether or not I want some specific find at the record store or that pricey but rare pressing on Discogs. Nope. I own everything.
What would I do if I were you, you wonder?
Do whatever you want! I’m not trying to be a digital evangelist here. I’m explaining why it’s the route I took. CDs are gaining back some of their momentum. So are cassettes. Seriously, there are many ways to take in music, and you can combine any or all of them depending on your need, and most importantly, there is no wrong answer.
When my daughter recently asked me for help picking out a CD player because they were getting into listening to CDs, I happily obliged. I sent them an old pair of speakers I wasn’t using, bought them a player as an early birthday present, and made suggestions for speaker placement, but in the end, I simply wanted them to enjoy listening to the music. That’s what’s at the heart of all this: enjoyment. If you have that, you are winning.
Be First to Comment