The below thoughts are a logical extension of the direction @SteveTs post of yesterday was taking and is not intended as a criticism but I wonder if one’s preferred choice of medium broadly aligns with whether one is a left-brain/right brain or creative/scientific type person?
It’s interesting that vinyl lovers eager to justify their love of LPs frequently use hard-to-quantify emotional terms such as anticipation, engagement, feel, etc.
Those who prefer CDs on the other hand regularly reach for cold, hard statistics and side-by-side metrics.
The only thing that might be said to unite those on both sides of the analog/digital divide is a shared hatred of the term “vinlys”
Like many AWers, I started off with LPs and was an early adopter of CDs.
The big plus for me with CDs was that I led a fairly peripatetic career and their smaller, more robust format made them far easier, cheaper and safer to ship between countries than my old vinyls.
Having finally reached a stage of life where I was unlikely to move homes or work overseas, I began dusting off and supplementing my vinyl collection a couple of years back.
Probably still buy more CDs than LPs though.
CDs for me simply for cost, storage and ease of handling. I have my 20th century vinyl collection put away with the intention of bringing it out some day when I get room in the house and a decent turntable. Before storing them I recorded most onto mini-discs (!) so I can still listen to them but without the tactile experience. My daughter and her partner in Aukland have a vinyl collection so I buy LPs for them as Christmas presents.
I cherish my old vinyl collection – not a huge one, but substantial enough – but have opted for CDs since I got my first ‘hi-fi’ system (how quaint!). I found – and still do – that they’re much more convenient to play, and generally prefer the clarity of the sound. The scratches, pops and hisses inevitably accrued on vinyl, regardless of how well you look after the records, may well give you a Proustian rush when you hear them, but the flip side (swidt?) is that they are annoying and detrimental to the enjoyment of the album.
The other bonus of CDs now is that they are by far the cheaper option…who’da thunk it?
I have invested in a decent deck so I can occasionally indulge in a nostalgic afternoon of record playing, but it does serve to remind me of what a faff it is. And I’ve only bought two new ‘vinlys’ (heh!) since the format became hip again.
In answer to the question, I would have to say I’m a CD type person – I did a degree in Electronics and so know, or probably knew, all the Shannon’s sampling thereom stuff so look at it from a technical perspective.
That said, these days, I’m very much a download the digital file type person – I still like to own music and not stream, but I have it all stored and played from a network drive rather than play the physical CDs. It also helps that downloads are instant and I don’t have to wait a week for Amazon to ship it to me. That said, I still do buy CD’s / Blu Rays – mainly in boxsets etc etc for the surround / hi res mix.
I grew up with vinyl, but was very quick to move to CDs (probably 1986 when I was at Uni and working for Philips in the summer). I have never considered going back to vinyl – partly in that I can’t be doing with all the messing about and partly that at 30 degC ambient temp and 80% humidity here in Singapore, they would all be warped within a week…….
I’ve always thought there was something faintly racist about vinyl and the people who collect it, so I generally steer clear. Always have, always will.
CDs, I used to enjoy, but somewhere around a decade ago I felt there was an unpalatable shift in the audio quality. The Quan Range of the sound was clearly subject to greater filtration, which lead to a lot of unnecessary, and sometimes even audible, snagging on the top notes. I also detected a tremor in the lower end of some of the basal tones, which gave the sound a sludgy quality when played in high temperatures. I’m sure some people could probably live with such afflictions, and good luck to them, but it’s not for me.
Nowadays I only consume music produced by my own vocal chords. If I want to hear a song, I take the time to have a good look at the sheet music, sequester myself in my listening nook (acoustically engineered to within a micro-ampule of perfect sonic balance), gargle honeyed water and have at it. Some of the best music listening experiences I’ve ever had, don’t know how anyone can call themselves a serious music fan when they’re letting unreliable and imperfect technology come between them and the tunes man.
I’m glad I re-read this and didn’t steam in with a “What the…”
Grew up with vinyl. A troublesome format that i was very glad to see replaced by CD. This in turn has been mostly replaced hi res and CD quality streaming.
Recently bought a Wiim streamer to attach to the 20+ year old hi fi. A total game changer for a couple of hundred quid.
https://www.wiimhome.com/wiimpro/overview
I’m the same as most of you. Vinyl for me as a teenager through the 80s and still for a few years as CD’s were too expensive by comparison. Then I switched fully to CDs when vinyl disappeared almost completely for a few years.
When it made its comeback I did buy some new records but the pressing quality was so hit and miss I stopped. Also the cost compared to CDs puts me off too.
I still like a physical medium so it’s CDs all the way for me. And occasionally I’ll buy a record if I see it in a shop, if it’s something older and used, and if it’s album I know I’m going to like. And the price isn’t too ridiculous obviously.
But generally CDs 99% of the time
Isn’t CD basically streaming but in scratchable form with a case that is both prone to break and afflicted by a tiny font? I get it if you have invested £1000’s fo pounds on a CD player and have a chair positioned optimally in a triangle with your speakers but if not, why?
I get vinyl a bit becasue the form is much more of an art form and there is some ceremony to it. It’s like having a classic car – looks nice, makes you smile but you don’t really want it for everyday life.
Good quality streaming with decent amplification and speakers is all I do and anything else feels retrograde. The arguments for vinyl and cd are not really sonic – they are lifestyle aren’t they?
Has anyone got a spare tin hat?
I look it the same way sometimes, but I do like booklets and stuff particularly on good reissues
I never could read the lyrics in CD booklets in the 90s so no chance now. Smelt terrible too. I also think downloads should include a decent pdf.
I have moved towards digital files if they are reasonably priced as I always rip the CD anyway.
Oh yeah, the smell of CD booklets was often pretty awful. I’d forgotten that. And if they were too thick you’d tear the bastard getting it out of the jewel case. And display the fingerprints of everyone who had touched them, forever. Never liked jewel cases and digipacks look cheap. Quite liked the old “fatboy” cases though (eg the original Sandinista! and White album)
I’ve never understood why you can’t access good reproductions of cover art and credits etc. with downloads and streaming?
Tidal does have some credits available, but it seems like a bit of an afterthought.
That’s what I use discogs.com for. But you’re right, cover art and credits should be available when streaming. Tidal’s efforts are half-hearted at best.
I’ve only recently discovered that sort of info is available on discogs but had already forgotten. Thanks for reminding me.
Apple – in their iTunes Store heydays – encouraged record labels to include PDF booklets and individual credits (tagged to each track) with their digital files. They even supplied guidelines for readability etc. I’ve worked on a couple of album and box set projects at the time, and the iTunes store versions had complete credits incl. musicians line-ups for each song, plus a 30-page booklet with the CD artwork adapted to an easy-to scroll screen format with embedded hi-res pictures.
After six or eight months these »enhanced« files were deleted: customer surveys revealed that only 7% (!) of the buyers were interested in these amendments (the price was the same as for the regular versions).
With Spotify it’s the same – when you supply files with full credits and mention this as a possible marketing point, the response is always »that’s nice, but nobody checks the credits…«. Some hi-res file formats don’t even have the capacity for credits that mention more than the composer and the copyright date. Brian Eno recently mentioned in an interview that for the average user of streaming services ALL his albums seem to have been recorded between 2003 and 2011.
Very interesting. Thanks.
I flit between them both. I suppose on a day today basis I listen more to LPs.
My LPs are generally 60s and 70s vinyl. 80s/90s and onwards tends to be CD.
If I was to think of a typical LP that just doesn’t feel right playing it on CD, I’d say CSNY’s Deja Vu, or Paul Simon’s There Goes Rhymin’ Simon.
If I was to think of a typical CD that just doesn’t feel right playing it on LP, I’d say Radiohead’s OK Computer, or Dire Straits’ Brothers in Arms.
(I’m also getting right into my 5.1 / Dolby Atmos/ SACD / BluRay/ DVD music formats, so not sure where that fits in!)
I’m lucky as (about 10 years ago) I moved house to somewhere with a garage big enough to retrieve my LPs from my mum’s loft, my kids became old enough to trust not to break my turntable, and I became quite ill.
Part of moving house was to have my own space (once I’d soundproofed the garage), part of my recovery was to get my hi-fi system back out of the boxes, and part of Covid avoidance was to give up on commuting to the office (which can be not much fun when you have an intestinal disease).
No longer commuting means I no longer clear my head by blasting a CD out on my drive home. I can sit on my arse for half an hour and listen instead on big speakers. My preferred format for this is vinyl, but that’s partly the rigmarole of putting a record on helps me to unwind, partly that I started listening to music in the 1970s on records, and partly that I don’t have time to listen to more than one side of an LP before I have to go and make the dinner.
But I probably buy as many CDs (and live music DVDs) as records, simply for reasons of cost and space. I have a posh CD player in the hi-fi, but I rarely use it.
Neither. Downloads. Buy about four or five LPs a year, often second hand, usually replacing something I’ve lost or never physically had. CDs have no attraction for me whatsoever since HD FLAC sounds exactly as good and I have absolutely zero physical attachment to the format despite growing up in the CD age. I’m incredibly time- and space-poor so I need to get my music in me with absolutely minimum fuss. And I don’t have time to be poring over sleevenotes and lyrics any more so physical product is out.
LPs and 12″ singles do cause me to have deep loinal stirrings but I don’t have the space or the time for the records, so leave them for those that have, lucky sods.
Deep Loinal Stirrings – TMFTL.
I’ve just realised that “usually replacing something I’ve lost or never physically had” may reveal more than I was intending to.
My 500 LPs and 50 singles sit next to me and a record player, to remind me of times past. I have
Acquired 3 new LPs in the last decade, 2 ordered from Bandcamp by mistake(!) and 1 a gift. The shelves behind carry my lots of, an estimate, CDs, my option of choice to buy, mainly for the car. DLs and vinyl are all backed up to disc, with everything added to my computer. Or will be, a work in progress after last years macbook meltdown. I tend to listen via the computer to Sonos at home, and cds in the car. I consider the discs to be back up for the files and vice versa, but have a back up disc also. (An Apple Music contract also maintains a digital library, both bought and added to by me, in the event of mishap, my reason for preferring over Amazon or Spotify.)
Both records ,CDs and a small collection of sacds.
I bought a denon heos streamer and use Amazon high res streaming. I still dont think the sound is a patch ion either of the other formats. I am not prepared to spend a bucketload to upgrade to something that may or nay not be as good as what i am listening to via cd or vinyl.
I’ve heard Lodes and others say FLAC and cd are indistinguishable. To me there is a loss of presence.listener fatigue kicks in earlier.
No, once again CDs contain WAV files. FLAC are lossless compressed versions of WAV files. You are hearing identical digital data either with CD or FLAC. So any listener fatigue or difference in “presence” is in your imagination (if playback equipment identical)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FLAC
How is presence measured?
There’s a slight smell of onions
No idea but identical digital files will always sound the same through the same equipment
Even when it’s raining and there’s a bit o’ damp in the air?
… and the same atmospheric conditions, room size/treatments etc
Even on Tuesdays?
If I lived in my own isolated universe I would listen to vinyl in a big fuck-off sound room. But I don’t, I have a life. Streaming does the job for me these days and does the job just (only) fine.
CDs for me… but I need a new prescription from the opticians for any text, including title on the spine.
Over 1000 CDs are held in FLAC format on a 512gb USB stick shoved up the backside of my rather pricey active bluetooth speaker, and all controlled by an app on my phone.
Mainly CDs but I have introduced some vinyl as I posted on Twitter (not flipping X) a while ago.
Do I spy The Academy in Peril? There’s good taste on display…
Eagle-Eye spotters badge for you!
Somewhat dubious about the proximity of the loudspeaker and the turntable, especially on a rather flimsy wooden shelf. Don’t you get awful acoustic feedback if you crank it up a bit?
Those shelves* are anything but flimsy and it’s such a tiny room it never gets cranked up.
But if the room allowed it I would put the speakers somewhere else. Everyone has to compromise don’t they?
* https://shelfstore.co.uk/
Where and when the value is. £35 or 50p… hmm, tricky one.
Dire 1980s = vinyl, as few CDs from that decade had decent sleeve notes or bonus tracks and they were riotously expensive. One CD for four Arsenal home matches!
Accordingly, I didn’t buy my first CD player till 1997, and actually the vast majority of CDs I now buy seem to have been released around the mid-1990s to the mid-2010s mark.
Because I was so late to CDs, I actually find the experience very tactile, something which everyone else informs me isn’t a thing with them at all.
The only bit of advise, and she offered a considerable amount, left to me by my gran that in 2023 is totally at odds with reality is… ‘you get what you pay for’.
In her lifetime, probably true, in 2023 it couldn’t be more inaccurate.
10% CD 90% Streaming.
Mid-Late 70s cassettes
Late 70s to Late 80s Vinyl
Late 80s to early 2000s CDs
Since – mostly vinyl, some downloads, CDs mainly in box sets
Around 2005 I started buying lots of second hand vinyl when it was really cheap. Now my collection is worth up to $30,000 according to Discogs.
And a good point about moving vinyl around.
Since I bought my first records I have moved approximately 20 times and some of them have been in for the ride every time. It gets more painful every time.
LPs, CDs or streaming. I seek something I want to hear. I generally have different albums on CD from those that are LPs. Streaming for what I don’t own as product and for playlists which are mostly for evenings at home tailored to what we can both tolerate, which is quite a lot. I haven’t bought any product in quite a while. If I didn’t use streaming I would never hear a mass of old and new. I doubt I would have bought many of those records either.
Almost entirely steaming these days, even though a lot of the music I play will be on CD at the other end of the room from my desk. It’s a whole 5 metres to them, my phone is right there by my hand and to my knackered ears at least the sound of the stream is just as good when played through the same speakers.
I, too, am almost entirely steaming these days…I should put more water in it…
Well, it is nearly Christmas. Cheers!
Yer a good man. Y’awright? Heh, y’awright? Whit? (He’s awright…)
Gie’s a song, then…
“When the bluuuueeee of the nighttttttt
Meets the gooooooold of the daaaaaay…”
Could ye go a kebab? Eh? Ye whit?
Fairly typical journey for me
Early 70s to mid 80s vinyl
Mid 80s to Covid cds
Post Covid vinyl down from loft and a mix of vinyl and cds.
CDs for cost. Vinyl for aesthetics
Mostly listen via Quobuz or Amazon.
All CDs backed up uncompressed and also mp3. With a backup of each of those.
Due to space constraints am replacing cd jewel cases with poly wallets. 70% saving in space
Emotional attachment to vinyl when every purchase was an event. Had to save up and buy with care. In the 80s to about 2005 a lot of indiscriminate buying much of which I haven’t listened to this day. Too much disposable cash, too easily led, too little sense. The curse of being a completist by nature.
But the first 50 or 60 albums. Lodged in my brain. I remember every purchase. The shop. The price (sort of ). My initial reaction to playing – good bad or indifferent.
Yet I have many archival cd box sets which are a joy in their depth and presentation.
I have got to the point where I literally won’t have enough years in me to do justice to a massive collection (approx 9,000 lps/cds – box set/double cds etc counting as 1)
What to do with it when I’m gone. Who the fuck knows or cares. I thought I was building something scholars would pore over and marvel at the breadth of my good taste. Streaming buggered that.
Thank you for the therapy session doctor. I’ll get me coat.
You are me. Pop round for a Henry Cow listening session sometime, I’ve got all their boxed sets. And my Moodies albums on Threshold are all still in great nick.
@Leem you must know what you listen to these days and what you don’t.
I have crossed the Rubicon and have started to sell down. The kids dont want them and I think vinyl is at market peak. Boomer collections are gonna flood the market.
Discogs from Oz a pain , ditto Facebook trade pages. Now have a couple pf record shops and am taking in 100 -200 at a time and take the cash on the spot.
The African collection is the conundrum.
I’ll send a shipping container.
Love both
Love streaming too
And playing mp3s on a memory stick in the car
I have thousands of lp’s haven’t touched one in years. I have as many cds, I rip them to iTunes and I do all my listening on my half dozen iPods when I go scooting around town.
I am currently in Tokyo doing the rounds of the record stores to get more cds to fill up more iPods. I just get weird stuff that I could never get at home such as the Escape from LA soundtrack, a tribute to Wire irresistibly called Whore. A 75 track Lieber & Stoller compilation as well as assorted bootlegs.
What boots?
Bruce, Elvis Costello, Tom Petty, CCR. I’ve said it before on this blog but when you come to Tokyo you shop like it’s 1999 and streaming never happened. The shops are packed with people and product. I could not recommend coming here more.
LPs have never floated my boat aurally or aesthetically. I divested myself of my modest collection in the early days of CD, and CDs still constitute the majority of my listening on a 90% CD / 10% streaming ratio. I don’t like jewel boxes much, but digipaks and cardboard boxsets can be quite attractive.
Streaming while in the office, ‘background working’ is a very long playlist. And in the kitchen while cooking, cleaning etc.
CDs in the car and for listening at home.
Every now and then I put an LP on and always enjoy the listening experience, but I guess as I was vinyl from 11-25 and CD from 26 to date I would back CDs. Yes when CDs were at their cheapest – around ten years ago I probably bought one too many that have two great tracks and some mediocre ones. Now trying to weed them out as I relisten to Oxfam’s benefit.
Almost all my collection of DJ mix CDs from Journeys by DJ, Global Underground, Fabric etc. are absent from streaming.
Reading everyone’s comments it feels like I am typical – LPs from 1963 to around 1990 when I started getting CDs as the reissues and box sets started to get really interesting, and were simply unwieldy or not available as LPs.
I still have all my vinyl and occasionally have a listening session, but they are a faff after the ease of use of CDs. I do stream some music, but miss the physical presence of the object. I guess this addresses the question in the post about the emotional response to listening – after 60 years of listening the idea of owning the music is pretty ingrained!
I have said this before, but this is a golden age for picking up CDs for next to nothing and I’ve been mainly filling in gaps over the last few years rather than buying anything new.
I find second hand cds hard to access. Stores will pretty much only buy vinyl , maybe some super rare stuff or boxsets so a lot go to the op shop or the tip.
I get most of mine via 3rd part sellers on Amazon. Occasionally something will turn up in a chazza but I’m usually looking for specific titles these days @Junior-Wells
Yep, the ridiculous vinly thing rather queered the pitch. Example: Sainsbury’s. Reasonable CDs available. They lump on vinly in about 2019. CDs go downhill, cos they don’t stock any good stuff. Vinly goes downhill, cos, well it would wouldn’t it. Now they don’t bother with either. Brilliant! Very redolent of Record Store Day.
A couple of £50 purchases (about 5 CDs) online a year. Chazzer/market stall/mojo or uncut CD = another 20 or so purchases. That’ll do me.
Our local hospice charity has 2 shops at either end of the high street. The posh one at the top of town won’t take CDs or DVDs (but took a load of my late brother’s shirts, jackets, suits etc.). Their Pound Shop, down the other end happily took a couple of large boxes (and a couple of small ones) of my late brother’s CDs and DVDs after we’d cleared out his house.
Predominantly CD until about 10 years ago when my wife bought me a decent turntable from the inheritance that her dear mum left her. Then it became a few albums per year for next few years.
In the last 5 months my LP collection has jumped significantly due to my part time employment in a record store which pays me in er records.
Still my collection is 10 to one in favour of cd’s – roughly 4500 cd’s to 450 lp’s.
Re streaming – non unless you count buying a digital album from Bandcamp. Is it streaming when you pay for it? If so I dont see the point unless the album is only digital.
This is a genuine question as I dont really understand the point of streaming.(Unless it is a space issue)
5I can only answer for myself your questions about streaming music Steve. Others may have a different response but I certainly pay for my streaming services namely Qobuz & Tidal. I pay north of thirty quid a month for them.
Today I’ve streamed the following albums…
Ontology – Roxana Amed.
Here Now – Søren Bebe Trio.
Yesun – Roberto Fonseca.
Apertures – Rajna Swaminathan.
And I’m listening to Sarah Neufeld’s album from 2021 called Detritus as I type this. The reason I’ve streamed all of these albums today is for exactly the same reason I stream music every day and it’s for exactly the same reason you play a CD or Long Player. To listen to it. To hear and enjoy music. That’s the point of it.
On top of space it’s cheaper. Vastly cheaper. On top of the massive catalogue , you can have access to, playlists you can compile or on some platforms share. Recommendations. Bespoke to your listening. Trialling stuff you might want to buy.
It’s a revolution.
There are downsides but the appeal is obvious.
Yebbut, you can’t store your streamed songs in the attic or garage when you’re done with them, can you eh?
Case closed .
You could make like you you were Tony Wilson and set up
FLACtory Record’s
Excellent @jaygee