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Hearsay, Rumor, Myth or Fact?

Last week I ordered a cd by Lee Morgan called "Charisma" on Blue Note Records from CD Connection. Their database listed a $10 domestic cd and a $25 imported cd...same music label.

I received the $10 cd yesterday. I played it last night and it was thoroughly enjoyable. What do you get for the extra $15 on the imported version?

I was told by a wise old sage and fellow jazz fanatic back in the '70's that imported lp's from Japan were of superior quality than the domestic stuff. Normally in record stores back then, when you saw the Japanese version of an lp, it was generally at least twice the cost of the domestic version.

Has anyone here found this superiority claim to be true? Can anyone cite any specific examples of recordings that they have compared side by side that supports the import superiority claim?

If true, is it generally found that certain record labels sound better on the imported version...or is it generally true across the board?

Or, is it true in just jazz recordings?

Or, is this something that audiophiles do to spend more money to psychologically fool themselves that their system will sound better if the imported recording costs more money than the domestic version?

It would seem a shame for an audiophile to spend $10-50K+ on a system, and then feel like he's cutting corners when confronted with these two choices when purchasing music. I would rather not spend more than twice as much for a piece of music just for peace of mind that I've gotten the best if it's just hearsay, rumor or myth.
mitch4t

Showing 1 response by nrchy

nrchy's avatar
nrchy
2,124 posts
 
I was a little perplexed when reading the question because you started talking about CDs and jumped to LPs.

There is a big difference between domestic(US) and some European and Japanese LP pressings. The issue dates back to the 70's when the environmental lunatics determined that the process for producing superior quality LPs caused too much pollution. The manufacturers were forced to change the way the vinyl was made, and this resulted in poorer quality vinyl for LPs. Some European countries adopted these laws too, and their vinyl also was of poorer quality.

Holland, and Japan, for example continued to press LPs with the old recipe for vinyl and therefore were able to produce better sounding LPs.

The new DSOTM is a good example. It is pressed in Holland. Did you ever wonder why Holland was chosen? It wasn't due to the admittedly nice scenery. The quality of the vinyl is better than the UK, and production costs are cheaper than Japan.

This has nothing to do with the manufacture of CDs though. I don't know why an import CD would cost more other than the cost to swim across the ocean. That's a lot of work!
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