Vinyl

[George-2.0]

I was sittin' going through my old LPs - enjoying the cover art. Not that you can't do interesting things with CDs (Aimee Mann's got some nice CD packaging that's won a few awards over the years), but I just love the large size, the gatefolds, the gimmick covers Alice Cooper used to do (ala the Schools Out LP, which open like a school desk, and the album itself was covered by a pair of panties.)

I was listening to some of my old Nazareth records. While known for blues flavored hard rock, they dabbled with a little of everything (Scottish Folk, AOR)

Seeing the covers, listening to the tracks, brought back memories...






I used to put the album covers on a music stand, and stare at the good ones while I played the record.


Of course, I had to give their album masterpiece a go, Hair of the Dog

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/vp6-8g-nw4A" target="_blank" class="new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/vp6-8g-nw4A</a>

[MartyS (Gromit)]

I finally have a nice copy of the Beatles white album on white vinyl.   I've wanted one since the mid 80s when I would occasionally see one in a used record shop, but they were always way out of my price range back then since I was poor (the reason I was going to used record shops in the first place ).

I got the US release since near mint condition copies of those are not too expensive, I payed $60 for mine, the jacket is a bit worn but the discs are pristine.  The UK pressings are supposed to sound much better but they start at around $250 and go up from there.  Of course you have to take some of those claims that certain pressings are much better with a grain of salt, some of that talk is people listening to them on super high end equipment, I doubt the average person playing it on a a few hundred bucks worth of equipment would be able to tell the difference.

[The Lurker]

So tempted to get this...
https://theyetee.com/products/rocket-knight-adventures#

[Pak-Man]

There's an underappreciated gem from the mascot era of 16-bit games.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

I picked up an original Thick As A Brick album at a used record shop over the weekend, Tull did some crazy stuff with their albums, this one has a fake newspaper that folds out of the sleeve.

I have also acquired The Beatles red and blue compilation albums on red and blue vinyl.

And now for the direct ancestor of vinyl, shellac.  The records made from bug droppings, look up how shellac is made, it's insane to think about how many bugs had to be used to make millions of records over 60 years.

Been playing around with the stylus I got for playing 78s on my new turntable, recording some using the USB output, and then doing loads of noise reduction with Audacity.  It's been interesting, some that sound just terrible directly from the turntable can be made to sound pretty darn good with some filtering, noise reduction, and equalization.

Made a few videos using the audio I cleaned up:

This one from 1923 was in fair condition:
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/J-AEOtF17zc" target="_blank" class="new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/J-AEOtF17zc</a>

This one from 1935 was in good condition:
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/BkJDQAabZSQ" target="_blank" class="new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/BkJDQAabZSQ</a>

This one from 1955 was in terrible condition:
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/v/wo1AyJlYo0k" target="_blank" class="new_win">https://www.youtube.com/v/wo1AyJlYo0k</a>

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Got the vinyl soundtrack for The Force Awakens with the 2 "holograms" etched into the back side of each disc.

Pretty cool effect, but you need a point source of light and a certain angle above the disc in order to see the images.  An LED flashlight works well.  One disc has the Falcon and the other a TIE fighter, one image that appears to float above the disc and the other inside or below it.  The images are wireframe models. 

As for the soundtrack, it's OK, got the records for the holograms.

Been recording lots of old 78s and putting the videos on YouTube, getting pretty good at cleaning up the audio in Audacity.  Hardest so far has be an Edison Diamond Disc, those were recorded vertically, so a modern stereo cartridge has trouble with them, and if they were ever played on a Victrola they get damaged.  But there are tricks to get the sound out, invert one of the stereo channels and then combine them and you get mostly just the vertical movement from the stylus.

Got like 10 old records now up on my channel:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCDTQZCl7smGulubE9Cov76g

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Picked up the 50th anniversary vinyl of Sgt. Pepper.  Mostly because I haven't been able to find an old copy at any used record store, well, not an old copy that has the stuff recorded in the lead out track.  Seems all the US versions released in the 60 to the 90s had blank lead outs on side 2.

Sounds fantastic.

Nothing left on my vinyl wish list now.

I'm going to make a video of playing all 6 78s of Beethoven's 5th, might end up being too long, we'll see.

[Russoguru]

I got some vinyl because I got a record player back in November... and I figured it's also blue-tooth enabled so if worse comes to worse I could always just use the damn thing as a glorified wireless speaker. So I got a few old record albums off Ebay SUPER, SUPER cheap. I got News of the World, Jazz, Flash Gordon, and The Game by Queen. I got Rio, Seven and the Ragged Tiger by Duran Duran. I got Synchronicity by the Police... although I was mystified as to why the song "Murder by Numbers" wasn't on the damn Vinyl LP!!!

I also picked up some kick ass soundtracks, like Heavy Metal, Close Encounters, The Black Hole, and Meco's interpretation of music from The Black hole and Star Trek The Motion Picture. I, being a lifelong lover of Olivia Newton John picked up the album Making a Good thing Better. There's just... just something about Vinyl that I really love. It's just so cool to spin some great records that are as old if not older than I am.

[MrTorso]

I got some vinyl because I got a record player back in November... and I figured it's also blue-tooth enabled so if worse comes to worse I could always just use the damn thing as a glorified wireless speaker. So I got a few old record albums off Ebay SUPER, SUPER cheap. I got News of the World, Jazz, Flash Gordon, and The Game by Queen. I got Rio, Seven and the Ragged Tiger by Duran Duran. I got Synchronicity by the Police... although I was mystified as to why the song "Murder by Numbers" wasn't on the damn Vinyl LP!!!

I had Synchronicity on vinyl when it came out. Years later when I got the CD and Murder By Numbers came on I was mystified!!

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Last week I was near a Barns & Nobel store so went in to see what they had, picked up the Guardians Of The Galaxy Awesome Mix Vol. 1 picture disc.

I've seen some bad reviews for this disc with some being off center, mine is not off center so plays normally, picture discs in general usually don't sound as good as regular vinyl but this one sounds fine to me, I did notice a little more surface noise than you normally get with new pressings these days.  But it does look cool:

[Russoguru]

Guardians of the galaxy volumes one and two have some of the best soundtracks of all time. I would love to get those albums but damn they are expensive, as far as vinyl goes anyway.

[The Lurker]

Need to listen to the other side of the Rocket Knight Adventures soundtrack vinyl at some point.

[Russoguru]

A video game soundtrack on vinyl sounds like... something that probably has a very limited pressing. I'd lock that Rocket Knight soundtrack up tight at night if I were you. That is an awesome game. I think it was originally only on Genesis.

[MartyS (Gromit)]

Watching the Guardians Of The Galaxy movies got me back into ELO. 

Pulled out my original copy of Out Of The Blue and the glue holding the jacket together had failed completely, so had to re-glue it.  I remember building the paper model of the spaceship on the cover when I got the album back in '77.

The records sound pretty good, I think around that time I had gotten a slightly better turntable so I guess it didn't get played on the crappy one I had when I was very young.