I'd say my CD and analog rigs are pretty comparable in quality: I have a Sony SC-2000 ES 5-disc CD/SACD changer (which was a huge improvement over a same-priced CEC from a few years before), and my TT is a Technics SL1210 M5G with KAB fluid damper and Denon DL-160.
I often spin vinyl when I'm puttering around the house--cooking, doing dishes, picking up things, etc. So often, when I'm in the kitchen cooking or cleaning, I HAVE to put aside the dish towel to sit in the sweet spot to hear it all. This was even true when my entire rig was worth about $570--before the DL-160 and fluid damper. Now the music *compels* me to come in and sit down.
I find it hardest to resist when it's a minimally mic'd recording that presents a true sonic hologram of the musicians and the venue. Recordings that come to mind include a Columbia Masterworks of Stokowski conducting the Bizet Carmen and L'Arlesienne suites, small jazz combos recorded live in real space, and some Living Stereo and Living Presence orchestral recordings.
The thing is, even with studio recordings of pop music, I come in and listen when I can. But if I stay in the other room and work, the music *still* gets under my skin and haunts me for hours and even days afterwards. A couple recent examples are "Moondance" by Van Morrison and "Catch Bull at Four" by the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens.
I played those LPs recently while I was in other rooms working, but still, those great songs and arrangements go around in my head in a way that digitally sourced music never did (and I have both Moondance and Van Morrison's Greatest Hits on CD)--not in 20 years of exclusively digitally-sourced music.
I often spin vinyl when I'm puttering around the house--cooking, doing dishes, picking up things, etc. So often, when I'm in the kitchen cooking or cleaning, I HAVE to put aside the dish towel to sit in the sweet spot to hear it all. This was even true when my entire rig was worth about $570--before the DL-160 and fluid damper. Now the music *compels* me to come in and sit down.
I find it hardest to resist when it's a minimally mic'd recording that presents a true sonic hologram of the musicians and the venue. Recordings that come to mind include a Columbia Masterworks of Stokowski conducting the Bizet Carmen and L'Arlesienne suites, small jazz combos recorded live in real space, and some Living Stereo and Living Presence orchestral recordings.
The thing is, even with studio recordings of pop music, I come in and listen when I can. But if I stay in the other room and work, the music *still* gets under my skin and haunts me for hours and even days afterwards. A couple recent examples are "Moondance" by Van Morrison and "Catch Bull at Four" by the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens.
I played those LPs recently while I was in other rooms working, but still, those great songs and arrangements go around in my head in a way that digitally sourced music never did (and I have both Moondance and Van Morrison's Greatest Hits on CD)--not in 20 years of exclusively digitally-sourced music.
