do record cleaning fluids soften the treble?

Only if you gargle with them.

All very well but I just listened to "Music From the Time of the Crusades" on Argo; I gave up half way through one side before I cleaned it, really noisy. After cleaning it was much better and sounded fine to me. It use to be a general recommendation that you clean new records before you play them, I have seen several comments about how much crud was on them. Everyone to their own taste but all my friends with LP collections have cleaners and use them often.

If I may, can I then ask, and perhaps make a few conclusions-assumptions about these different viewpoints-opinions mentioned here?

What I have normally noted, when there was a rare, past time of playing any uncleaned records, was usually a higher degree of crud accumilation on the Stylus?

So, one question to the original poster, have you noted this as well? Why I ask, and my thoughts, are, if such is occurring, wouldn;t this then be a certain sign, that the Stylus is trying to plow a path through the groove?

Wouldn't this then have a greater degree of degradation, versus a cleaner groove?

Another thought is, can we then lump all makes-types of cleaning fluids, and rinses into the same boat, in that all that is made, can then cause these degrading qualities that some claim to note?

That even to a highly trained eye, that the uncleaned, brand spankin new record appears to be perfectly fine to play, wouldn't a certain degree of Stearates, and Mold Release products on the record's surface, and within the groove then be a benefit, or?

Just curious about this, because generally, most would no doubt find the exact opposite set of results with cleaning versus not cleaning.

Lastly, could it be a partciular cleaner-rinse, or a specific process that is being used, to cause less than optimal results? Mark

You see. No wonder that as much as I like tape I hate vinyl. I just have to deal with it. But it's a big pain in the backside and also very expensive.
Generally speaking, I too try to do as little cleaning as possible - I let the stylus do the work.