Analog is the new pink

Frogman, good to hear your son is on the right track for life-long music listening and enjoyment. I will have to temper this by stating that I don't think he would be in the majority of the "younger people" crowd I was refering to-rather the exception. I was of course speaking in generalities. We audiophile denizens as a group are the 1/10 of 1% of the normal listening and music buying population. The other posters makes some excellent points as to how things have changed since our generation was first exposed to stereo systems back in the 60/70/80s. Timrhu's comments basically endorse my original statement. They like vinyl 'cause its cool. Nothing wrong with that, but I can't extrapolate this trend into the next generation's burgeoning interest in all things audiophile. As usual, the 1/10 of 1% of them will move into the twisted and demented ranks of "soundstage" grail chasers like us.

To echo here.

Vinyl playback among the youth is not much different that when other gens were younger. Its about hip, cool and not really about or if analog sounds better. Of course back in the 60's and 70's there were less options in recorded music for the masses. You had vinyl which offed the most availability and best general quality of sound be it on a higher end setup or a more modest one. You had 8 tracks which had all sorts of reliability issues and less penetration at home. The audio cassette was still rather new and teething. It did not become a credible audio format until the 80's. Reel to Reel was too expensive and too fussy that only the most audiophile-like persons bothered.

Today the youth, well all of us if need be have numerous digital formats to which most are based on ease of use not quality. But again most people regardless of era did not listen to music only on quality of sound and did not buy high quality gear. The price to good gear relative to income was higher back in the day. Today, yes many youth will be fans of quality sound, they will invest in better gear be it new or search out good vintage gear. They like us and others before us will be a minority though.

Enjoy what they bring to it all and by making vinyl hip, cool they help keep it alive and for us, even those who are audiophile geeks it's a good thing.

Vinyl on modest gear can still sound great. The vinyl collection with the album art and liner notes are all a part of it all and that's why its special compared to digital especially downloads.,

Timrhu, perhaps I'm not "getting" you but, if you're serious, I wholeheartedly disagree with your comment about analog playback merely being "cool" rather than actually sounding better.
Lindisfarne

My post is not about which medium sounds better, it's about the attraction young people have toward vinyl.
As Frogman, I did a similar thing for my daughter when she expressed an interest in my albums. She bought a few albums to play on my system so I set up a vinyl system in her room. Her friends would come over and they'd spin the records. It lasted a few months. She went off to college and the fascination waned. Now she's graduated and has moved on, the lps are in a closet in a spare room.
I could be wrong but I believe that is a more typical scenario.

Unfortunately...like Tim Tebow the current mainsteam vinyl renassaince is a fad...the 70s/80s experience is being marketed to youth in film, clothes, music...and yes medium...most of them buy a usb turntable at Target and rave how Warm vinyl sounds...similiar to underdeveloped palletes...college kids will eat any thing...their sonic sensibilities are a decade or so from maturity

Like Frogman, I strongly disagree with much that has been said here. I have always found that young people, if exposed to a good vinyl set-up (and no, it doesn't have to cost thousands of dollars), do immediately hear the difference. Especially if they are young music students....