When somebody is into analog and they rant about how digital doesn’t sound as good as analog, it’s normally due to a weak digital setup and/or not listening to the best format in digital (redbook, dsd, MQA, hi-res). I stopped reading any review of digital equipment when Fremer does it because he is so biased and he compares at $250,000 analog setup to a $3000 dac.
I used to be into analog up until a couple years ago. When I setup a quality digital system and use hi-res/dsd/MQA music, I much prefer digital and sold my $15k analog setup and my $5k preamp that I didn’t need any longer.
The other reason I left the analog world beside of the SQ, was that most of the new music I listen to doesn’t come on vinyl (jazz, new age, blues, progressive rock). That’s on top of all the headache associated with keeping vinyl clean, living with the clicks and pops, and if I wanted to create a playlist of 50 different songs from 50 different albums, something you can’t do with vinyl.
As for playing cds, over 15 years ago it was proven that cds sound better after being ripped to a hard drive, I agree and sold my $3000 CD player back in 2006.
The op is correct though, you can take different analog albums or different cd releases and 1 of them can sound much better than the other release. I experienced this many times using vinyl too, and I hear it in digital too.