My post was meant in a tongue-in-cheek way as I was feeling a bit daft last night when I posted that.
Records are records, and there are going to be clicks and pops. I’ve done a better job of doing my research on any new reissues or new releases. Sometimes I find out the mastering is terrible, or sometimes I hear horror stories about QC. I’ve passed on many purchases lately, whereas I’ve been burnt in the past. If there’s something I like from MoFi or AP, I feel pretty good about purchasing without too much investigation. I’ve never had QC issues with those companies - worst case, the production/mastering didn’t live up to the hype or perhaps my unrealistic hopes. Not everything is gonna sound like Steve Hoffman’s “Stadium Arcadium” or AP’s “L.A. Woman.” I’ve grown a set and started buying older releases on the used market. I try to stick to sellers with great feedback and a decent history of selling. I’ve been lucky with NM purchases so far. Been happy about 85% of the time with some VG+ purchases (I don’t spend more than $20 on those). So far, knock on wood, no lousy experiences. Doing my best to avoid “bad” records up front is only part of the vinyl experience. Having a consistent cleaning process is VERY important to me. Every record gets cleaned with my Okki Nokki, and gets placed into brand new MoFi inner sleeves and outer sleeves (not always MoFi, but always mylar - recommended for my valuable comic collectibles, so good for my record sleeves, right?). Records are cleaned with carbon bristle brush before every play. Stylus is with Onzow ZeroDust before each side and with an ultrasonic cleaner after 2 sides are played. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to say, “No clicks and no pops.” This is playback generated by dragging a diamond stylus through a bunch of grooves cut into some fancy plastic. There’s gonna be noise. I do, however, think I do a good job limiting exposure to pops and clicks while still being able to really, really enjoy the whole record listening experience.
Seeing as we're on the subject. I bought five records new from Amazon this week. Four of them were varying degrees of awful. One is pretty decent (the one I really wanted thankfully) and that's only because I have a SugarCube to fix the clicks. It couldn't help the other four. Maybe it's bad luck but the majority of new vinyl I've bought in the last six months has been returned. I don't remember it being this bad last year.
My records were having a lot of pops and cracks but..... ultrasonic cleaning has reduced them by over 80%.
