Do 45rpm singles sound better than 33rpm lps?

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by audio, Jun 13, 2003.

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  1. audio

    audio New Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    guyana
    Is a 45 rpm 7" single generally a better sounding version of a particular song than the lp cut? I've always assumed that because of the faster speed that there would be more sonic information on the 45 single. Is that the case or what?
     
  2. Beatle Terr

    Beatle Terr Super Senior SH Forum Member Musician & Guitarist

    I think it's a matter of how loud the 45 mix was actually mastered at volume wise perhaps in comparison to what would be the same song on a 33 1/3 LP and that would also matter if the 45 was in Mono as well as in Stereo also.
     
  3. audio

    audio New Member Thread Starter

    Location:
    guyana
    Of course, but I am speaker generally. Assuming the volume is the same and the audio spectrum is the same, is 45 going to sound better usually as a rule?
     
  4. Beatle Terr

    Beatle Terr Super Senior SH Forum Member Musician & Guitarist

    I believe generally speaking as a RULE would a 45 sound better. My truthful answer to you I believe there would be to many variables then for a difinitive answer of "YES or NO". That's my honest answer when it comes to vinyl pressings of any kind. As to where they were made. What material was used, how good was the metal master for the pressings, these would be the varialbles I'm referring to.
     
  5. John Hatter

    John Hatter Senior Member

    Location:
    England
    I've always thought that the sound from an LP gradually deteriorates as it plays towards the centre. So if the inner track was available on a single, I'd go for it because it would sound better. In fact one of the plus points of CD's is that I can hear those "inner" tracks much more cleanly than I ever could on an album.
    Desperado on the Eagles album always suffered sonically because of this, as did a number of Bowie tracks on his early albums. I guess it would depend upon how much information is crammed onto the disc.

    Since joining this forum I've been encouraged to set up my record deck , and dig out all my singles and LP's, for the first time in over 15 years.
    It's been a joy to hear some of this stuff, and I am recording them onto CDR. Some of the older sixties singles sound great, whereas the early 70's
    ( Lola, Schools Out) do not.
    I'm playing Alladin Sane at the moment, and the sound is excellent. It's strange that when CD first appeared I embraced it for its "high fidelity" and clarity of sound, but l've realised now that I dont listen to whole CD's anymore, basically because I believe it is tiring ( on the ears) to do so.
    Having dug out my old LP's , I 'm listeing to them all the way through.
    Strange world isnt it !
    Cheers
    John
     
  6. Grant

    Grant Life is a rock, but the radio rolled me!

    I would say that technically, an LP at 45 RPM should sound the best because of the faster speed and the potential for wider grooves.

    But, in the real world, I have found that the 33 1/3 LP sounds best because the LP was usually cut from a better tape, while the 45 tape is usually a compressed copy cut at high quantities, meaning fast and cheap.
     
  7. lennonfan

    lennonfan New Member

    Location:
    baltimore maryland
    If comparing the 12" 33 to a 7" 45, I would say the answer is no, as the 'land mass' of a 33 at the opening grooves covers just as much ground at that speed as a smaller 45. Now, comparing 7" 33 to 7" 45, undoubtedly yes, because again the mass is covered at a slower speed and more info has to be encoded in a smaller space, sort of like 1 7/8" ips tape over 3 3/4" ips...the 3 3/4 wins theoretically because more detail can be captured. Now, with 12" 45 compared to 7" 45, the 12" would win hands down.
     
  8. Roland Stone

    Roland Stone Offending Member

    I remember the few 12" singles I owned sounding incredible. I started buying them when I could get them from a band I liked.

    If you asked me what music would be worth big bucks on eBay years from now, I'd say a lot of these 12" 45s, usually hip-hop or rap, that wander in- and immediately out-of-print. They usually feature special mixes of popular songs (unique), are beat to hell in clubs and parties by house and amateur DJs (consumable), where they become the soundtrack for a lot of powerful memories (emotional connection). That's a combination that means big bucks years down the road: consumables of limited availability that are used and used up during childhood and adolescent years.
     
  9. Lord Hawthorne

    Lord Hawthorne Currently Untitled

    Location:
    Portland, Oregon
    All good points, but the biggest spoiler for the sound of 45 rpm singles is the crappy vinyl (or in some cases, styrene) that many labels used for their singles. There was a lot of distortion because of the cutting process too. When looking for the original 45 mix I often find the original Japanese or European pressings much better in this regard. Unfortunately, many US singles didn't get pressed there.
     
  10. reb

    reb Money Beats Soul

    Location:
    Long Island

    Agree on the quality of vinyl issue with 7" singles. I only buy them now based on past expereience. There are several types of 45's that I reject for purchase. Only those that are pressed on vinyl and have grooves as found on quality LP's do I now buy.
     
  11. BRush

    BRush Senior Member

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    I've been collecting Rock, R&B, & Jazz 45's from the 60's & Early 70's. The Promo/DJ Singles often sound wonderful, pressed on great quality vinyl. They often contain mixes not found on the parent LP. Quite a few acts from the 1960's didn't put out LPs. Its a really nice bonus to have both the mono and stereo mixes on the same disk.
     
  12. sgraham

    sgraham New Member

    Location:
    Michigan
    A lot of good points have been made in this thread.

    The linear velocity of the outer grooves of a 12" disk spinning at 33.3rpm is higher than the inner grooves of a 7" disk spinning at 45 rpm. Despite this in my experience the 45 still often sounds "better" than the album cut.

    In the real world there's no clear cut answer to the question, because 45's are so often mastered quite differently than the LP that has the same cut.
    Sometimes more compression is used, sometimes the EQ is different, etc.

    An interesting comparison, though, is the "King of Love" 10" disk that Dave Edmunds put out. It has the track at 45 rpm on one side and 78 rpm on the other. Yes, the 78 side sounds better. (But alas! it's not exactly a super-fi track to begin with.)
     
  13. -=Rudy=-

    -=Rudy=- ♪♫♪♫♫♪♪♫♪♪ Staff

    Location:
    US
    I've found that 7" 45s CAN sound good if you put a lot of money into a good cartridge. I thought all 45s were distorted until i got my Shure V15-V. Two things against them, mentioned above, I can also attest to. The smaller diameter of the groove does not help the situation (the signal on the grooves is *very* tightly packed), and a lot of singles are pressed on plastic, not vinyl...so it's almost a waste to try to buy used 45s unless you buy them from a good collector who has taken care of them. I have yet to buy a used 45 that sounds good. And it's a shame because some of those B-sides and "single" mixes are not available elsewhere.

    Now, 12" singles at 45 RPM can sound quite good. It was common for European 12"ers to be cut at 45RPM, while most US labels cut them at 33 RPM.
     
  14. MikeyH

    MikeyH Stamper King

    Location:
    Berkeley, CA
    We have some 45 aficionados on the phonogram list. There are great advantages to using the correct cartridge (mono or stereo) and a parallel tracking arm. A real high end one, no one of those servo driven things from the 90's.

    The sonic results are great, on mid to high end systems.

    Mike
     
  15. Sckott

    Sckott Hand Tighten Only.

    Location:
    South Plymouth, Ma
    I used to think this way too, until I got a really nice cartridge, then all that crummy tracking problems basically went away, almost totally.
     
  16. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Back in 1973 (a lifetime ago) I made the expensive switch to a Shure V15 cart. From that day, all of my records stopped getting any wear on them and play perfectly fine today, 45's included.

    Get a good needle; protect your records, troops!
     
  17. Sckott

    Sckott Hand Tighten Only.

    Location:
    South Plymouth, Ma
    That's the cart. Tracks with grace. :) I love it.
     
  18. Michael Doyle

    Michael Doyle New Member

    Location:
    Pittsburgh
    Would someone name other cartridges recommended both on the basis of
    a. low record wear
    b. good sound
    maybe this was a past post
     
  19. Casino

    Casino Senior Member

    Location:
    BossTown
    Agree, though I've found very few instances of an LP track sounding better than the 45rpm version. Compare S&G's Cecelia on LP with the slammin' 45 - no contest. LP tracks are usually thinner-sounding. I'm sure compression and EQ are part of the equation, but those 45's have a warmth and immediacy not often matched on LP.

    Frequently, yes, the LP will have quieter surfaces, but I do have many nicely-pressed 45's with no objectionable surface noise. Warner Bros. (including Reprise, of course) and Columbia (& Epic, etc) usually did a good job with 45's.
     
  20. sgraham

    sgraham New Member

    Location:
    Michigan
    Warners and Columbias were (in the U.S.) usually of the injection-moulded polystyrene variety, which mens nice quiet surfaces which can deteriorate exceedingly rapidly, depending on the stylus and the disk itself.

    Shure seems to make the best cartridges for playing back those disks with the least chance of damage. They developed the "Masar" stylus specifically for it; but their other styli also are better than most for avoiding damage on these types of disks.

    (That is not a universal recommendation - if we're talking about cheap models the Shures may not sound as nice as some others. For instance, IMHO, a cheap Grado will knock a cheap Shure out of the water, sonically; but the Grado won't be particularly nice to polystyrene disks. Nor to disks with a lot of sibilance.)
     
  21. Graham Start

    Graham Start Forum Resident

    Location:
    Toronto, Canada
    As stated already in this thread... the Shure V15.
     
  22. Todd Fredericks

    Todd Fredericks Senior Member

    Location:
    A New Yorker
    I agree with protecting records with a good cart. I'll also add that a good arm helps also.

    Todd

    P.S. Also make sure everything is level and check set-up every now and then...
     
  23. Tony Plachy

    Tony Plachy Senior Member

    Location:
    Pleasantville, NY
    I do not have many true single 45's, but I have a number of 45 albums pressed on a single side from classic records. The Cowboy Junkies "Trinity Sessions" and Dave Burbeck's "Take Five" (which has some tube noise in it from the cutting electronics) are just the best I have in my collection. Incredible dynamics.
     
  24. jgrig0

    jgrig0 Active Member

    I don't know about you guys, but during the late 70s and early 80s, it seemed like every LP I bought had some defect in it. If they didn't skip they sounded so scratchy you couldn't stand to listen to them. I think this may have had something to do with the record pressing plants near where I live. It got so bad that I switched to cassette tapes until CDs came out. If you remember, the quality of everything seemed to suck at that particular moment in time. Chrysler nearly went out of business and everything was better from Japan. Maybe that had something to do with it.
     
  25. Casino

    Casino Senior Member

    Location:
    BossTown
    That's what I've been using for decades (V15). Way back when, tried Audio-Technica and Stanton, but always came back to Shure. Ruler-flat, with no frequencies lacking or over-emphasized.
     
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