Vinyl Digging VS E-Digging

I found this 'Noisey' article an interesting read.

Dusty but Digital

I've done my share of vinyl digging and generally I don't tend to sample that much but I often get the itch. I've still got my ton of vinyl and I've often bulked at the idea of sampling from YouTube because of how compressed it can be etc... unless it's some simple vocal to scratch with or something. I'd have never entertained the idea of sampling a main break directly from YouTube but it appears there are many that do. Even Action Bronson's recent track 'Easy Rider' with those awesome Turkish samples were taken directly from YouTube NOT from vinyl which is something I'd have never known, but then I'm not a professional sound engineer, I'm just a producer.

So I was wondering what everyone's thoughts on this are?

I'm the same way. I've been digging for years. However, sometimes I come across a good sample on youtube so I take it. The thing I am most concerned with is stereo & mono. If it is stereo I will use it. But as mentioned in the original post, I'm not a sound engineer either. I don't know how this affects things overall.

My thoughts generally are that I don't really care what other people use, that's up to them. I do the youtube thing sometimes, but nearly everything I've done for the past year has been strictly vinyl. I tried it, it's fun, but just not for me. I hope one day everyone uses youtube/mp3s etc... more vinyl for me!

The saddest thing I learned reading that article is that there's actually a producer called Small Professor. That kinda made me just

SEMS wrote:My thoughts generally are that I don't really care what other people use, that's up to them. I do the youtube thing sometimes, but nearly everything I've done for the past year has been strictly vinyl. I tried it, it's fun, but just not for me. I hope one day everyone uses youtube/mp3s etc... more vinyl for me!

The saddest thing I learned reading that article is that there's actually a producer called Small Professor. That kinda made me just

Yea no doubt. I guess it all depends on what you like. Almost all of my beats were made off of vinyl as well. Only in the last 2 years I started using youtube.

Small Professer. Ridiculous.

Small Professor actually has beats though.

IMO it also depends what you do with the sampled sounds. Do you process them heavily, mangle them, add effects, etc? Then it might not be such an issue with quality, because you're going to **** up the sounds anyway (even if you could argue that a shit sound will sound worse compared to a good quality sound, even or especially if you process them).

If you just chop and add minor effects, then quality is an issue IMO.

It's not that obvious first, but if you directly compare a good quality vinyl rip to a 1080p youtube version, the difference is night and day.
I've participated in a few beat battles here on the forum where the provided sample was an MP3. It bothered me every time that it sounds like shit compared to sampling from a record. You notice it especially when pitching sounds and doing other stuff, ugly ass artefacts you don't have with a good quality sample, etc.

In the end: If it works for you and you are happy with your sound... who the hell cares? Do you.

richie wrote:Small Professor actually has beats though.

Yeah I checked him out, I'm not knocking the man's music, I just... c'mon maaaaaaaaaan.

What's next? He's starting a group called Secondary Source? Their debut single Listening At The Back Door?

SEMS wrote:

richie wrote:Small Professor actually has beats though.

Yeah I checked him out, I'm not knocking the man's music, I just... c'mon maaaaaaaaaan.

What's next? He's starting a group called Secondary Source? Their debut single Listening At The Back Door?

Thats what I'm saying. Pick a new name. I knew a kid who called himself Lil' Pun. It was gay. Lol. Secondary Source!!

I been producing since 1992 and I started by buying cassettes from the bargain bin to sample them or record the vinyl sounds to tape and sample that too. I never looked at vinyl or any medium as THEE source to sample from, I just wanted to make dope beats back in those times. When CD began becoming affordable, I was digging in the bargain bins as well and wasn't at all bothered that its not vinyl. CDs, cassettes, vinyl or digital should be options in your production and not discriminated. The more options, the merrier.

Though I am against the idea of calling it "e digging", its not. You googled it.

I'm not going into the sound issue at all.
The main thing about "e-digging" is that you have all the sources of music just some clicks away. You have any dope sample for free immediately.
A drawback is, you might lose your inspiration through clicking...
At the other hand vinyl digging is more, way more expensive and you don't know what you purchased until go home and listen to those dusty as old grave records, especially if there were from 1$ bin (I have found sealed diamonds though in 1$ bin).
So, after that everything is personal preference.
I start with my buddy, dj youtube and fl studio. Then, I purchased a turntable some records and later mpc 2000. Why, because this is how I get inspired.
For me to go digging is pain in the @$$. I must go to an another city to dig some records. My bus tickets cost more than the average record bills I do. But I keep doin' this because I feel more full through that.
The thing is to do the best we can with the things we have.
Music is a creative process, the means don't count, only the result.

P.S.: Sorry about my english.

The only issue I see with sampling from the internet is the sonic quality. Not everyone who uploads stuff to the internet, blogs, etc uses proper encoding formats which end up seriously affecting the frequency after 15khz. You could do a frequency analysis of some of the files and see for yourself.

The dope thing is that there are some now strictly posting wav and flac files, abandoning the mp3 format all together. I do not think it matters if a million other beat makers have access to the same samples as you. There is enough to go around for everyone.

I enjoy the process of digging and flipping it on my mpc more than the end result, really....if I wanted easy I'd probably do it all through Ableton with a MIDI controller.

But at the end of the day, a dope beat is a dope beat. if you come up with something cool from Youtube more power to you.