Vinyl VS CDJ's

[Lurka]

But knock on the door + square flat package = maaaassive grin

nothing beats this feeling!

[deadly_habit]

wow dude I've never heard of a soundclash, or dmz, or metalheadz. Thanks for enlightening me to these brand new musical ventures. Those aren't 'battles' as far as I'm concerned. Those are crews purposely booking together for the sake of a good show for the artists and fans alike.

If you read the dudes entire thread its pretty obvious he was trying to take the macho dj route.

Ok Rookie. I could run circles around you in a heartbeat. I've been playing Metalheadz in clubs for a decade. The battle is about the show. I ain't trying to be macho on the forum you twit. You ain't even heard of Metalheadz and you want to say you know better than me ? Fool Shut the F*ck Up, listen and learn. I'm not going to take you down a f)ckin bad road seen. You are obviously a newbie rookie who don't know shit so pipe down and have a listen before you spout off on sh*t you don't have a clue. peace.

someone is oblivious to sarcasm...

[babylonburn]

wow dude I've never heard of a soundclash, or dmz, or metalheadz. Thanks for enlightening me to these brand new musical ventures. Those aren't 'battles' as far as I'm concerned. Those are crews purposely booking together for the sake of a good show for the artists and fans alike.

If you read the dudes entire thread its pretty obvious he was trying to take the macho dj route.

Ok Rookie. I could run circles around you in a heartbeat. I've been playing Metalheadz in clubs for a decade. The battle is about the show. I ain't trying to be macho on the forum you twit. You ain't even heard of Metalheadz and you want to say you know better than me ? Fool Shut the F*ck Up, listen and learn. I'm not going to take you down a f)ckin bad road seen. You are obviously a newbie rookie who don't know shit so pipe down and have a listen before you spout off on sh*t you don't have a clue. peace.

Love the "peace" comment at the end, genius!

[EMAGDNIM]

The internet is serious business...Remember this kids!

[JimmaJamJamie]

But knock on the door + square flat package = maaaassive grin

nothing beats this feeling!

[corticyte]

oh this thread again...

1. Anyone can burn a CD

2. To put a track on Vinyl, it has to be professionally mastered in a very specific way

Therefore:

Tracks on Vinyl often sound better than a rough mixdown on a CD

But technically:

Uncompressed 16-bit 44.1KHz CD audio is immensely higher in quality than Vinyl.

At least one person is going to argue with the above statement, and this is probably because they haven't read any books about Digital Signal Processing or the disadvantages of Analogue electronics. I'm not saying that CD-quality (and higher quality) audio always sounds better than vinyl (I personally enjoy the sound of vinyl), it's just that science would say that digital audio has superior fidelity.

[brasco]

But knock on the door + square flat package = maaaassive grin

nothing beats this feeling!

[jekal]

It’s really frustrating to see a debate with such amazing potential devolve into a trans-Atlantic bitching match within the first page; though epitomical of the forum circa this time last year - not to lay all the blame on that unbridled success Snoopy Dizzle “throw your hands in the air” etc.

Having a debate about the benefits of vinyl will not bring a logical outcome – using vinyl, as I think’s been proven, is an extremely subjective desire. Maybe when discussing (un)audible frequencies [that is an interesting argument, which has been done to death], but generally debating vinyl is not quantitative: you can’t argue for vinyl, but you can explore why vinyl is important to some people. Those reasons cannot be argued against, and it is unhelpful to ridicule them –in fact it can be very fucking complicated in a community exploration to say:
“Dude you've got issues if you think the medium determines anything.”
Yes, completely true, the medium in an average system will not affect the sounds you hear. But then what are sounds? What is music? if not for context. It’s no coincidence that my crème de la crème of tunes are those unreleased or relatively unheard of. It means more to drop those tunes. Just as it can mean more for somebody to drop a tune on vinyl they’ve purchased. Just as it can mean more to drop a tune you love, which you’ve had specifically pressed. Just as, it can mean more to drop a tune that you’ve made which you’ve had specifically pressed.

I’m not arguing for vinyl here, I’m just trying to make the point that context is everything. Music is not just music in and of itself. Music makes meaning. Medium makes meaning. Look at the top 10 Djs from the dubstepforum awards:

Skream
N-Type
Plastician (Serato)
Mala
Youngsta
Kode9
Benga
Bunzer0 (I don’t know)
Oneman (CDJs)
Hatcha

Again, I’m not arguing for vinyl, I’m trying to prove that vinyl is a medium that some people think is important, that medium is a considered context, that the medium can affect the music in a way beyond sound. I can appreciate that these djs are also the best producers, who have/ acquire more unreleased songs, that get more bookings, that can afford to regularly press vinyl. But you can also appreciate that 7 out of the awarded 10 best dubstepforum djs use the medium of vinyl and people for whatever reason feel this is an important attribute of their performance.

Vinyl alone can bring with it a whole socio-cultural context, there has been fuck-loads written on this - to some people it can mean a lot [fascinating chapter in ‘The Cultural Roots of British Devolution’ by Michael Gardiner, where he describes the idea of the ‘post-colonial touch’, linking the analogue vinyl and the physical touch of the DJ back to Caribbean immigration in the 50s and the percussive 'tactile' music:

"Its imported music was frequently percussion-based; its pounding drum & bass, which confirmed some Powellite [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enoch_Powell] suspicions about the noisiness of immigrants, has roots in Caribbean traditions of music as repetitive and ritualistic force. This is a tactile music, felt as well as listened to – a post-Enlightenment stress on touch as joining persons in a single time of experience."
he then goes onto describe dance/ rave culture and the surviving post-colonial touch:

“it’s stress on percussion and bass survived from the immigrant culture of reggae; repetitive percussion takes precedence over any sequential narrative progression of melodic verses and choruses. The tactile was reflected in techno in bass frequencies often lowered as far as possible, and given a new twist by a generation of analogue equipment recalling that used by 70s dub producers. The Roland TB303 gave acid house its characteristic analogue stabs, and allowed for an infinite number of variations controlled by hand; in analogue, unlike digital, there are no discrete and mediated units of sound – each frequency is specific and contingent. Guru producer Aphex Twin has thus spoken of exploring ‘in-between’ notes, notes never finally corresponding to digital intervals. The performance of the DJ – brought to England via the Caribbean/ black American context – hands-on vinyl mixing and scratching have accentuated the significance of touch in cultural production…Like punk, rave’s DIY music was hostile to official forms of British cultural unity…
Rave’s inheritance of postcolonial touch shows how, even in the individuating and democratically problematic period of the late 1980s, a challenge was arising from ‘below’ and refusing meanings, which had undergone official categorisation, whether ideological or digital. The only spin-doctors some now listened to were DJs."

I am not suggesting here that this is all in the front of Skream's mind as he's dropping the wibbela. But vinyl is a medium with a cultural heritage. There is here, as with everything else in life, no right or wrong answer – stop fucking bickering – there is only what people find important and why; appreciate belief.

[wooda916]

It’s really frustrating to see a debate with such amazing potential devolve into a trans-Atlantic bitching match within the first page; though epitomical of the forum circa this time last year - not to lay all the blame on that unbridled success Snoopy Dizzle “throw your hands in the air” etc.

Having a debate about the benefits of vinyl will not bring a logical outcome – using vinyl, as I think’s been proven, is an extremely subjective desire. Maybe when discussing (un)audible frequencies [that is an interesting argument, which has been done to death], but generally debating vinyl is not quantitative: you can’t argue for vinyl, but you can explore why vinyl is important to some people. Those reasons cannot be argued against, and it is unhelpful to ridicule them –in fact it can be very fucking complicated in a community exploration to say:
“Dude you've got issues if you think the medium determines anything.”
Yes, completely true, the medium in an average system will not affect the sounds you hear. But then what are sounds? What is music? if not for context. It’s no coincidence that my crème de la crème of tunes are those unreleased or relatively unheard of. It means more to drop those tunes. Just as it can mean more for somebody to drop a tune on vinyl they’ve purchased. Just as it can mean more to drop a tune you love, which you’ve had specifically pressed. Just as, it can mean more to drop a tune that you’ve made which you’ve had specifically pressed.

I’m not arguing for vinyl here, I’m just trying to make the point that context is everything. Music is not just music in and of itself. Music makes meaning. Medium makes meaning. Look at the top 10 Djs from the dubstepforum awards:

Skream
N-Type
Plastician (Serato)
Mala
Youngsta
Kode9
Benga
Bunzer0 (I don’t know)
Oneman (CDJs)
Hatcha

Again, I’m not arguing for vinyl, I’m trying to prove that vinyl is a medium that some people think is important, that medium is a considered context, that the medium can affect the music in a way beyond sound. I can appreciate that these djs are also the best producers, who have/ acquire more unreleased songs, that get more bookings, that can afford to regularly press vinyl. But you can also appreciate that 7 out of the awarded 10 best dubstepforum djs use the medium of vinyl and people for whatever reason feel this is an important attribute of their performance.

Vinyl alone can bring with it a whole socio-cultural context, there has been fuck-loads written on this - to some people it can mean a lot [fascinating chapter in ‘The Cultural Roots of British Devolution’ by Michael Gardiner, where he describes the idea of the ‘post-colonial touch’, linking the analogue vinyl and the physical touch of the DJ back to Caribbean immigration in the 50s and the percussive 'tactile' music:

"Its imported music was frequently percussion-based; its pounding drum & bass, which confirmed some Powellite [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enoch_Powell] suspicions about the noisiness of immigrants, has roots in Caribbean traditions of music as repetitive and ritualistic force. This is a tactile music, felt as well as listened to – a post-Enlightenment stress on touch as joining persons in a single time of experience."
he then goes onto describe dance/ rave culture and the surviving post-colonial touch:

“it’s stress on percussion and bass survived from the immigrant culture of reggae; repetitive percussion takes precedence over any sequential narrative progression of melodic verses and choruses. The tactile was reflected in techno in bass frequencies often lowered as far as possible, and given a new twist by a generation of analogue equipment recalling that used by 70s dub producers. The Roland TB303 gave acid house its characteristic analogue stabs, and allowed for an infinite number of variations controlled by hand; in analogue, unlike digital, there are no discrete and mediated units of sound – each frequency is specific and contingent. Guru producer Aphex Twin has thus spoken of exploring ‘in-between’ notes, notes never finally corresponding to digital intervals. The performance of the DJ – brought to England via the Caribbean/ black American context – hands-on vinyl mixing and scratching have accentuated the significance of touch in cultural production…Like punk, rave’s DIY music was hostile to official forms of British cultural unity…
Rave’s inheritance of postcolonial touch shows how, even in the individuating and democratically problematic period of the late 1980s, a challenge was arising from ‘below’ and refusing meanings, which had undergone official categorisation, whether ideological or digital. The only spin-doctors some now listened to were DJs."

I am not suggesting here that this is all in the front of Skream's mind as he's dropping the wibbela. But vinyl is a medium with a cultural heritage. There is here, as with everything else in life, no right or wrong answer – stop fucking bickering – there is only what people find important and why; appreciate belief.

spot on

[fractal]

yeah, great post man

[saphyre]

so many of these, but i'll post my opinion in this one. mp3s are cheaper, don't get scratched, and don't wear out. quite a few digital DJs probably don't even buy the music. if i was ever at a gig and saw that, i'd probably knock your laptop off by "accident." i've heard that it's easier to mix digitally. i only know vinyl, and i'm still learning. i'm sad that a few releases i want are digital only and i don't have cash for a 3rd channel CDJ. it's also ridiculous to buy a white label promo thinking that's it, only to find a full artwork release a few weeks later. so, you pay double if you want the art. sometimes you'll be paying almost $10 for just one song, too. then there's the whole limited release greed for ebay/discogs. i want SBTRKT "Timeless" on vinyl and 2 sellers want $40+ for it. well, i have the mp3 rip so if i ever had a CDJ...the one time i'd say it was ok. no offense, SBTRKT. ;X

http://www.roughtrade.com/site/shop_det ... sku=316549

[pkay]

It’s really frustrating to see a debate with such amazing potential devolve into a trans-Atlantic bitching match within the first page; though epitomical of the forum circa this time last year - not to lay all the blame on that unbridled success Snoopy Dizzle “throw your hands in the air” etc.

Having a debate about the benefits of vinyl will not bring a logical outcome – using vinyl, as I think’s been proven, is an extremely subjective desire. Maybe when discussing (un)audible frequencies [that is an interesting argument, which has been done to death], but generally debating vinyl is not quantitative: you can’t argue for vinyl, but you can explore why vinyl is important to some people. Those reasons cannot be argued against, and it is unhelpful to ridicule them –in fact it can be very fucking complicated in a community exploration to say:
“Dude you've got issues if you think the medium determines anything.”
Yes, completely true, the medium in an average system will not affect the sounds you hear. But then what are sounds? What is music? if not for context. It’s no coincidence that my crème de la crème of tunes are those unreleased or relatively unheard of. It means more to drop those tunes. Just as it can mean more for somebody to drop a tune on vinyl they’ve purchased. Just as it can mean more to drop a tune you love, which you’ve had specifically pressed. Just as, it can mean more to drop a tune that you’ve made which you’ve had specifically pressed.

When I said medium doesn't determine anything, I was speaking from the point of view that playing an actual dubplate for the sake of playing a dubplate doesn't give you a +1 to your set. Just as playing serato doesn't mean you're some type of tech-whiz who is a dj from the future.

I think what's funny is that in certain parts of the US (can't speak for other countries) blog-house, electro-house, and other infashion genres, the whole lap top DJ/Serato thing is actually something their scenes bank as a plus. Some people actually argue that vinyl djs are old fogies.

My point is that both sides of the coin are ridiculous in my opinion. Not one person on here is going to go up to Richie Hawtin and tell him he's a piece of shit for using a laptop. Just like no one is going to tell any established dj they're retarded for using vinyl. The medium in which a DJ takes track 'A' and mixes it with track 'B' has zero merit on how good of a DJ they are. A great dj will be great, a shit dj will be shit.

I think the technical arguments are valid, there's probably some validity to the quality tunes see vinyl more often than mp3s, however implying there's some artistic credibility to the medium in which you DJ is horseshit. (not saying you argued for it but it was implied earlier). What boggles my mind is that we've had cdj's and final scratch for a decade... and a now we have people using it as a gimick of sorts (seeing 'all vinyl set' on a flyer makes me cry inside)

[esfandyar]

But knock on the door + square flat package = maaaassive grin

nothing beats this feeling!

like christmas everytime!

and EMAGDNIM nice avatar, roy is the shit.

[Dead Rats]

I prefer vinyl, but CDJ's are quite good if you want to play the tunes you just illegally downloaded from the internet.

[Corkz]

I like vinyl when playing. Just prefer the feel of control I have over a record.

Also I'm an obsessive record collector in general. I love having the actual physical copies. Feel like a bit of a knob buying just a digital file.

same lolz, there something about having the CD case i love ha

[DubStudio]

I came into this a bit late but thought I would chip in, as I am accustomed to do every time I find a vinyl vs CD debate

I will start by saying that it doesn't matter to me that this discussion has taken place thousands of times before, and that I have read the same old arguments over and over again - because each time the snapshot of the debate is slightly different. Its like a barometer of the time, and I find it fascinating to see how attitudes shift over the years. It may look like groundhog day but that's practically impossible.

That said, the debate is almost always discretely polarised, as if we are somehow forced to choose one medium over the other. This is a legacy of the major labels telling us to ditch our vinyl and buy cassette tapes, and then throw out the cassettes and buy CDs - and yes it is well documented that the major players in the music industry actively tried to replace vinyl with the cassette at first (not CD as 99% of people seem to think).

Personally I am not gonna ditch anything that works just because something "better" comes along, I have two turntables, a cassette player, 3 minidisc players, a Cowon A3, an iPhone, several computers loaded with iTunes, and DVD player that plays CDs. I am quite happy managing all these things and their associated media. Trying to merge them all into one format I am happy with would be a long and thankless task, and perhaps even impossible.

The other thing I often see is the attitude that: quicker, easier and cheaper = better. Well, that's simply not the case. Quicker, easier and cheaper is just that - quicker, easier and cheaper. Is digital audio better than analogue because its quicker, easier and cheaper? Potentially yes, invariably no. Similarly I don't buy the whole "analogue is best" idea. To me what's best is to make the most of all the technology available to you.

Ultimately vinyl will be appropriated by whatever group of individuals think its a good idea at the time. Its happened many times since its creation, from its use as an office dictaphone, to mass-produced music, to DnB and Dubstep. Scientologists recently chose it to preserve their recordings of Ron Hubbard, so who knows what might happen to it next? In a sense the use of vinyl doesn't need defending as if its some sort of cause, its something that should be treasured by those who use it, otherwise someone else will. Similarly, mp3 does not need a band of impassioned supporters, everyone knows about Serato, everyone knows about CDJs - why not support a really great digital medium like SACD or BluRay - they really do need your help!

Those who shun the use of vinyl will be well advised to consider it as an incredibly important medium, for several reasons: firstly it has a physical value: its costs £79,000 to legitimately fill an ipod with 100,000 tracks, but the insurance value is probably not much more than you paid for the device. Secondly, vinyl sticks around for a long time, creating a legacy for the artist that can simply vanish in the cyberworld. Thirdly, as this thread would testify, people hate being told what to do, so why bother? It makes much more commercial sense to be open to all media opportunities available to you. I am guessing that most people on this forum would be happy to publish their music (or at least discuss the idea) on whatever medium the label wants them to, as long as they get paid. I simply cannot understand why anyone would want to publish in writing on a forum that they are opposed to the use of, or feel its uncool to use, any particular medium whatsoever. Much less swear and fight with other people about it!?

[Dark Reign]

It’s really frustrating to see a debate with such amazing potential devolve into a trans-Atlantic bitching match within the first page; though epitomical of the forum circa this time last year - not to lay all the blame on that unbridled success Snoopy Dizzle “throw your hands in the air” etc.

Having a debate about the benefits of vinyl will not bring a logical outcome – using vinyl, as I think’s been proven, is an extremely subjective desire. Maybe when discussing (un)audible frequencies [that is an interesting argument, which has been done to death], but generally debating vinyl is not quantitative: you can’t argue for vinyl, but you can explore why vinyl is important to some people. Those reasons cannot be argued against, and it is unhelpful to ridicule them –in fact it can be very fucking complicated in a community exploration to say:
“Dude you've got issues if you think the medium determines anything.”
Yes, completely true, the medium in an average system will not affect the sounds you hear. But then what are sounds? What is music? if not for context. It’s no coincidence that my crème de la crème of tunes are those unreleased or relatively unheard of. It means more to drop those tunes. Just as it can mean more for somebody to drop a tune on vinyl they’ve purchased. Just as it can mean more to drop a tune you love, which you’ve had specifically pressed. Just as, it can mean more to drop a tune that you’ve made which you’ve had specifically pressed.

When I said medium doesn't determine anything, I was speaking from the point of view that playing an actual dubplate for the sake of playing a dubplate doesn't give you a +1 to your set. Just as playing serato doesn't mean you're some type of tech-whiz who is a dj from the future.

I think what's funny is that in certain parts of the US (can't speak for other countries) blog-house, electro-house, and other infashion genres, the whole lap top DJ/Serato thing is actually something their scenes bank as a plus. Some people actually argue that vinyl djs are old fogies.

My point is that both sides of the coin are ridiculous in my opinion. Not one person on here is going to go up to Richie Hawtin and tell him he's a piece of shit for using a laptop. Just like no one is going to tell any established dj they're retarded for using vinyl. The medium in which a DJ takes track 'A' and mixes it with track 'B' has zero merit on how good of a DJ they are. A great dj will be great, a shit dj will be shit.

I think the technical arguments are valid, there's probably some validity to the quality tunes see vinyl more often than mp3s, however implying there's some artistic credibility to the medium in which you DJ is horseshit. (not saying you argued for it but it was implied earlier). What boggles my mind is that we've had cdj's and final scratch for a decade... and a now we have people using it as a gimick of sorts (seeing 'all vinyl set' on a flyer makes me cry inside)

Excellent post.

[philly]

oh this thread again...

1. Anyone can burn a CD

2. To put a track on Vinyl, it has to be professionally mastered in a very specific way

Therefore:

Tracks on Vinyl often sound better than a rough mixdown on a CD

But technically:

Uncompressed 16-bit 44.1KHz CD audio is immensely higher in quality than Vinyl.

At least one person is going to argue with the above statement, and this is probably because they haven't read any books about Digital Signal Processing or the disadvantages of Analogue electronics. I'm not saying that CD-quality (and higher quality) audio always sounds better than vinyl (I personally enjoy the sound of vinyl), it's just that science would say that digital audio has superior fidelity.

I take it you haven't read books on it yourself both have pro's and con's mate,
Vinyl: higher frequency response yet debatable as it is out of the range of hearing ( digital brick filtered 20-20k)
digital: higher dynamic response
digital: clipping sounds like shit
analog: clipping= harmonic distortion which sounds nice (saturation)
vinyl will sound worse if its dirty, scratched obviously but a clean record will sound as good as a wav.
vinyl has no sample rate limits ie. it will sound better speed adjusted, especially slower as samples have to be repeated algorithmically in digital formats.

[MikeE]

For the record I have to boost the gains and the EQ to twice that of the vinyl when i record. Take the data and run with it. Peace out !

Well the answer to that is quite simple compadrè - stop using illegally downloaded/ripped digital files, 'cos thats the only reason why you'd be having that problem.

If you were using a wav or a 320, that problem wouldn't exist. If you are using 320's/wavs and still claim to be having that problem, then, as i suspect, you are talking shite.

Clearly you haven't heard "Giant - Drumstick VIP" on beatport.com

[rob sparx]

oh this thread again...

1. Anyone can burn a CD

2. To put a track on Vinyl, it has to be professionally mastered in a very specific way

Therefore:

Tracks on Vinyl often sound better than a rough mixdown on a CD

But technically:

Uncompressed 16-bit 44.1KHz CD audio is immensely higher in quality than Vinyl.

At least one person is going to argue with the above statement, and this is probably because they haven't read any books about Digital Signal Processing or the disadvantages of Analogue electronics. I'm not saying that CD-quality (and higher quality) audio always sounds better than vinyl (I personally enjoy the sound of vinyl), it's just that science would say that digital audio has superior fidelity.

I take it you haven't read books on it yourself both have pro's and con's mate,
Vinyl: higher frequency response yet debatable as it is out of the range of hearing ( digital brick filtered 20-20k)
digital: higher dynamic response
digital: clipping sounds like shit
analog: clipping= harmonic distortion which sounds nice (saturation)
vinyl will sound worse if its dirty, scratched obviously but a clean record will sound as good as a wav.
vinyl has no sample rate limits ie. it will sound better speed adjusted, especially slower as samples have to be repeated algorithmically in digital formats.

What you've said about clipping is irrelevant - clipping whilst playing out will come from the mixing desk which is in the analogue domain not digital. There could be some digital clipping from a really shit mixdown but that could occur in a tune on vinyl or cd format - the result of a poor mixdown like this will be that you cannot drive the sound as loud before it "breaks up" (this is to do with gain staging) but that goes for tunes on vinyl or cd.

I can't be arsed to read whats been said in this thread as theres been a million threads like this b4 and its fucking boring now but im assuming that no-ones mentioned the most important reason why it can suck to play vinyl in the uk and thats because a hell of a lot of promoters are hopeless at setting up a rig. All to often there's feedback from a deck or one is damaged and the outputs distorting etc - this sort of bullshit can ruin the impact of a set big time and make the dj look bad. A lot of soundchecks are done with cdjs now so when vinyl is played it sounds real muddy. Basically although on a well set up rig vinyl will sound better than cd, on a poorly set up rig it will sound fucking awful - I don't get these issues on the continent so why is it such a problem in the uk?