I’ve bought a number of New LPs recently, 3 of which have what I’d call significant flatness issues.
I took these back to the shop today and the lovely sales assistant suggested I fix a penny to the arm on my record deck with some bluetac, to help with tracking… priceless!! 
I’ve been told if my deck is that good it should play anything.
I said you wouldn’t win a rally stage with an F1 car. 
As he was giving me my refund 
I use a pound coin with my Ekos.
Works very well…
Would you have been more or less appalled if the assistant had suggested you try the album on CD instead?
more as I no longer have a CD player and haven’t had for a very long time - but I do have plenty of CDs 
Do you think that we are to wrapped up in how it sounds as a pose to what it sounds like I say this because I can remember picking up lp’s back in the late 70s/80s and I was buzzing off the sound coming from my £70 record player. Fast forward to today I play my vinyl now and I try not to listen for faults but try to get that buzz back, I still have all my original vinyl with crackles and pops and the odd jump because they have been lent to a mate who’s record player had a penny on its arm and a drawing pin for a stylus. But I try never to loose the excitement of the good days when most shops sold vinyl and you had to go to them to buy them with real money sometimes I miss those days most time I miss those days
As I said before, the 20p & 50p coins are totally unnecessary.
The arms owner is just boasting about how much money he has…,.
I listened to ELO out of the blue yesterday. It hadn’t been out of it’s sleeve for over 40 years. It sounded amazing.. not many crackles or pops as I rarely lent LPs to anyone other than one or two other hifi mates.
The vinyl is totally flat as are all my 70/80s albums.
Just disappointing that modern manufacturing techniques seem inferior..
that said I have bought some good ones too.. Brother in Arms anniversary disc set is good.. Flat, sounds great.. but now runs to 4 sides of Vinyl..
But in general I’m preferring it to most streamed content
I wonder if that at least partly because back then the music (and maybe your record player) was new or relatively so, and you didn’t have many albums, and your listening experience was new/limited, whereas now an album may be new but is in the context of all else much less so.
As far as I can tell I still get the same enjoyment as I did 50+ years ago when I play an old album I haven’t played for a while. That said, while I do miss the physical album sleeves/artwork and to some extent the ‘magic’ of lowering a stylus into the groove, I don’t miss the imperfections to which I used to turn a blind eye, and I no longer have to return every third or fourth album I buy due to warps or other issues.
I agree that manufacturing is not as good in vinyl as well as many other things but maybe that’s because the world got greedy and everything is based on massive profit. But on a lighter note I hope you do get the vinyl you are looking for
Hi mate no my record player wasn’t new ( although it was when I bought it ) it was just crap as was the sound it produced but I was an apprentice at the time on £29 per week most of my money went on records my taste was not so much limited but more one directional but I now have the added joy of going back over and rediscovering new stuff. Of course now I have a decent HIFI and my tastes are a lot more exspansive but I still enjoy when I find a new band or album to listen too
"I’ve bought a number of New LPs recently, 3 of which have what I’d call significant flatness issues.
I took these back to the shop today and the lovely sales assistant suggested I fix a penny to the arm on my record deck with some bluetac, to help with tracking… priceless!! "
Did you travel to the record shop by Dr Who’s Tardis, and find yourself back in 1975, by any chance?
If only… I’d love to be 13 again!!
I am buying CDs in preference to modern vinyl. I recently purchased 3 Pink Floyd remastered 180g, a Stones Album, and a Willie Nelson Teatro album. All had “pops” at first play. The first track of Teatro now jumps.
All the Floyd albums sound flat and the Stones the same. Very unimpressed.
It may be considered heresy by some, but CDs ace it for me.
I came to the same conclusion a long time ago. The moment I heard a CD at a friends house, back in the Eighties, I ditched vinyl, with all its quality control problems. I was sick and tired of pre warped, pre scratched records, and those that were full of background noise.
It seems nothing has changed QC is as bad as ever. The only thing that has changed, is that a €10 CD, will cost you €40 on vinyl. I know the sound is warmer and all the rest, but CD or Download is much cheaper and sounds just as good, if you accept the more analytical sound.
Interesting replies.
I don’t think I’ve bought anything that sounds flat.. I do find vinyl seems to improve after a couple of plays.
As for pops, yes one or two.. I’m thinking a record cleaning machine will help hear..
I guess, try as we might, we will never reach perfection.. 
Interestingly I wasn’t impressed with early CD - I heard several, in shops and other people’s houses, and always the same, a harsh treble and no bass. It wasn’t till 1989 that I heard something that matched vinyl (different sounding, but as good in its different way - though better compared to worn vinyl). But as you say no returns, never warped, no pops crackles ets
Maybe it was the early CD players, maybe the mastering, of early CD’s. I have replaced some early ones with better masters. Modern recordings that are well mastered sound great to me, and >i have no urge to go back to vynil.
The same with digital photography, which took a while to put film in the shade.
Perfect answer
