I get down on the floor and dig through the dollar bin to explore new/old music that I might be interested in. Don't have too many worries about sound quality if the record is cheap...it's all about discovery. Yesterday I found that "Deadman's Curve" by Jan and Dean is much worse than I remember, but "Uneasy Rider" by Charlie Daniels is just as great as when I was 12.... A clean $3 copy is a bonus...
I stuck with with vinyl because I found it interesting mostly. I also had a fixation on classic rock at the time which was intertwined with it. Some bands I found from my parent’s record collection directly — some by digging. At that time nobody wanted common stuff in VG condition, so it was the frugal option for a kid vs buying all the expensive CD deluxe reissues of classic rock targeted at the boomers, or used CDs at like $15 a pop. I had a Crosley-style all-in-one system — total junk but the lack of fidelity let me be a bit format agnostic. Eventually I got curious about how to improve LP playback and liked what I heard.
I took a look at your profile, and I noticed that you like Brazilian music. I'm assuming your taste is similar to mine and includes stuff like vintage bossa nova, tropicalia, and post-tropicalia 70s MPB/samba funk. I've found it to be nearly impossible to find spotless vinyl copies of Brazilian classic albums. It took me years to find a VG+ copy of an original pressing of Clube Da Esquina, for example, and it still plays with some clicks and surface noise at points. I had the same experience with Os Afro Sambas. How do you do it? Or are there some genres where you just stick to digital because perfect vinyl is unobtainable?
For older records, I think it is harder now to acquire clean copies at a reasonable price. I did a lot of buying from the '70s through the 20-teens to get to the point of having a largely (not entirely) clean playing collection of copies. In some cases, this meant buying multiple copies. I guess at peak I had around 17,000 LPs in about 2015 when I started to cull heavily-- I was planning a move from NY to Texas and knew I had a lot of seconds, duplicates, lesser copies and didn't want to move all that, partly because I wouldn't have the space I did in NY, and partly because I really needed to get a handle on all that I had accumulated. (There wasn't any particular plan in buying what I did when I did, though I was familiar with some of the music and labels). So, I got rid of close to 12,000 records through a broker in the course of 2 years in preparation for that move. Since I've been full time in Texas, I have acquired close to another 1,000 records, so I figure I have roughly 6,000 LPs here and did a cull right before Covid hit, getting rid of approximately 8-900 records. I still have more work to do. I don't think records are "perfect" by their nature. But it is still amazing to me that this fairly primitive medium can yield the amount of musical and spatial information that it does. Some recordings are, inherently not great, or pressed on sub-optimal vinyl (mid-'70s oil crisis stuff). But you can still extract the information that is on the disc. There has been a fair amount written by folks like @Ralph Karsten about the importance of the phono stage, and its stability in handling impulses that can cause more or less "clicks and pops." As @Jim0830 said upthread, it is a combination of things, time, effort and money that yield results. I'm at a point where I don't necessarily have to throw money at gear and can spend it on records. Part of this is simply having been around for a long time, having benefitted from a less inflated used record sales market and having a system that is fairly "mature" at this point (as well as a good cleaning regime).
This may be that rare benefit of being a fan of classical music. Boxed sets are usually pristine and very inexpensive.
"With brutal rejection!!" That sounds hard, but yes, I guess that's the way I do it. I'll remember those exact words! (Already saved it in my notes!) It is 'one way' to get a perfect LP collection. But it's brutal. LOL
The fidelity of my records has improved immensely ever since I started washing them before they ever get played on my table.
A record cleaning machine is necessary, 95% of the records come back to perfection after cleaning, I usually buy records from Japan and have not encountered a very dirty one
Thanks Jim, yes I do want a meaningful discussion because despite me personally being pleased with my record collection I'm quite concerned that the only thing that will keep records around for suckers like me to keep buying is punters. If older vinyl lovers are dieing off it stands to reason at some point there will be a small limited market to sell too and Main Street vendors will disappear and so will the major online vendors as well along with those companies who press and wholesale our beloved disc. This is bad for me and others who want to keep the vinyl side of our hobby alive (IMHO). So I'm very very keen to do whatever I can to encourage my four kids and anyone else I can to enjoy the hobby like I do. And first things first is to identify why I love the flawed medium so, and second is to do my best to pass on that love to those that follow. This thread is purely about helping to set expectations correctly so that the younger crowd can focus on the joyful bits of record ownership (what ever those may be) and not focus on the bits that can't be resolved or easily remediated. Plus I'm curious as to what standards others are achieving.
If by "record cleaning machine" you include a person using brushes and a shop vac I agree. You don't really need an expensive RCM to do the same thing by hand.
Thanks you are right my phrasing "new kids" does sound like I'm a bit of an old fart, really it's all just a presumption / worry on my part. FYI if you've ever seen a DJ handle records (or teenagers and the general public back in the days when records were the only media available) you'll know that 'handling' is a bit of a misnomer. People used to stick their dirty mitts all over the grooves with nary a care, only those of us who cared used the "drop the record from the sleeve into one open palm and squeeze only on the edges of the record between two open palms" handling method. Oh and heaps of people never changed the needle. Don't think I ever saw anyone in my extended family change a needle ever. I've got more spares and used needles now than my whole family had back-in-the-day installed on their turntables! (Don't you know the needle lasts for ever, if you can still see it then it's fine!)
I sometimes wonder if in many cases the record is as clean as it's going to get after the first step and the rest aren't needed, but I'd rather over do it than under do it and end up recleaning.
Sorry, but if you're hearing lots of pops and crackles when you play vinyl, then there's something wrong. Either your turntable is crap, your stylus is worn out, or you're just playing worn out/knackered records. Maybe some people don't care to check condition etc, but then you're in for a crap-shoot.... there's absolutely no reason that used records can't sound amazing... I buy both used and new and both can sound fantastic. Sometimes you get bad pressings from new, but most of the time they sound fine. For used, I closely inspect the record before buying... usually, if it's covered in scuffs, it goes back on the rack, I don't care how rare/hard to find it is... if it's in knackered condition it doesn't 'count'.... if there's a scratch that I can feel with my finger, it goes back on the rack... but if it's just dust, it can be cleaned and should play fine. I have around 4000 LPs, and while there's one or two I know are in less than great condition - Ray Charles Hallelujah I Love Her So first pressing (hard to find and just a wonderful record - I'm keeping this until I find a better one, if that ever happens), and a Miles Davis Four And More first pressing (same) - for the vast majority of them, they play through will minimal to no noise.... because I 'curated' them as I bought them. It's ridiculous this notion that 'records come with noise'. It's simply not true, unless you're using worn out records. It's like if people only bought CDs that were covered in scratches and claimed 'oh, CDs just come with digital skips, it's part of the charm'.... that would be ridiculous, right? Same with records. I sold a few records at a boot fair and record fair recently, and was amazed by the amount of people who made a purchase without even removing the record from the sleeve, let alone examining the condition. That's fine if that's their choice, of course, but if that's your choice, then yes, you live in a world where 'records come with noise'. If a record has noticeable surface noise, pops or clicks, it either needs cleaning or it's wrecked (aside from pressing faults). If it's dirty, I give it a clean, if it's wrecked it goes out the door. No way I'm listening to snap, crackle and pop....
That is what amazes me the most. They are using technology that originated in the 19th century and was improved upon in the early part of the 20th century. From age 3 I was fascinated with the act of playing records. The idea fascinated me that a groove was around a quarter of a mile long and it all fit on a 12" record. Plus the actual groove was thinner than a human hair, yet contained so much information. Maybe I'm just easily amused, but it still fascinates me watching a record being played and staring at the grooves.
I absolutely understand your worry, which is why I try to help out my friends (and anyone who's into vinyl is my friend) get the most out of their vinyl! Exactly. Teenagers as a whole have never been kind to their records, now or 60 years ago. I can't tell you how many 45s of 50s rock I've found that have names gouged in the label with pen and were obviously tossed around at parties and the like. It's part of why it's difficult to find original Beatles albums in good shape now. And while I'm not saying that Crosley Cruisers are good (they sound... bad), from a record wear standpoint, I'm not sure that they're much worse than some of those early 60s mono portable units that were very common among teenagers. Counting for inflation, teens then were paying more for new albums than we are now at $20-$25 each.
“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic”. Attributed to Arthur C. Clarke
I voted in the 1st category. I have NEVER purchased a used record for listening. I have purchased some Beatles LPs to have in the collection but I don't listen to them. I've been buying and listening to LPs since the mid-Sixties. If an LP has/had pop and/or clicks I returned it for another copy.
Not vacuuming it dry invites airborne dust to land in any moisture and form a sort of cement in the groove. Theoretical, perhaps, but I’d rather not take that chance.
I noted my records are great but have crackling in the music bits. That's mostly because many of my LPs date back to the late 1960's and they've been played a lot over the years. Tried to be careful; always cleaned them before playing but the occasional ham-handed events mean they aren't perfect. Also, I've been given probably 100 LPs that are in various conditions. It's interesting to listen to some that have been played with a large chisel. I'm getting rid of most of them. I think it's fine that vinyl has come back. No, I don't think it is the end all and be all of audio but it's a valid alternate music source, the same as CD, streaming, etc.