Are there digital front ends with the body...

The APL units do, including the now defunct APL Denon 3910.

A. Peychev designs his digital players to perform up to the level of his reference analog front end (or better, if possible). He often burns CDs with the analog rig as the source, and then he uses the CDs in his players to compare to the vinyl original.

"Body" has nothing to due with accurate, neutral and transparent reproduction of a recording. In addition, there is only as much "body" as exists in the recording's mix, which varies from disc to disc (or lp to lp).

If one seeks "body" beyond what exists on a recording and what is reproduced by a transparent system, then one seeks coloration to please their subjective taste. There's nothing wrong with that, but the term has no bearing on "the best" digital or analog source machine, which by definition should be neutral.

If we're defining "best" based on subjective rpeferrences, then all bets...and comparisons...are of no value unless one happens to know the listening preferences of the person offering the opinion.

IMO...