What about the music itself and the recording itself Some music (I'm think classical music and acoustic jazz) has much more black space and dark gray, as it were, than pop in general. Some recordings (and I'm thinking predominantly pop) squeeze the life out of the music by overusing compression. This affects the volume required to experience the music properly.
Volume levels
I don’t know if it’s just me, but I find that I have to boost the volume levels more when I play records softly than when I listen to digital softly. I find that at low levels, records do not equal the intensity that low levels on digital do even if they emit the same number of decibels. I find that I’m forced to listen to analog more loudly to achieve the same measure of SQ.
How about you?