Sound quality is perhaps last on the list of my reasons for my preference for vinyl. First, it is a complete sensory experience involving the kinesthetics of handling the vinyl and cleaning it along with the visuals of the artwork. Then there’s the nostalgia and emotional connection to albums I have owned for 20, 30, 40 years. Which leads to my preference for ownership over subscribing which leads to rewarding the artists versus paying them pennies. I probably stream music more often than play vinyl due to the undeniable convenience of it all. But when I want to focus and listen to music prioritize vinyl. Just like I did when I was living in my parents house as a teen playing my system in my bedroom. Discovering Talking Heads and playing them for my confused friends. Right now I'm trying to choose between which box set for more songs about buildings and food. The ultimate with the singles or just the four album collection?
It Can't Be Explained Better
I just read this latest post from Dave Chesky at Audiophile Society, and I must share it, as nothing I've read has better explained the phenomenon that may be behind the preference for vinyl playback so many of us have...
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Loved this discussion: had doubts that "it can't be explained better" but that was one good try. Found compelling the finale by twowheels53.
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+1 Mahgister on all your comments Someone above made an analogy between incandescent and LED bulbs--in some ways I think that's a good one for vinyl v digital but i have the opposite view--i much prefer incandescent to LED b/c of the unnatural "glare" of LED. Regardless of how many shades i can turn my smart LED bulb i cannot make it appear as "warm" as incandescent. However, do i use LED? Of course. Same for vinyl v digital--i prefer the sound of vinyl but more often than not i will stream music b/c of its convenience and unlimited library. However, when i stream i sometimes use my equalizer to gently roll off the highs which reduces that glare which may be coming from either compression or the fact that digital can reproduce treble to a higher frequency than vinyl. Back in the 80's Stereo Review ran a column on equalization and how to go about approximating best seats in concert halls. Their "perfect" curve on 5th row seats at an orchestral concert hall featured a rolloff of the highs beginning around 12KHz. I could reproduce that curve with my computerized graphic equalizer and pink noise generator and found it quite pleasing for taming CDs which were just gaining prominence. I usually bypassed the equalizer (as i still do today) for vinyl playback. Chesky's point about everything resonating is the reason i recently replaced my metal component rack with solid wood racks. All that aside there really shouldn't be a debate between vinyl vs digital--it really doesn't matter which one is more "accurate" or dynamic--it only matters which one you prefer.
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People generally are completely unconscious about the amount of information that a vibrating and resonating source convey. (be it our own body speaking, singing, or a violin or any object which is put in a vibrating (ringing) state). Here a quote from a very important article on acoustics :
«"In seminars, I like demonstrating how much information is conveyed in sound by playing the sound from the scene in Casablanca where Ilsa pleads, "Play it once, Sam," Sam feigns ignorance, Ilsa insists," Magnasco said. "You can recognize the text being spoken, but you can also recognize the volume of the utterance, the emotional stance of both speakers, the identity of the speakers including the speaker’s accent (Ingrid’s faint Swedish, though her character is Norwegian, which I am told Norwegians can distinguish; Sam’s AAVE [African American Vernacular English]), the distance to the speaker (Ilsa whispers but she’s closer, Sam loudly feigns ignorance but he’s in the back), the position of the speaker (in your house you know when someone’s calling you from another room, in which room they are!), the orientation of the speaker (looking at you or away from you), an impression of the room (large, small, carpeted).» Oppenhein and Magnasco https://phys.org/news/2013-02-human-fourier-uncertainty-principle.html
Now go to page 5 and look at the image of this article and read this text :
« Wherefore, a body in vibration produces auditory attributes peculiar to the body as a function of its properties. With the ear,we did not have to cut A and B open to see the cavity inside; it sufficed to tap A and B and let the objects talk to us about themselves. Even with closed eyes we can hear A say, ’I have no cavity’, and B say, ’I have a cavity’. All this information is available to us in the sounds produced by the excited bodies A and B. Numerous traits distinguish bodies one from another, and the differences impact on the sound qualities they produce in specific ways. Consider the pair B1 and B2 in fig. 1. The presence of an orifice (aperture) adds a new sound quality and distinguishes the sounds produced by the pair. The sound produced by B2 can never miss out the presence of an orifice, and the sound produced by B1 can never convey the presence of an orifice which it
This is what Chesky tried to convey with the notion that all thing are ringing like a bell and all things being linked by resonance... This goes way beyond the useless debate vinyl/digital... I am interested way more by acoustics than by subjectivist taste about gear or objectivist narrow mind interest in few measures as key to sound qualitative information...
Thanks for your appreciation...
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