New vinyl records suck!

[genewiseman]

I am a big fan of vinyl. I still have my first records that I purchased as a little kid in the early '70s and they are still in decent shape. I still buy a lot of used albums and several new ones. Here lately, my luck with new albums has been pretty bad. I bought John Prine's last record and it sounds good. I pre-ordered the reissue of John Prine's first album and it sounds awful. I have the cd and it sounds good. I recently bought Charlie Crockett's latest album. I knew that it should sound great because on the radio and on tital it sounds like it was recorded at Sun Records 60 years ago. The vinyl version sounds like it's being played on an old transistor radio in the next room. I intend to return it and buy the cd for half the price as the record. I do have several new records that sound awesome like the newest Ray Wylie Hubbard record and Chris Stapleton's "Traveler". I am about ready to quit taking my chances on new vinyl. I intend to keep buying old records, but from here on out, it's going to be hard to get me to spend $20.00 and up on new vinyl records that sound worse than the same cd at 1/2 the cost. I like good sounding records but I feel like a sucker when I pay that much for a record only to stream it off tital because it sounds better there.

Thanks for letting me rant!

Gene

[HiWire]

Gene, it sounds like you need a local record store where you can sample the records. It sounds old-fashioned, but that's the only way to be sure when you're spending so much money. I've noticed a bunch of negative online reviews in the same vein over the last few years – it sounds like some of the labels are pushing records out without any kind of quality control – perhaps they are outsourcing the operation.

[genewiseman]

9 minutes ago, HiWire said:

Gene, it sounds like you need a local record store where you can sample the records. It sounds old-fashioned, but that's the only way to be sure when you're spending so much money. I've noticed a bunch of negative online reviews in the same vein over the last few years – it sounds like some of the labels are pushing records out without any kind of quality control – perhaps they are outsourcing the operation.

It would be great to have a local record store that allows you to listen to the records before you buy them. I have never lived anywhere where they had a record store like that. The closest record store to me is about 35 miles away and they aren't really set up for customers to try out the records. I buy a lot of used albums on Discogs and it seems like I have better luck buying used records graded vg+ there than new records on Amazon. 

[swt61]

I'm lucky enough to have a few local record stores nearby. Both will let me sample the merch, but also steer me away from lesser quality pressings.

I made lots of discoveries by browsing my local vinyl shops back in the day, and had forgotten how much I love spending an afternoon record browsing. 

[ironbut]

Yup,..

Amoeba on Haight is one of my favorites stores (not just records).

Streetlight in San Jose was a real haunt of mine when I still lived there.