VINYL REVIVAL

[catsmeow]

Interesting article about vinyl (Australian article).

http://www.smh.com.au/news/music/were-having-a-vinyl-revival/2008/02/04/1202090317972.html

I've always loved vinyl. Nothing beats looking at the cover art. Don't know what it's like in other countries, but vinyl here in Australia is becoming more popular. To me it never died out.

What do you guys think. Who else loves vinyl and what do you collect. I personally don't think downloading music is good. It's always good to have the original. What do people think of downloading music?? Any comments are welcome.

 

[KY Gentleman]

I think vinyl is the best way to enjoy music. I have collected albums all of my life and just recently had to buy another turntable to enjoy them with.
You cannot compare the old LP cover art with a 5x5 CD cover.

 

[Samsa]

http://www.thefedoralounge.com/showthread.php?t=24793

 

[catsmeow]

I think vinyl is the best way to enjoy music. I have collected albums all of my life and just recently had to buy another turntable to enjoy them with.
You cannot compare the old LP cover art with a 5x5 CD cover.

What is your favourite album cover??

 

[Salv]

I'm still badly addicted to vinyl, and I'm still trying to fill holes in my soul collection, but the wants list never gets any smaller. For every 45 I buy I add another half dozen to the list.

Yesterday I picked up a few original US issued soul 45s in London:
• Family Circle - I Hope You Really Love Me / Loving You Make The World Go Round - Sky Disc
• Mighty Sam - Evil Woman / Your Love Is Amazing - Atlantic
• Judy White - I’ll Cry / Satisfaction Guaranteed - Buddah
• White Family Band - Miss America Stand Up/I’m A Little Smarter Now - Duke

I'm waiting for a few recent eBay buys to be delivered from the US:
• Debbie Taylor - Comin' Down On You LP - Today (a real bargain at just $3.00)
• Chuck Armstrong - I'm A Lonely Man / Poor Make Believer - R.E.W.
• Hank Sample - So In Love With You / You're Being Unfair - Jay Walking
• Reuben Bell - All The Time / Leave My Kitten Alone - Deluxe

And over the last couple of months I've bought these from various sources, including eBay, UK-based record dealer John Manship, a record fair, and in the case of the Eli 'Paperboy' Reed directly from the record labels website:
• Jay Wiggins - Sad Girl / No Not Me - Amy
• King Floyd - Think About It / Here It Is - Chimneyville
• Laura Lee - Love’s Got Me Tired (But I Ain’t Tired Of Love) / Same - Ariola
• Johnny Soul - Take Me Where The Sun Never Shines / I Almost Called Your Name - SSS International
• Billy Young - Nothing’s Too Much (Nothing’s Too Good) / Too Much - Mercury
• Ralph “Soul” Jackson - Set Me Free / Take Me Back - Black Kat (a reissue - originals sell for about £400)
• Chuck Brooks - I’ve Got To Get Myself Together / Baa Baa Black Sheep - AGP
• The Continental 4 - The Way I Love You / I Don’t Have You - Jay-Walking
• Ike Lovely - You’re My Bad Habit / I Want It All - Capitol
• Charles Lattimore - Do The Thing / We Try Harder - Jay Boy
• Tommy Tate - I Remember / Help Me Love - Koko
• Randolph Walker - I Love Her More / Good Ole Soul - Jay Boy
• Eli “Paperboy” Reed & The True Loves - The Satisfier / It’s Easier - Q-Dee
• Roy Tyson - Oh What A Night For Love / Not Too Young To Sing The Blues - Double-L
• Jerry Combs & The Mannix - It Takes A Whole Lot Of Woman / I Don’t Want To Cry - Warner Bros.-Seven Arts
• Mr. D & The Highlights - Nose Full Of White / Every Now And Then - Jas
• The Village Choir - Talk To Me Sometimes / The Switch - SCM

 

[KY Gentleman]

What is your favourite album cover??

Wow, theres a lot of great covers. What comes to mind off hand is Bram Tchaikovskys' "Strange Man, Changed Man", any of the old Roxy Music covers. Emerson, Lake and Palmers "Brain Salad Surgery" had a very cool cover. Angel Citys' "Darkroom", too. And yours?

 

[catsmeow]

Wow, theres a lot of great covers. What comes to mind off hand is Bram Tchaikovskys' "Strange Man, Changed Man", any of the old Roxy Music covers. Emerson, Lake and Palmers "Brain Salad Surgery" had a very cool cover. Angel Citys' "Darkroom", too. And yours?

This might not be everyones cup of tea, but I always liked The Cramps covers-colourful, crazy, wild and creative. I think Lux designs them all.

Just to name a few:

Miles Davis - Bitches Brew
Janis Joplin - Cheap Thrills
Led Zeppelin - self titled, Led Zep II, Houses of the Holy, Physical Graffiti
Scorpions-Love Drive
Beatles and Rolling Stones, The Clash

Blue Note have some nice ones:
http://www.geocities.com/mark_j1_2000/AlbumArt.html


As mentioned too many to list. Will add to this list most likely.

Just discovered this guy:
http://www.jimflora.com/

 

[Dixon Cannon]

I'm fortunate (and old enough!) to have all the Beatles LP's on vinyl - both playing and virgin (unplayed!) Most on original Capital or Parlophone, and Apple labels.

I recently bought a USB turntable to make my own CD's from the records. The turntable works great, I just can figure out the software (Audacity!). I'm perplexed and confusbulated with it. I would love to hear all those pops and tics while driving in the car, but so far it just ain't happenin'!

-dixon cannon

 

[Ada Veen]

Dixon - you don't actually need to buy a USB turntable (sorry, I know this is a bit late). My partner is currently in the process of cding all his vinyl, and it's all done from a lead like the one below going out of the headphone jack and into the laptop input socket (which cost about 2 pounds) and then through Audacity (which we downloaded for free).

The quality is excellent. Our record player is like a twenty five year old national panasonic one too. The record player, being old, has a big jack (like on an electric guitar) and the laptop has a small one (like on headphones) but you can buy a converter for a pound or so.

If you have any specific questions on the Audacity, let me know. He's a whizz on it, and uses it to record his own music as well, so I'm sure could help you out.

 

[Salv]

I use Audacity as well, with the same sort of set up as Ada, although I've got a spare pair of outputs on my amplifier, so I use a Y-shaped cable - 2 x RCA to a 3.5mm plug like this.

What happens when you try to use Audacity Dixon?

 

[Flivver]

My favorite album cover is on Frank Sinatra's 1958 release "Come Fly With Me". Reports indicate that Frank thought the cover looked like a TWA advertisment...but I think it's fantastic!

Frank's outfit and the TWA Constellation in the background just screams late 1950s.

Interestingly, Linda Ronstadt copied the "Come Fly With Me" cover on the back of her "Lush Life" album...one of a trilogy of re-creations of golden era music done with the incomparable Nelson Riddle. On her cover, Linda used a DC-6 instead of a Constellation, and her style is more 1952 than 1958, but it still works for me!

By the way, Ronstadt's trilogy with Nelson Riddle..."What's New", "Lush Life", and "For Sentimental Reasons"...is outstanding. Highly recommended!

 

[Edward]

For my ears, vinyl is just superior to CD sound, though I mainly buy CDs for convenience. The sound on a vinyl record is warmer, that little bit richer, though that said I do think that you need a pretty good setup to appreciate it (a lot of folks don't spend much on a home stereo system, and the run of the mill units that are around now, if they had a turntable, wouldn't sound that much different. Good, I have no doubt, but not to the point wher you could hear the difference much). Of course for artwork, you can't beat the big old vinyl sleeves.

Some of my favourites:

Rocky Horror Show soundtrack, original London cast - various editions, but ost especially the original cartoon artwork

Rocky Horror Picture Show - the blood-writing font, the lips.... a classic.

Shock Treatment soundtrack (little known, 1981 quasi-sequel to RHPS).

Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols - a true design classic.

Elvis' first album - love the pose, love the layout, even adore the Clash's London Calling cover (the one with Paul Simonon smashing his Precision Bass on the floor) which pays homage to this one.

Ramones' Ramones - the four bandmembers in leather jackets, stood against a wall. Superb image, and one which has been copied time and again.

The Pogues - pretty much any of them, but especially their Rum, Sodomy and the Lash album.

I'm sure there are many, many more, but those are a handful of favourites for now.

Vinyl is the best, though I do buy CDs as a default (vinyl on particular things - either old collectibles, new limited edition things - I have a complete Elvis number 1s box set that I paid far too much for (had to buy a bunch of them at inflated eBay prices, but mine are all the first pressing LE numbered ones). I'm very much against the idea of going over to downloading. I love the mp3 format in its place - which is to allow me to be able to carry my entire collection around in something the size of a cigarette pack: the ultimate Walkman. BUT why would I buy a downlaod instead of a CD? What do they offer?

- downloads have no artwork. Ethics aside, there's nothing more on offer than the same soundfile you could get hold of from a pirate
- downloads are inferior in sound quality due to the compression formats (such as mp3) used. Fine on something like an iPod, but once you put it through a decent sized system at any volume, the flaws start to show.
- the lack of tangibility bothers me - I collect the artifacts (the discs) as much as I do the music contained thereon.


I'm also very concerned by the "rights grab" that took place in recent years. Some of the conditions the official download sites have tried to put over what you buy are way over and above where the balance should lie with copyright - basically they've often tried to extend their rights over the material at the expense of the end user. Fair use is being shot to pieces. I'm glad thugh that Apple have abandoned DRMS in their iTunes stuff, and that others are starting to follow suit, realising that the market is opposed to the sort of restriction they tried to put in place. Nevertheless, I'll continue to buy CDs and vinyl with their tangibility and superior sound quality.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Me, I'm still waiting for them to get around to the Shellac Revival. 78rpm forever!

Seriously, there were some gorgeous 78rpm album covers during the forties, especially those designed by Alex Steinweiss at Columbia. Starting in 1939 and continuing thru the next fifteen years or so he came up with hundreds of eye-catching designs for Columbia albums, and was probably the first artist to really treat the album cover as a selling point beyond something just to hold the records.

 

[pgoat]

No question that the artwork was better and more inetresting on the old albums of various sizes - just easier to appreciate than with the size of a cassette or CD Jewel Case. Of course, there was an entire side indusry that concentrated on album art (Hipgnosis, etc.)

Elektra did some nice covers in the 60s - Love, The Doors, MC5, Stooges, etc. Simple but powerful designs with great photography.

Robin Trower's early albums on Chrysalis were done by an artist named Funky Paul; worth buying for the art alone.

Of course if u want the quintessential 70s LP art, suitable for painting onto the back of your denim jacket, you need go no further than Roger Dean's covers for Yes......

Lots of classical music LPs had wonderful artwork, often using paintings by the 'masters'.

 

[Fletch]

Me, I'm still waiting for them to get around to the Shellac Revival. 78rpm forever!

Why couldn't someone start putting out those colorful bendy plastic 78s they used to do in the early 30s? We have the technology to make 'em sound a lot better, last a lot longer, and they'd be relatively easy and cheap to press.

Acetate, laminate, rah rah rah!
Flexatone, Filmophone, siss boom bah!