I love music, and sound, and objects and media and technologies.
I love listening to music on any format, from 78 rpm phonographs,
45 and 33 rpm vinyl, open reel to reel, compact cassette, CD, and FLAC.
Format doesn't matter, I listen to MIDI files off of a SB55 into a SC55.
In my experience, vinyl does not sound better, or even as good as CD or equivalents.
You can have MP3s sound better than vinyl at higher bitrates. So it's not
some headfi idea of superior sound quality or even "warmer" sound. Ideally, I prefer
music without distortion, and if you look at the RIAA curve for any time, you'll
know that vinyl won't deliver that, but with good equipment, it's not terrible.
It's this fragile format, that can sound _good_ under the right circumstances,
if the equipment and medium are in good condition, it sounds very acceptable,
not close to CD, but also not terribly far behind.
So I don't have any good technical arguments for vinyl, and I won't even recommend
it because of any objective factors, because I can't. Go listen to CDs or FLAC.
But there are several things about listening to vinyl that I enjoy, and is why
I'm trying to write this down.. As you see, it's not going too well.
One thing I enjoy about it is the fragility of the process, these mechanical
things have to work just so, or it won't work well, it seems amazing to me
that this rotating disc with some grooves stamped into it can produce anything
even resembling sound, let alone produce clean and pleasant sounding playback.
The engineering and thought that has gone into making this work, from thinking
out the equalization curve to physically mass producing styli and cartridges and
the records themselves to such exacting standards and have them actually work
together. The elegance of smooth rotation of the record, the tone-arm ever so
gently resting a needle inside a groove that is at most 80 microns thick, where
the needle vibrates as it passes over the unevenness of the groove itself, relying
on the inertia of the arm and cartridge itself to produce the motion of the tiny
moving parts (magnet or coil depending on the type of cartridge) that induces
a current into a coil, and this minute current is then transported, hopefully
without the induction of additional electrical noise, into an amplifier that will
bring it from the sub 10 millivolt range into line level, many times higher.
I find this impressive in and of itself, entirely in the analog domain that is
so fragile and magic to me. The signal is never abstracted (though it is distorted
on purpose for physical reasons) away from its original physical shape.
Just imagine that.. That some physical arrangement of atomic structure on the
surface of the actualy record, is directly the same shape as the movement of
electrons on the copper, and it never strays far from that, only changed and
then amplified twice before the moving membrane of the speakers move exactly the
same (except with the equalization applied). That's kind of amazing to me to
think about, if you couldn't tell by how much I felt I needed to write about it.
So, one thing is the technology itself being fascinating.
The other thing is the way I listen. With my computer, I just search Rhythmbox
for what want to hear, and it streams the flac off of the file server via a
cifs mount, over the interent, entirely much more magic, but also much, much
easier, enabling different usage patterns, music then easily becomes somewhat
of a background thing, rather than an actively engaged activity.
To me, the process of listening to vinyl is something that forces a higher level
of engagement from me. When I decide to listen to vinyl, I'm either inspired to
a specific album or song, or I will have to browse the collection, which is an
enjoyable experience in itself, flipping through covers, appreciating the artwork
and maybe changing my mind two or three times, before pulling out the one I want.
Then it is the processing of turning on the equipment, I usually do this first,
so it can stabilize before playing, first the turntable is powered up, then the
phono preamp, finally the amplifier, waiting for that click to indicate capacitors
have been charged and output stage engaged, then the gently turn of the volume knob
to the desired level of attenuation, if I'm alone, about 20 db, if there are other
people, around 50 db for my current setup. Then the physical medium is placed on
the turntable, it is brushed for a few revolutions, with the carbon brush to remove
dust. Then the needle is positioned over the groove and the lever to gently lower
it is drawn, and finally the soft thump in the speakers indicate that playback
will commence shortly. A short second there is nothing but the literal sound of
vinyl silence, which is not silence at all, but the actual sound of the texture
of the groove. That soft noise floor is not a technical mistake, it's the
reality of the physical medium, and I don't want it in all my music, but it's
allowed, maybe even welcome in my vinyl listening sessions. Then it is time to
take a seat in the comfortable couch, right in the middle, which is also in the
middle of the line between my monitors. And the listening ensues, and it is intent
I am wearing down my record, it is not just for the sake of background noise in my
life, it is active enjoyment in my life, and that justifies this excess of effort,
electrical energy, stack of equipment and mechanical wear on both equipment and medium.
It is a ritual, and ensuing sensual feast, a deliberation of consumption of time.
It is handling physical artifacts in a world that's increasingly living inside
of machines in some data center out of sight. It's a reminder that there are
also things worth enjoying outside the screen. A temporal anchor of the music to
it's own time. Maybe that is what headfi is for me, and I enjoy that.
