Aimy Winehouse -- who knows her?

You're right on the money Cutocycle. The "Back to Black" CD seems to have been deliberately engineered to have somebody's lame idea of a grainy, peaky retro sound that is very grating. I picked up an EP containing remixes of "Back to Black" and "I'm No Good" that have scrubbed that part of the production away and the vocals are startlingly more clear and focused. There are other aspects of what is done to the songs that I'm not wild about, but Amy's voice is much better presented.

Siliab: thanks for confirming my thoughts.. my other friends laughed at that rating.. I had to buy the white stripes vinyl (oh yeah and both records were warped brand new ...retailers won't take them back either..) because the CD is so compressed also....

the funny thing is I'm starting to explore vinyl because of how bad the new CD's are over produced.. it's so odd that the they use a different master to make the vinyl.

It's frustrating as I don't want to spend 5-10k in analog accesories (table,arm, cart, cleaners, isolation,preamps, etc... cleaners, cart aligners..) I have heard these setups and I have heard bargain beaters but and you have to go big. I don't care what people say about how a Rega P3 can beat digital.. sorry you just have bad digital! My old Technics SL1210 DD kicked the P3, but unfortunately still not enough (not looking for KAB upgrades as I'm watching my friend implement those).

Cutocycle,

Never been a huge fan of CD sound though I do agree that $5k to $10k is the buy in for a vinyl rig that doesn't miss any of the essentials. The difference between the CD and LP versions of the Stripes' "Elephant" remains one of the most amazing of my experience. The LP so lunches the CD that it almost seems like different music. Frickin' nuts if you ask me.