The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

This just goes to show that you shouldnt disregard a dirty record. I found this record and thought that there was almost no chance there was a clean playing groove underneath all the gunk, but I was definitely wrong. To my surprise the record was nice and shiny underneath and played as smooth as butter. Here is a snippet of it playing (same video used to test my AH)

https://youtu.be/PNWONOGuL_g

Martin

Absolutely! I find the same from time to time. Always a nice surprise.

I've had some of those nice surprises as well, and also getting good sound from records that looked worn and scratched. On the other side, I had also some disappointments when playing records that looked shiny and new, and sounded horrible with high background noise ...

Nice. Sometimes it's just gunk like that.

Similarly, deep or wide dimples on the shellac may look bad, but 9 out of 10 with track perfectly with thumps that are less distracting than scratches.

I once bought a box of wax cylinders cheaply due to the fact that the bottom rims of the boxes were caked with termite mud. Someone bought the records above this layer, and left this layer of records due to the nasty termite visual. Some of the mud reached the last few grooves. I cleaned off of the wax easily with minimal surface noise. Only a few suffered worse. The best part is that they were all Mexican, and two cylinders were 2M Blue Amberols.

It's easy to turn up your nose. But it's smarter to take minute and think. These "damages" work in your favor when you negotiate on a price.

James.

I have a record that apparaently was not liked buy some past owner. (Can't remember the title right now... maybe hot version of "In Your Easter Bonnet"?) They gouged a series of X's all across the grooves and seem to have sandpapered the one side as well. Also gouged the title off the label. Yup, it plays perfectly clean! No audible damage to be found! You'd never guess it.