Ahhh, vinyl. There’s nothing else like it in the world. Some people get excited when they hold their first born in their arms, others after winning a championship game, but for us crate diggers, there’s no greater joy than finding that one rare record buried under dirt, dust, dead insects, and countless other nasties you’ve found along the way.
Crate digging is more than just a hobby, it’s a survival skill.
Ok, ok, so what is vinyl?
Vinyl is another name for a record, which was associated with using vinyl materials to press the recordings, now the word has become synonymous with record, so pretty much everyone just calls it vinyl. Music is pressed on vinyl in the form of small grooves that start from the outside of the record and continues inwards, unlike CD’s which start from the inside out.
Types of Records:
There are many types of records, including 33 1/3’s, 45’s, 78’s and 16’s, however, DJ’s primarily use 33’s. There are various sizes to each of these, however, DJ’s generally use 12″. There is also 2 types of 12″, which can either be L.P.s (Long Play) or E.P.s (Extended Play).
LP’s are generally used for full albums. Go grab your copy of Dark Side of the Moon (I know you have it, everyone does) and look at it, that’s an LP.
Now, if you have a 12″ with maybe 1 or 2 songs on each side, that would be an E.P. An example of E.P.s can be promo’s.
How it’s made:
There are a couple ways how vinyl is made, and it’s rather quite basic.
The earliest way of recording on vinyl was to use a cone, or horn, that would vibrate the stylus and thus it would etch the sound onto the vinyl. This was an analog method, which is why people will often call vinyl an analog music format. However, there were problems with this method, because too loud of sound and the stylus cutting the groove would bounce around and mess up the recording.
They eventually made a way to record onto vinyl using electronics. The basic setup was recording in with a microphone, sending it through a vacuum tube, and then having it etched on using an electromagnetic head, crazy stuff.
Side Story:
Many of the old record producers were really cheap or often broke because of the falling popularity by the late 80’s, early 90’s. What these producers used to do was take these huge collections of backcataloged vinyl that either never was sold or was in very poor condition, and would break them up, melt them down, and press new albums on them. Of course, using old vinyl and Frankensteining new plates out of them gave a fairly crap quality to the records, but it’s dance music, as long as people could feel the bass, people we’re grooving to it.
So, let’s continue…
Vinyl was the big thing back in disco days, seeing that it was basically the only music format anyways. But after disco died out in America, House producers from Chicago and Techno producers from Detroit began to press their music onto LP’s, and as both of these genre’s began to gain popularity, so did the format again.
Skipping past tape’s, when CD’s first started being produced in the mainstream, they gained popularity due to the fact that you could listen to your favorite albums on something the size of your hand. No longer did you have to carry around a record player, amp, and speakers (though that would of been a sight to see). Although CD’s were becoming more and more popular, audiophiles prefered vinyl because of better production and recording methods, being analog.
So as electronic music became more and more popular, so did vinyl. And as this continued, DJ’s noticed that they could mix two records together, or in terms of another tangent, scratch. With the ability to mix songs together, music didn’t have to stop and change up the next song, making the entire dj set seem like one long song.
Vinyl began to lose popularity in the 90s because of CD’s, however, producers still pressed their songs and albums on vinyl.
Vinyl began to be popular again as a new generation found crate after crate sitting around collecting dust with hundreds, if not thousands, of great old albums or E.P.s that no one has touched in quite some time. Let’s take a moment to celebrate crate digging, a hobby like none other, it’s like being a junkie without the comedown.
One of the appeals of vinyl for DJs is that it has an old school feel to it. Many people would agree that vinyl has this “warmth” to it compared to digital recordings on CD’s and MP3’s. They also remained popular because, if it works, don’t mess with it. Technics 1200’s are the industry standard, and are usually the first suggestion people will give you if you plan on DJing. The reason why the Technic 1200s are so popular is because they are workhorses, they barely have troubles and they are very reliable. Technics 1200’s were also mass produced, which allowed people to buy parts incase theirs broke down, a major plus instead of buying a whole new turntable. Because there were so many turntables out there, it was obvious that vinyl was the format of choice seeing that the medium to play it on was everywhere.
There is also a huge following that love to collect vinyl. Many records had amazing album covers and included one of a kind booklets and other miscellaneous pieces on the inside. A general album will include the cover often made of cardboard, a paper or plastic liner to help protect the vinyl, and often artwork/booklets/lyrics are included. Many people like to simply collect vinyl for the art, as some designs are truely awe inspiring. There are also picture discs, which are albums which has a picture imprined onto the vinyl, which can really entertaining to watch spin around and around. Sometimes you will also see clear vinyl, which is really interesting, and often rare.
Now with better recording encoders and algorithms, there are communities on the internet that have begun to index vinyl in lossless formats so others can enjoy them. These vinyl rips are even as high as 24bit 96Khz recordings! Keep an eye out for these communities, as they are very dedicated and really give back to the musical community.
Wrapping up, Vinyl is a format that is used still today because of its high quality of music. DJs use turntables to play songs recorded on vinyl, mix them, and have a great time. I suggest going out and dusting off that old player of yours and give your favorite album a good listen through, enjoy the pops and clicks, feel the warmth, and do a few spins and the moonwalk (I know you have Thriller).
