When did vinyl sound quality go down hill?

My guess is in the late 80's or early 90's. I am referening to record label releases, not audiophile versions or the like. I know many of the mid to late 80's lp's I have are mediocre at best for example Fleetwood Macs Tngo in the Night. What is your impression of vinyl quality going down hill?


Tim

 

I would say 1987 for certain. I've got a 1985 pressing of The Power Station's self-titled debut, and that sucker is thicker than some original 60's LP's I have (a fluke?). However, Paul Simon's "Graceland" (1986) is so thin it almost resembles RCA's Dynaflex series.

 

A lot I would imagine...based on all those boutique 200-gram pressings out there. I mean if they charge more it's gotta be better, right?

 

In 1978, my co-worker Fats R. told everyone to record their records on cassette, and just play the cassettes, because the quality of the records -- including the vinyl quality -- was so bad. I didn't bother. My records sounded okay to me.

I moved in with someone in the '80s who had a junky rack system turntable, and on this turntable, I was finally able to hear what Fats was talking about. So, while "sometime in the '70s" might be the answer you want, maybe the question you should ask is when turntable quality went downhill.

 

That could explain why my 1985 Power Station LP sounds so good, whereas the 1986 Paul Simon "Graceland" LP (digitally recorded, blah, blah, blah) is somewhat "lacking".

 

When was this?

 

Thickness isnt that important imo, a thicker one might not warp as easily I guess.

 

I know, tin ear and all, that I must be mistaken, but I have always found My "Graceland" original LP, thin and all, to be one of my best sound non-audiophile LP's I own, or occasionally play anyhow.

 

I agree. It's a great sounding record on vinyl. There are plenty of digitally recorded and mixed albums that turned out well on vinyl----Donald Fagen's The Nightfly and Joe Jackson's Body And Soul are two that come to mind offhand.

 

My "Graceland" vinyl is one of my favorite LP's to play. It sounds awesome, it's in mint condition, and I got it from Goodwill for 50 cents!

 

The 1973 "oil crisis" - they stopped using "virgin" vinyl and you might see a piece of rubber band embedded in your record.

 

I remember from the mid-1970s on, there were a lot of LPs released that had bits of paper sticking out from the edge. I was told by one engineer that this is what happened when "recycled vinyl" was used, where the plant would melt down used records (with some of the labels still affixed), and so we saw shards of the old label mixed in with the newly-pressed LP. Sounded like Rice Krispies, too.

I actually think pressing quality got much better in the 1980s. One can make an argument that the engineering got worse, but that depended on the artist, the engineer, and the label.

 

By 1981, I was only buying UK, European and Japanese LPs. US pressings got much, much worse long before anyone else's.

Japanese pressings, AFAIK, never went downhill.

 

Well I must have tin-ears too as I reckon "Graceland" sounds ace on vinyl as does Ry Cooder's "Bop 'Til You Drop" (which I believe is one of the first all digital recordings to vinyl). Both have beautiful full bass; no top-end "tizz"; well reproduced mid-range, superb imaging. What more could you want?

I don't know what the CDs sound like or whether I just got good pressings but I hear nothng at all wrong with them - they sound like "music" to me.

 

Just for the record ( ), Graceland was recorded partially on a digital multi-track, partially on an analog multi-track, which were synced, and mixed through an analog board to an analog two track. So "some" of that LP is AAA. This from a Roy Halee interview in one of the stereo rags.

 

Thin vinyl has it's own issues but I feel it's more about how the 'master tape' makes it to the cutter that counts. In other words the 'mastering' for LP and the cutting engineers work.
Most of my UK, West German and Canadian vinyl from that period sounds quite impressive - subject to the limitations of 'the source'.
The only area of concern I had toward the late 80's and into the 90's was the attempt to make single LP's with very long playing sides. This involved many compromises in cutting level and low frequency extension at the disc mastering stage.

 

I concur.

 

Part of the reason I converted completely to CD was the state of 1980's vinyl (in England I would add). It had got very thin and I would reject at least 50% of ourchases whilst doing the visual surface check in-store. Problems were often in the pressing, with many little surface bumps. It also did seem excessively prone to scratching.

 

Not sure I totally understand your question, but I think so.

I started noticing the vinyl quality going downhill around 1980. Vinyl was getting thinner, and small warps were showing up, where that sort of thing was never an issue before. Case and point, my RL AC/DC Back in Black (which I bought new on release day) is pressed on the thinnest vinyl Ive ever seen. It sounds great in all its analog glory- amazingly enough. The sound of the stuff was fine, but the vinyl was getting a bit cheesy, in my experience.

 

Ditto. I never bought Graceland on CD, my vinyl always sounded so good.

 

Dynaflex

 

Styrene 45 rpm pressings. Not a lot of my Columbia, Epic or RCA vinyl from the seventies or eighties survived for long, which is why I stopped buying 45s from those labels. (Granted, my family was pretty slow to replace worn styli, but still...) And those things really, REALLY didn't take back-cueing well when I started in radio in the late eighties, either.