Mixing & Engineering definitely plays a factor. There is an ELO's greatest hits CD (that I also had on tape as a kid -- it's the one with the Military Medal on the cover) that sounds ~nearly~ monophonic, whoever mixed that compilation did it very weirdly.

But the "Light Years" 2 Disc compilation has MUCH better mixing, it doesn't sound anywhere near as "narrow" as the old War Medal version.

Yeah. It's called ADHD.

HOLY SHIT, LOOK AT THAT SQUIRREL!!! I'M GUNNA CHASE IT UP THAT TREE!! YUH-HUH, YUH-HUH!!! YUP!!! IMA GUNNA GIT'EM!!!

Do you prefer your movies to be on old-school 8mm Film?

Is DVD or Blue Ray just too mainstream and plebeian for you??

Is a digital picture not a picture because it's digital????

If you have a fancy digital camera that's rated for a crazy amount of Mega Pixels, you would still prefer an analogue camera from the 70s or 80s????

Why did Captain Sisko even WANT the stupid old baseball, when he could have just told the Replicator to make him one just as easily as it was making Picard's Earl Gray Tea, or Janeway's coffee????

Is a JPEG or a PNG ~less~ of a Static Visual Image than something like an old-school Polaroid Picture??? One is digital, the other is traditional / analogue. But both are "images."

The only aspect I like about Vinyl is sometimes finding cool and unique stuff to sample. (YouTube is a frigging gold mine of potential samples). And samples don't need to be 100% perfect --- even the old-school Akai MPC 2000 did not have a "perfect" sound quality. But people still used it and made some amazing beats with it.

DJ Premier made the "Nas Is Like" beat on it and that's one of the nicest Boom Bap beats I've ever heard.

Music is subjective. You may ~hate~ the stuff that I like. But I don't care. I'm still gunna like it, whether you approve or not.

Is a Playboi Carti fan going to care that I ~hate~ Trap / Mumble Rap and stop listening to what they like because I personally dislike it??? Probably not.

They're just gunna say "Fug-Off, you grouchy Old Head!"

The first MP3s were usually all 128 KBPS (at least, that was commonly what Napster and other P2P clients had).... Which is honestly not great. Then as the format grew it got better over time. Also the individual person's hearing plays a lot into it. And then there's the Device playing the files, what kind of Headphones or Speakers etc.

Just out of curiosity, I ripped a CD to FLAC & 320kbps MP3, and even though it goes against what most of the internet believes --- I can't even perceive a difference or benefit.

What I ~CAN~ do is run quieter mixed albums like say: Pretty Hate Machine or License to Ill through RC20 to help bring them up a little and add more "richness" (better Midrange Presence).

That is something I ~CAN~ perceive. I can A-B it (turn the effect On & Off). I can't really do that with a format or Bit-Rate. I don't have a magic green button in Adobe Audition that will let me flip between FLAC & MP3, all I got for that is good ole Winamp.... (it really whips the Lamma's ass!) And even with playing two copies of the same song -- one in FLAC & one in MP3 320kbps, ~I~ personally can't perceive a difference.

My preference to listen to Music in a digital form is not going to magically make all the Vinyl records in the world disappear.

My preference to play Retro Games emulated is not going to magically make all the physical game carts and cartridges in the world disappear.

You will still have your precious jewel hoard, okay Smaug? Nobody is trying to take your stash. (Even though I can just copy it... Lol.)

If this was an argument about Religion, I might feel compelled to engage in some battle.

But this is about Music, which is subjective. Preferences are preferences. Some people think you should be crucified if you like Ham & Pineapple on your Pizza. I couldn't give a shxt -- Pizza is Pizza. It all tastes the same anyway. Lol.

Some people think you should be tortured to death if you play a 4:3 Aspect Ratio game in forced 16:9....

I say: let people like what they like. If some guy out there likes Mini-Disc, let him listen to Mini-Disc.

If some guy wants to play Super Mario World in 16:9 Aspect Ratio, let him. I don't care enough to argue with them and tell them they're "enjoying the game wrong."

Don't care.

https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2015/06/02/411473508/how-well-can-you-hear-audio-quality

The technology has also gotten much much much better.

When I was 12 years old and I had a Koss PP125 little Auto Reverse cassette player, I had cheap drugstore headphones! Those things probably sounded like shxt, but did I even care at the time??? Nope! All I cared about was jamming to my Duran Duran tapes I found at the Junk Yard when I was scrounging with my Dad! (mutual benefit, I helped him take off parts, he let me dig for tapes). Those tapes were probably moisture damaged all to hell from sitting in wrecked cars, but I didn't care.

All of my school friends were into 2pac & Biggie and my wierd goofy ass was gushing over 80s Synth Rock. (I didn't get into Rap til way way way later).

Then CD came around and I remember getting a ton of those through BMG or Columbia House Records or whatever. The "Get 10 CDs for a Penny" deal, remember that one??? I got Prince Greatest Hits for my mom and Duran Duran -- Decade for myself. And it sounded way better than any tape I had (but like I said, my tapes were dug out of junked cars at my dad's work!).

Technology improved. Things got cheaper. And my hearing -- admittedly -- probably got crappier! I don't have the same ears as 12 year old me. But even back then I don't think I cared. I don't care now either!

MP3 320 KBPS, FLAC, ATRAC. It all sounds pretty much the same to my ears.

The purity isn't all that important to me -- the important part is to just enjoy the music. If I play an old Nintendo game --- it doesn't matter to me if it's a real cartridge on real hardware, or if it's playing off a hacked Wii with an SD card, or a hacked SNES Classic Edition, or an Emulator on Windows PC.

To me, it's still the same game.

What you are really after is a reason to feel smug. Oooh, look at me, I'm the big fancy audiophile, I have perfect hearing like a Canine. Ohhhh, look at me -- I'm a Vegan and I don't eat meat. Whoopidy freekin' doo. LAH-DEE-GAWD-DAMN DAHHH!!!

~is trying to do a Chris Farley voice~

Exactly! A CD can sound exactly like an LP. An LP lacks the physical capability to give you all the sound that a CD can.

It can if I process it with RC20 VST.

I can add crackle-pops. Tape Hiss. "Worn Spots" where the tape audio drops out. I can add Harmonic Distortion like a Tube Amp. I can muck about with the audio any way I want. You want "Warm?" I can ~make~ it Warm. You want "Wide?" I can ~make~ it Wide.

"You’re making it pretty obvious that you don’t know what you’re talking about below a surface level."

You're right because I absolutely do not give a shit -- if other people wanna judge me for liking "Lower Quality Files" let them. I don't care. If you can tell the difference between a FLAC and a 320kbps MP3 - great! Good for you. But I can't. I failed ~most~ of these.

https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2015/06/02/411473508/how-well-can-you-hear-audio-quality

Is analogue better because it can have more "organic subtlety in the waveform" or whatever??? I guess??? Probably????

I don't really care. I personally cannot hear those "organic subtleties." And I'm not going to go to bed angry about it. I like what ~I~ like. If I wanna play an 8bit or 16bit game with a 2xSAI pixel smoothing filter. I WILL.

If I wanna play it stretched out of its natural 4:3 Aspect Ratio and FORCE it into 16:9 so that it fills out edge to edge. I WILL.

AND NOBODY CAN STOP ME.

BUWAHAHAHAH!!!!!

The real question is --- Do I care???

Do I ~care~ enough to spend $300 on a fancy Vacuum Tube amp???

Do I ~care~ enough to buy a subscription to Tidal so I can stream FLAC files???

Music isn't about ~perfection~

It's about having fun and enjoying the art.

Playing Retro Games isn't about ~perfection~

It's about having fun playing the game and just enjoying it for what it is.

What difference does it make whether I play Secret of Mana on a Real SNES with an old CRT for the "Authentic Experience™" or whether I play it on a hacked Nintendo Wii, or whether I play it on a PC using Retro Arch or ZSNES???? It's still Secret of Mana. That's the only part of it that matters ~TO ME~

I can listen to D12 & Eminem in FLAC or MP3 @ 320 KBPS, or even ATRAC on my Sony D-NE320 CD Player, and it's still gunna be the same songs with the same lyrics.

I don't care about "purity"

I only care about my own personal pleasure. And for me, some cheap Skull Candy Ink Plus earbuds or One Odio A71 Over Ear Cup Headphones is juuuuuust fiiiiiine.

I am not an Elitist (except when it comes to lyrics, you won't catch me bumping any of that Psychedelic Mumble Mess).

What people actually like about Vinyl Records (besides the Collectible Aspect and the HUGE album art) is the subtle harmonic distortion, the wobble caused by the non-perfect spinning speed of the turntable, and just the general imperfection that comes with an analogue medium.

Vinyl Dust and the other traits are to Music what Scanlines on a CRT is to Retro Gamers. CD is obviously better -- it's a cleaner sound, and playing your 8bit & 16bit games on a high quality HD TV is better, but the nostalgic feeling is from the Imperfections.

Old Vinyl Records make crackly noises.

Old CRT TVs make everything fuzzy.

But software options are getting better and better at replicating those traits.

"This is so bizarre. CDs replaced vinyl because the sound quality was off the charts better. People who prefer the sound of vinyl are actually preferring the slight hum and crackle that is added by the needle interacting with the record."

Which is easy to add back in with a VST like RC20.

https://www.reddit.com/r/huntingforsamples/comments/x9gleo/rc20_old_cd_album_sweetener_or_harmonic_exciter/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Knight Rider: A shadowy flight into the dangerous world of a man.... who does not exist. Michael Knight, a young loner on a crusade to champion the cause of the innocent, the helpless, the powerless, in a world of criminals who operate above the law.....

https://youtu.be/yBf87YdPHRw

HEEEEEERE WE ARE.

BORN TO BE KINGS.

WE'RE THE PRINCES OF THE UUUUNIVERRRRSE.

https://youtu.be/GI-5ResmpvA

Maybe true, but "Fire It Up" is still my fave song.

KNIGHT RIDER, YO!

https://youtu.be/4I4QdFZD4c0

TURBO BOOST, KITT!!!

Try these:

Daft Punk -- Give Life Back to Music

Smoov & Turrel -- Slow Down

Beastie Boys -- Intergalactic

ANDROID52 -- KISEKAE

It's funny. I barely hear ~any~ bass in a lot of the more intense ELUVIETIE songs, but when I listen to something like Busta Rhymes, Wu Tang Clan, or Masta Ace -- there's bass out the wazoo.

I like cheap "but still good" type stuff.

Skullcandy Ink Plus ~wired~ in-ear buds.

One Odio A71 Non-BT "Over Ear" Cans.

A nice little cheapie-cheap SD05 mini amp.

This makes me wanna try putting a DX7 or a D50 through the Scream box in Reason.