Zaikesman, in a bolt of counter-intuitive energy I recently purchased (and I am repeating myself here, so people who know this tale can go and do something else) a Rega P-9 with RB 1000 arm and an Ortofon Kontrapunkt B cartridge and, this week, got a used Audio Research PH 3. For me it is a considerable expense. That I did this on what is for me a tangent makes it even more of a challenge. There is one store that I know of here in Montreal where new vinyl can be purchased. Over the last little while I bought 13 new albums and have had many surprises (both good and bad) but, unfortunately, the bad ones seem to weigh more heavily. The initial question was on the value of spending on heavier vinyl. One of the albums I bought was a reissue of Mile Davis' My Funny Valentine on 180-gram vinyl. Before hearing it and just by a visual examination I even said that it looked nice and flat, this based on my belief that these pressings were "audiophile" grade. Well to my surprise and consternation the damn thing was so warped I couldn't even cue it. The store was nice enough to exchange it, that is not the problem (although I fear that if I bring back every record that I find is wanting insofar as pressing and surfaces go, that I will be told (probably politely) to take a hike or, as Hwy 61 so nicely put, that if I can't accept the trial and tribulations of vinyl on the road to superior analog sound I need not bother joining the club). I could run down the list of what I bought, but why bother. Suffice it to say that the replacement 180-gram album Miles Davis "Seven Steps to Heaven" is flat and as noise free as analog probably gets. The "ordinary" pressings are a mixed bag. The worst I got by far is a reissue of Roland Kirk's "The Inflated Tear" that is so noisy, that has a surface scratch and an edge warp. At nearly twenty bucks it is good for the garbage. Another one in the same vein is Lee Morgan's "Candy". On the positive side, two, for want of a better expression, NOS, Pablo albums of Zoot Sims are good pressings and the music is great. So, based on this limited sampling, I dont think that heavier vinyl is a guarantee of anything, except a steeper price. When analog sounds good, it is really nice, but when you just spent forty bucks on two albums that are unplayable are you wrong to conclude that, insofar as the quality of pressings, nothing has changed in over twenty years? The next purchase is some form of record cleaning machine. I will then be able to put to the test the myriad suggestions I have gotten that the noise is usually the result of dirty grooves. Hell, a fellow even opined that edge warps don't cause any audible problems that it's the dirt in the hard to reach warped areas that is the culprit! I guess I will be able to test firsthand this proposition. Another step I want to take is going over the cart set-up, possibly by purchasing a Wallytractor. I still have a bunch of test discs from years gone by (Omnidisc, two Shure test records and one from McGill University issued by Sound & Vision many moons ago). I am still uncertain that I have the patience and dexterity to go through this process though, and may decide to find a technician knowledgeable in such things. So don't read too much or too little in what I write and don't beat a man for trying. Insofar as the clubbish attitude that vinyl is only for the courageous, the well heeled or the one's in the know, spare me. Good day.
