After having been a vivid collector of CDs back in the days (I sold all of them some 15 years ago…), I started collecting vinyl and depend on streaming services ever since. Currently, I make use of a Quobuz subscription and Roon to manage my library which also includes various high-res downloads stored locally (with backups in the cloud).
But I miss physical media, and vinyl doesn’t cut it for me. Don’t get me wrong, nothing beats listening to a good record with a dram of Scotch, but quality wise, it’s nowhere near digital sources, at least not within any reasonable price point.
Where to go from here? Paying for high-res downloads I often can stream at the same time feels strangely unsatisfying, while falling back to CDs might be an option, but leaves out higher quality tiers. Physical alternatives such as HDCD, SACD or DVD-Audio seem more or less a niche for enthusiasts of classical music (if not dead), with a very limited catalogue.
Can some of you share my feelings? How do you deal with it?
I will go to HD Tracks first, and if the title is not available there, I’ll buy the CD from Amazon. Mike Campbell’s (Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers) band The Dirty Knobs, is an example. I do buy vinyl occasionally, but the physical quality of modern vinyl, combined with modern production methods, just doesn’t allow vinyl to do the voodoo that it can do. And I’m a recording engineer, with several excellent playback systems. I listened to a Buddy Miles record the other night, a scratched up beat to hell flea market find that didn’t even have a jacket. And it was transfixing. Played back through a pair of Tannoy PBM-8s. So technical perfection really has little to do with it sometimes. Sometimes the emotion will still come through. Everything converts to Apple Lossless, into iTunes/Music, then digitally out of a Mac mini using Bit Perfect. I keep backups of the original .flac files offsite. I still buy used SACDs and BluRay editions of audio surround releases and concert films too, which go on my Emby server. The vinyl stays downstairs on those systems, I don’t bother to transfer any of that to digital, even with Avid and Antelope converters sitting right there. I prefer the ritual of vinyl, which usually involves a cocktail, a sofa, and good company:-)