I have bought ‘mint’ or ‘excellent’ records that look like
they have been stored in a dust trap and conversely I
have bought 30 year old vinyl that plays and looks as good as the day it was
pressed. I have received flimsy 12” singles that I won for 50p wrapped in the
sturdiest and most frustratingly secure packaging known to man. I have also
received much anticipated eBay victories stuffed in a jiffy bag without a
stiffener and its fate trusted to the Royal Mail (it turned up with a heavily creased sleeve but vinyl intact). I have bought record cleaning brushes,
a new stylus, cartridge protractors and all kinds of protective covers. So
what have I learned from all of this?
 |
| The remastered Kraftwerk LPs are by far the best I have bought |
Modern remastered
vinyl sells at a premium: Most modern pressings are often of a very high
quality and that is reflected in the price. You get what you pay for I guess. The
soundtrack to “Blade Runner” by Vangelis (2013) is £28-32 depending on where
you shop, but is worth every penny. The remastered Depeche Mode (2007) and
Kraftwerk (2009) LPs are fine examples of what is possible with brilliant
mastering and virgin heavyweight vinyl but average out at £20 each. However….
Brand new 180g vinyl
doesn’t guarantee quality: The reissues of Mike Oldfield albums such as
“Crises” (2013) are lamentably inferior to the Kraftwerk repressings and quite
disappointing. In 2011 Jean Michel Jarre’s first three LPs were released on
vinyl for the first time in 20 years. Vinyl does have its limits and these
releases highlight the compromises that must sometimes be made. The higher
frequencies seem attenuated making the music sound dull, especially in tracks
such as Equinoxe Part IV (with a terrible edit at the end of Part VII
ruining the second side of the disc).
Not many people understand
how to grade a second-hand record: When buying records, major suppliers and
collectors use the system created by Record Collector Magazine. The average
seller, who is often ignorant of the grading system, will commonly list a
record as “good” when it should be graded as “excellent” and vice vesa. Buying
vinyl on eBay from private seller is something of a minefield as a result. It
took me 5 attempts to secure an “excellent” condition of one LP. Most people
simply don’t refer to the condition of the record and this should be a warning!
