2. analog
  3. 1247092305

New vinyl's noisy little secret

I may be wrong, but it seems to me that the current crop of vinyl formulations just have higher noise levels than LPs made years ago. A case in point--I stumbled upon an old, original copy of Henry Mancini's 1962 soundtrack to the movie "Hatari" in my collection a few days ago (I had never even played it), and was astonished at its deathly quiet playback. Simply no surface noise. What gives? OK, you may make fun of this black-label RCA pressing (LSP-2559) for its content musically (though it's actually pretty fun), but it sure reminded me what we are missing with new releases--super high quality vinyl with very low surface noise. Even the occasional mechanical clicks from scratches seemed subdued. Most of my (expensive!) new vinyl comes replete with very onerous surface noise. Is it just impossible to make this old-generation type of vinyl currently?
kipdent
axelwahl
788 posts
 
Oh, too bad --- I have: JavaScript turned off.
Because of all the malware BS, and I'm not thinking of turning it on. Guess I have to miss this one :(
A.
mapman's avatar
mapman
22,456 posts
 
Yesterday, I happened to play the dirtiest record ever that looked clean to me on inspection, an old 60's orcjestral recording on COlumbia Masterworks I picked up for 25 cents.

I cleaned it as I usually do but shortly after playing it it started sounding so bad and there was so much gunk on my stylus, even after repeated stylus cleans, that I thought for a while I had damaged the sylus during cleaning. Eventually, after multiple stylus cleanings with the stylus brush, things sounded pristine again. I wonder if the vinyl itself was in bad shape and shedding itself onto my stylus as it played.

Haven't had a cleaning experience like that in quite a while. Just goes to show, you never know what to expect whenever you bring a record, old or new I suppose in for the first time.
zowie
68 posts
 
Mapman - Be sure your stylus isn't chipped or damaged and scraping the groove.
dougdeacon
3,338 posts
 
Toscanini through a megaphone, oh no!
I'd take Toscanini through a mattress vs. most conductors, even live! :-)
axelwahl
788 posts
 
Doug, :-)
and you do sound so sure of that now.
He had a pretty serious 'fascist' conducting style and known for it.
The likes of Reiner, and Karajan pale! And then there would Munch, Dorati, Ansermet, Kubelic, Beechham, Kertesz, Monteux --- just to mention a few, and NON would sound like through a mattress :-) Eish!
Next we gonna argue about osmium-needles and their contribution to a more high-end 78 sound, eish!
Are you then also a shellack collector?
A.
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