Here's what I got when recording some snippets of a few tunes the other night to see if there was a visual difference in volume between some of the records I have bought these days and the 45/33 sides of some releases.
Firstly we have Phil Tangent - Bedouin EP. Top track is Bedouin at 45rpm, bottom is Rinjani at 33rpm on the flip.
Not a massive difference on this one, but noticeable. The pressing is pretty good though so not too much issue with that.
Next is Cern's Under Another Sky's album Pt1. Top is Infinite Exchange, and bottom is Helix.
Once again, not too bad. And as discussed, Dispatch is pretty solid when it comes to the 45/33 thing - but still a noticeable difference nonetheless.
Now, here's a bunch of tunes in a row. Compare them with above and you will start to see what I mean:
Top one is Foreign Concept - When You're Alone. Wave doesn't look too bad here, but this is a notorious one for me which I can never get the level right on.
Next one down is Diablo from the DRS LP plate. That one sounds pretty good, and I don't hear much of a difference with it at all.
The 3rd is the Gunshotta Om Unit remix. This one sounds pretty average to my ears - flat and quite quiet, which sucks as the record is a thick plate which feels bulletproof.
4th is Skeptical - Imperial. This one I have no issues with really at all (as mentioned before, the Exit EP's are all good for the most part, considering they are coloured too). The only thing that catches me out with this one is the intro being quiet haha.
5th is The Blob, on the Reso LP. Now you can see what I am talking about, the wave is so quiet and flat that it equates to a record that 'turning up the gains' doesn't really fix. I don't want to have to EQ the shit out of a record when I am playing it - that should of been done when it was pressed, and checked before being produced. I have forked out decent money for a product that, to me, is next to useless. Lets see if iy goes up in price on discogs so I can sell it to some Hospital hipster.
And lastly, is Teddy Killerz - Endlessly. As a few people have said, this pressing is terribly quiet. I actually think it sounds OK (there are still decent peaks on the waveform there), but it is an inferior product compared to Ram's normal pressings, and they better sort it out before we start losing confidence in their products.
To close, I know this isn't a perfect science - and some of the tunes above aren't exactly the same sort of style/drums between. But it gives a bit of an insight to my constant frustrations on this issue - and why I am very pro 45's (amongst other reasons I have also listed too).
And lastly, this is one of the main reasons why I am not a fan of 33's (if you don't want to play whole 3/4/5 phrase intro's...)
