BY Anthony Leon
Music Journalist
“New vinyl is kind of trash to be honest – it’s ripped from digital masters and just lazily pressed on to super thick wax to give the appearance of quality – where in fact you are getting compressed music that isn’t even CD quality.”
Peter Drosos, a 34-year-old who has been collective vinyl since 2013, believes that people are buying vinyl now because of the personal aspect that comes with playing a record.
“There’s something personal and authentic about playing a record and holding the jacket and reading the liner notes that brings the listener so much closer to the artist,” Drosos said. “And it looks so f***ing cool too, especially if you have a nice rig.”
To get the most out of an album, Drosos suggested buying the dominant format in which music was released. For example, if a person was looking to buy a record released in 1978, Drosos said to try looking for a clean used copy of the album on vinyl. For newer music, Drosos said to stick to higher-resolution audio streaming services such as Tidal and Qobuz.
“Buying newer vinyl is not going to produce the best quality from my experience,” Drosos said. “You can buy ‘Sour’ by Olivia Rodrigo for $24.99 on vinyl, but the tracks you are playing are just the same files as the ones you’d be streaming on Spotify or Apple Music.
