Records that sound better when played on vinyl

1. Boards of Canada - Music has the right to children
   

great topic!

anything with dire straits

as someone who learned to dj on vinyl and having gone to cd's and now serato, i'd say everything is better on vinyl (albeit a well pressed vinyl).. i'm not one to say vinyl or mp3, just that you cant beat putting a needle on a record.

all my records sound pretty bad as my speakers are awful....but free!

Everything.

Nice, heavy pressed vinyl still gives the best, most intimate sound quality.

Lot's of nice doom sounds beautiful on vinyl. Electric Wizard sounds fucking deep and booming and beautiful on vinyl.

Surprisingly (to me) I agree.

Plus AC/DC Back in Black, Highway to Hell & If you want blood.

great topic!

anything with dire straits

Everything before digital recordings started to be the norm (mid/late 80s? ABBA started to record digitally in the late 70s, I think). They don't sound better when pressed on vinyl in my opinion. It's great analogue recordings I love. There are loads that aren't very good at all, but the best examples are just wonderful. My copy of Transformer still blows me away. I have no idea if it's an original pressing, but it is American, claims it is 1972 and has a fantastic sound. I don't even like much of the record that much, but the sound is so full that no digital recording I've ever heard can compete in my ears.

I love vinyl but it is just too impractical. However many soundtracks sound amazing on Vinyl, Jaws, Star Wars and Requiem for a Dream are my favorites. My mum also has Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thmos and narrated by Richard Burton whose voice could soothe even the most troubled of minds!

7 inch vinyl FTW! Accept no imitations... Currently listening to my original stereo US copy of Love's Forever Changes... Had it for 25 years, still sounds amazing...

years ago when I dj'd we did some tests, mixing vinyl and cd copies of the same record. try it, it's eyeopening.

vinyl sounds noticeably richer, warmer, more tonal.

Everything before digital recordings started to be the norm (mid/late 80s? ABBA started to record digitally in the late 70s, I think). They don't sound better when pressed on vinyl in my opinion. It's great analogue recordings I love. There are loads that aren't very good at all, but the best examples are just wonderful. My copy of Transformer still blows me away. I have no idea if it's an original pressing, but it is American, claims it is 1972 and has a fantastic sound. I don't even like much of the record that much, but the sound is so full that no digital recording I've ever heard can compete in my ears.

No, ABBA didn't record digitally in the late 70s, nobody did. Tape was the prevalent medium until the mid-90s, when DAT and ADAT started to come in, but even then most top-end studios continued to use tape, many still do today.
What you love is probably nothing to do with the 'recording' medium per se, but has more to do with the production, the mix , the mastering and the pressing of the vinyl. the latter is probably the least significant factor, by some distance.
some records just sound better than others, and there are certainly 'digital' recordings ( although that phrase is hard to define: very few recordings are totally digital) that will sound bigger, fuller and warmer than so called 'analogue' recordings.
Without an in-depth knowledge of record production as well as recording technology it's pretty foolish for anyone to make pronouncements as to why one record sounds better than another - there are a great many factors, and in my experience it tends to be the talent of the artist and producer that makes the biggest difference sonically.

The CD volume wars have fucked it even more as a format. Compressed to fuck so the dynamic range is lost.

"The Beatles - Something" waveforms from the four CD remasters that have been done since 1983

nothing to do with CD or 'digital' though - just loudness vogue and advances in limiter technology.
Vinyl mastered in 2009 will be much louder than 60s vinyl as well.

Dub. Led Zep. Not much else.

But vinyl does put a physical upper limit on what you can do with the media itself.

1. Boards of Canada - Music has the right to children
   
   

Most modern records like the one above will have only had one digital master (professional mastering costs money) which will be used to press both cd's and vinyl. So there is no sound difference.

Those few that were mastered specifically for vinyl will have those additional low/high frequencies attenuated by the stylus cartridge that your using.

Anything on +8 records from early to mid nineties particularly vapourspace which seems 3 times louder than any other record I own. Agree about transformer and errrrr the original 12" of walk this way (RUN DMC version) is monolithic....

The CD volume wars have fucked it even more as a format. Compressed to fuck so the dynamic range is lost.

"The Beatles - Something" waveforms from the four CD remasters that have been done since 1983

My lecturer showed me one of the Red Hot Chilli Peppers recordings in a DAW and it w3as pretty much a green block.

Disagree with most of what's been said up there... On my phone, will launch into a drunken diatribe after some South Park and back on the laptop...

1. Boards of Canada - Music has the right to children
   
   

I don't really associate BOC with vinyl, i think it suits tape and cd well though. For me 90s hip hop sounds sweet on vinyl, warm bass and punchy snares. And most music from 60s/70s

My lecturer showed me one of the Red Hot Chilli Peppers recordings in a DAW and it w3as pretty much a green block.

it's how it sounds, not how it looks..

But vinyl does put a physical upper limit on what you can do with the media itself.

ye-es, but so does CD. the limits are in different places though.

Vinly is also cut with the RIAA EQ curve over it, which a vinyl pre-amp then has to correct - the sound of this pre-amps implementation of this EQ curve is a huge factor in determining the overall 'sound' of vinly through one system.

vinyl is my favourite median, looking down the record to check its not warped, holding it to the light to see if theyre are scratches,the smell, the feel of it, the limited pressings which make it more individual as opposed to mp3 files which anybody can download or get hold of!!. I love djing vinyl, ive tried all other ways and none compare to me with it, i agree that everything has a place but i'm not sure that sound is better on vinyl compared to digital, although i do like that faint crackle in the background you get sometimes but maybe cause im attached to vinyl, i will never dj on digital as long as i can get cheap vinyl from bootsales and markets so to me, music does sound better on vinyl i suppose to cause i still use it.......

Brilliant thread.

All my old reggae and ska records sounds amazing (got a first pressing of The Specials first LP!) on vinyl, my uncle and mum also have collections of Northern Soul that just wont cut it on any format but vinyl. The beauty of BoC is that even the CD versions 'sound' like vinyl with the crackles and pops, but I would still like to get the vinyl versions anyway ;)

Two of my favourites that I have on vinyl that are perfect for the format are; Godspeed You! Black Emperor and A Silver Mt. Zion. Fucking epic.

I forgot to add, I have also a small collection of opera/classical/orchestral vinyls that I had on mp3 format at one point but had to up/downgrade to vinyl just to get the perfect feel. I bought one today, 'Red Army Ensemble', traditional Russian Army orchestral music played live in London in 1963, paid 50p for it.