In my experience LPs from a digital masters are usually notably better sounding than the CD. There are exceptions like Nora Jones first release where the LP sounds no better than the CD. I have a great sounding Phillips classical CD where I found the corresponding digital LP. What a dissapointment. The LP was considerably worse.
I think that there is more to the story than just differences in the medium. The path between the Master and the signal that feeds into your preamp is a long one with plenty of opportunity for distortion and grunge, regardless of the medium (LP, CD, SACD...).
From the original master recording (digital or otherwise) separate CD and LP masters are created. They include the obvious stuff like separating into tracks with fade in/out and inter track silence. At this step it is typical for bunch of equalization and compression to be done. The munging of the signal at this point is customized for the medium and how good or bad depends on the skill and ears of the mastering engineer. In addtion the quality of the equipment used for the mastering process may be different for different mediums.
There is a lot of nonsense about digital being a perfect medium without distortions. It is true that digital information can be replicated and transferred without degredation or distortion. However, distortions unavoidably introduced for both the capture (A to D) and the playback (D to A) conversions. Distortions introduced from a digital process are different than those in analog. But it is nonsense to assert that digital does not have distortions. The distortions from digital are more difficult to measure but I would assert that they are easier to hear and more harmful to musical content.
So getting back to the topic LP and CD are two different methods of recreating the signal from the original recording. Both create distortions. Those distortions are different and to my ears LP provides the playback that is the most true to the original.
LPs made from digital masters are no doubt compromised but I find that they still sound quite good and often benefit from analog on the playback side.
I think that there is more to the story than just differences in the medium. The path between the Master and the signal that feeds into your preamp is a long one with plenty of opportunity for distortion and grunge, regardless of the medium (LP, CD, SACD...).
From the original master recording (digital or otherwise) separate CD and LP masters are created. They include the obvious stuff like separating into tracks with fade in/out and inter track silence. At this step it is typical for bunch of equalization and compression to be done. The munging of the signal at this point is customized for the medium and how good or bad depends on the skill and ears of the mastering engineer. In addtion the quality of the equipment used for the mastering process may be different for different mediums.
There is a lot of nonsense about digital being a perfect medium without distortions. It is true that digital information can be replicated and transferred without degredation or distortion. However, distortions unavoidably introduced for both the capture (A to D) and the playback (D to A) conversions. Distortions introduced from a digital process are different than those in analog. But it is nonsense to assert that digital does not have distortions. The distortions from digital are more difficult to measure but I would assert that they are easier to hear and more harmful to musical content.
So getting back to the topic LP and CD are two different methods of recreating the signal from the original recording. Both create distortions. Those distortions are different and to my ears LP provides the playback that is the most true to the original.
LPs made from digital masters are no doubt compromised but I find that they still sound quite good and often benefit from analog on the playback side.