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What's the point in cutting vinyl from a digital source? Fashion? I thought the whole point of vinyl was that it maintains analog from recording to playback

etothet 2y ago
It depends who you talk to. Some people feel vinyl “sounds more analog” just because of the format. Some people feel it adds natural saturation. In my opinion what matters most is the recording source. That said, bass frequencies respond very different on vinyl. Because of this, it’s pretty common to make a separate master for digital and vinyl. FWIW, almost all vinyl records produced today will come from a digital source. Even if the music was recorded directly to tape, there’s very likely a step of getting that audio into the digital domain.
- redeux 2y ago
  I think the compression format is what people point to when they say that digital music isn’t as full or “analog” sounding, and that would be true for vinyls made from a source that uses the same format, but there’s also the potential to use the raw WAV file which wouldn’t have this issue even if it’s digital.
  - etothet 2y ago
    It would be extremely unusual to print a vinyl record from anything less than 44.1 kHz / 16 bit wave or aiff. Also, for what it’s worth you can find online audio tests (https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2015/06/02/411473508/how-well-can-you-hear-audio-quality https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2015/06/02/411473508/...) that let you test if you can hear the difference between CD quality audio vs high bit rate mp3. Basically nobody can determine the difference with accuracy.
aczerepinski 2y ago
For me part of the appeal is to have something physical that I truly own and can enjoy without being tracked by algorithm. Blue Note Tone Poets (which are analogue all the way) got me into the hobby but I also buy new records, especially when they are available in a signed version.
- ljm 2y ago
  I like to think that different things have a ‘substance’ to them, not unlike the nebulous concept of quality in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. In this sense, the appeal is not just in the tangible record but also in the ritual of listening to it on a turntable. That process of choosing a record to play and then listen to it is quite a deliberate one, and you probably wouldn’t do it if you didn’t intend to appreciate it. It’s a hobby or an enthusiasm you have and there’s an effort involved in curating your record collection. I compare that to the process of opening up Spotify of Apple Music where most of that intentionality is stripped away. It serves a totally different purpose as a passive activity, not unlike leaving the radio on in the background, rather than an occasion you’d take time to enjoy. In my imagination I just picture those scenes in the Bosch TV show where he puts on a classic jazz record, with the view of LA sprawling into the distance in the background. And it wouldn’t be a vibe if he just said ‘Alexa play smooth jazz.’
risyachka 2y ago
For starters it will outlast your digital content. Also it won’t get deleted if you forget to pay for cloud storage. And your kids can inherit it without breaking into your cloud accounts.
- homarp 2y ago
  but why a vinyl instead of a cd? or a mp3 on an iphone/sdcard/hard drive?
  - interglossa 2y ago
    There is an argument that the loss of dynamic range and other factors in the compression required in mp3 or CD recordings make the latter inferior to vinyl. This was a prolonged debate forty years ago
    - mrob 2y ago
      Dynamic range compression is not "required", it's a choice of the mastering engineer. You can produce MP3 or CD recordings with higher dynamic range than vinyl if you want to.
      - tiagod 2y ago
        This is the reason why classical music CDs (and radio) usually sound much quieter. More dynamic range.
        prmoustache 2y ago
        Dynamic range compression is often used on most mainstream music because said music is rarely listened in perfect conditions in one's living room. They need to sound decent enough in the street, in a car, on a metro/train during rush hours, in the kitchen while cooking, on the beach, from allkinf of devices from crappy smartphone headphones, phones and computers integrated speakers or cheap bluetooth speakers. Ideally one would own 2 different recording of the songs they like. One for good listening environments and high quality equipment, one for more hostile environments. Or have devices that apply dynamic range compression on the fly when needed.
fumeux_fume 2y ago
Ideally you can maintain the analog chain from recording to the listener’s ear, but that really isn’t feasible for a lot of artists today and could also suffer from generational loss through the process. With cutting a record from a digital source you can control the digital to analog conversion rather than relying on the listener’s DAC (usually not high end) and it only costs you one generation of loss. I don’t think it’s a huge deal, but maybe a benefit.
bradly 2y ago
> I thought the whole point of vinyl was that it maintains analog from recording to playback That may be one point for some people, but not mine. I have my music on vinyl and that is how I listen to it. Regardless of the quality or analog vs digital or any of that, if I want to own an album, it needs to be available on vinyl for my to purchase. There are albums I want that I cannot purchase today. This is _my_ walled garden. You still see cassettes used today because of the ease of home distribution, and bridging the gap between those indie music makers and music consumers like myself is something I am looking forward to.
- iLoveOncall 2y ago
  So, what is your point for owning vinyls?
  - bradly 2y ago
    - I prefer to own vs rent music - I prefer physical to digital (albums often come with digital downloads) - I enjoy listening to full albums - I enjoy the album art, liner notes, posters, special releases, etc Not all the music I want to own is available on vinyl, but at the same time, some of the music I listen to is not on streaming services. And some isn't available on CD. Nothing is perfect. I choose vinyl as it provided the best set of trade-offs for how I enjoy music.
  - dghlsakjg 2y ago
    > I have my music on vinyl and that is how I listen to it. If I’m reading this right, he owns vinyl music recordings for the purpose of playing back music.
  - prmoustache 2y ago
    Listening to music? When I was a teenager I recorded vinyl, cassette, cd and even music from the radio on reel to reel tapes just because I liked using the Akai reel to reel tape deck my father was no longer using. Everything in it felt just more satisfyingly sturdy and mechanical to use than my other audio devices made with shitty plastics. Sometimes the ritual matters more than the outright audio quality.
dist-epoch 2y ago
> It is therefore ironic, that most vinyl records that were cut after the late 70s went through at least one round trip of analogue to digital and digital to analogue conversion. This is because a digital delay is almost always used in the cutting process in order to get better cuts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IM7sI7GZPbk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IM7sI7GZPbk
beAbU 2y ago
I might be totally wrong, but I won't be surprised if even commercial vinyls by modern artists come from digital masters. Surely mosts big studios have moved on from tape based systems by now?
- walthamstow 2y ago
  My point exactly. Modern vinyl records are simply a fashion object.

etothet 2y ago

It depends who you talk to. Some people feel vinyl “sounds more analog” just because of the format. Some people feel it adds natural saturation. In my opinion what matters most is the recording source. That said, bass frequencies respond very different on vinyl. Because of this, it’s pretty common to make a separate master for digital and vinyl. FWIW, almost all vinyl records produced today will come from a digital source. Even if the music was recorded directly to tape, there’s very likely a step of getting that audio into the digital domain.

redeux 2y ago
I think the compression format is what people point to when they say that digital music isn’t as full or “analog” sounding, and that would be true for vinyls made from a source that uses the same format, but there’s also the potential to use the raw WAV file which wouldn’t have this issue even if it’s digital.
- etothet 2y ago
  It would be extremely unusual to print a vinyl record from anything less than 44.1 kHz / 16 bit wave or aiff. Also, for what it’s worth you can find online audio tests (https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2015/06/02/411473508/how-well-can-you-hear-audio-quality https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2015/06/02/411473508/...) that let you test if you can hear the difference between CD quality audio vs high bit rate mp3. Basically nobody can determine the difference with accuracy.

aczerepinski 2y ago

For me part of the appeal is to have something physical that I truly own and can enjoy without being tracked by algorithm. Blue Note Tone Poets (which are analogue all the way) got me into the hobby but I also buy new records, especially when they are available in a signed version.

ljm 2y ago
I like to think that different things have a ‘substance’ to them, not unlike the nebulous concept of quality in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. In this sense, the appeal is not just in the tangible record but also in the ritual of listening to it on a turntable. That process of choosing a record to play and then listen to it is quite a deliberate one, and you probably wouldn’t do it if you didn’t intend to appreciate it. It’s a hobby or an enthusiasm you have and there’s an effort involved in curating your record collection. I compare that to the process of opening up Spotify of Apple Music where most of that intentionality is stripped away. It serves a totally different purpose as a passive activity, not unlike leaving the radio on in the background, rather than an occasion you’d take time to enjoy. In my imagination I just picture those scenes in the Bosch TV show where he puts on a classic jazz record, with the view of LA sprawling into the distance in the background. And it wouldn’t be a vibe if he just said ‘Alexa play smooth jazz.’

risyachka 2y ago

For starters it will outlast your digital content. Also it won’t get deleted if you forget to pay for cloud storage. And your kids can inherit it without breaking into your cloud accounts.

homarp 2y ago
but why a vinyl instead of a cd? or a mp3 on an iphone/sdcard/hard drive?
- interglossa 2y ago
  There is an argument that the loss of dynamic range and other factors in the compression required in mp3 or CD recordings make the latter inferior to vinyl. This was a prolonged debate forty years ago
  - mrob 2y ago
    Dynamic range compression is not "required", it's a choice of the mastering engineer. You can produce MP3 or CD recordings with higher dynamic range than vinyl if you want to.
    - tiagod 2y ago
      This is the reason why classical music CDs (and radio) usually sound much quieter. More dynamic range.
      - prmoustache 2y ago
        Dynamic range compression is often used on most mainstream music because said music is rarely listened in perfect conditions in one's living room. They need to sound decent enough in the street, in a car, on a metro/train during rush hours, in the kitchen while cooking, on the beach, from allkinf of devices from crappy smartphone headphones, phones and computers integrated speakers or cheap bluetooth speakers. Ideally one would own 2 different recording of the songs they like. One for good listening environments and high quality equipment, one for more hostile environments. Or have devices that apply dynamic range compression on the fly when needed.

fumeux_fume 2y ago

Ideally you can maintain the analog chain from recording to the listener’s ear, but that really isn’t feasible for a lot of artists today and could also suffer from generational loss through the process. With cutting a record from a digital source you can control the digital to analog conversion rather than relying on the listener’s DAC (usually not high end) and it only costs you one generation of loss. I don’t think it’s a huge deal, but maybe a benefit.

bradly 2y ago

> I thought the whole point of vinyl was that it maintains analog from recording to playback That may be one point for some people, but not mine. I have my music on vinyl and that is how I listen to it. Regardless of the quality or analog vs digital or any of that, if I want to own an album, it needs to be available on vinyl for my to purchase. There are albums I want that I cannot purchase today. This is _my_ walled garden. You still see cassettes used today because of the ease of home distribution, and bridging the gap between those indie music makers and music consumers like myself is something I am looking forward to.

iLoveOncall 2y ago
So, what is your point for owning vinyls?
- bradly 2y ago
  - I prefer to own vs rent music - I prefer physical to digital (albums often come with digital downloads) - I enjoy listening to full albums - I enjoy the album art, liner notes, posters, special releases, etc Not all the music I want to own is available on vinyl, but at the same time, some of the music I listen to is not on streaming services. And some isn't available on CD. Nothing is perfect. I choose vinyl as it provided the best set of trade-offs for how I enjoy music.
- dghlsakjg 2y ago
  > I have my music on vinyl and that is how I listen to it. If I’m reading this right, he owns vinyl music recordings for the purpose of playing back music.
- prmoustache 2y ago
  Listening to music? When I was a teenager I recorded vinyl, cassette, cd and even music from the radio on reel to reel tapes just because I liked using the Akai reel to reel tape deck my father was no longer using. Everything in it felt just more satisfyingly sturdy and mechanical to use than my other audio devices made with shitty plastics. Sometimes the ritual matters more than the outright audio quality.

dist-epoch 2y ago

> It is therefore ironic, that most vinyl records that were cut after the late 70s went through at least one round trip of analogue to digital and digital to analogue conversion. This is because a digital delay is almost always used in the cutting process in order to get better cuts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IM7sI7GZPbk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IM7sI7GZPbk

beAbU 2y ago

I might be totally wrong, but I won't be surprised if even commercial vinyls by modern artists come from digital masters. Surely mosts big studios have moved on from tape based systems by now?

walthamstow 2y ago
My point exactly. Modern vinyl records are simply a fashion object.