Motörhead – Rock n’ Roll (1986)
2015 Reissue
VJQC Score: 65%

I bought this album brand new, a few months back. Won’t comment too much on the music; I obviously thought the art is worthy of purchase.  It’s 

Motörhead, Lemmy is God and a music link is included below.  
I am dissatisfied with my purchase.  The VJQC score of 65% is based on my personal vinyl copy, which I purchased new.

The Good

• It sounds good.  I don’t expect audiophile Lemmy, It’s not even an expectation.  As far as metal records go, it’s fine.
• It’s cheap.  Affordable matters

The Bad

• It’s warped. Space can be seen between the record and the turntable platter, when it spins.
• Paper scuffs and other marks on both sides of the vinyl surface.  The fact that the record came sleeved in a paper sleeve is directly to blame fot that.  Why do they do that?  It’s like wrapping a sandwich in newspaper, and it just means I gotta go buy a proper polylined inner sleeve.

The Ugly

• This record is not centered.  You can see the tonearm sway from side to side, while it spins.. Combined with the warp, it’s completely destroyed my vinyl experience.   If your brand new car had a permanent issue with its steering alignment, would you be okay with it? This is completely unacceptable, for me. 
• Visible surface bumps on the surface of both sides. Again, I think this is unacceptable.  It’s a new record ferchrissakes!  If you bought a new car and it had a few dents, would you be cool with it?  But it drives so nice! No wait, the steering is also off…

Conclusion

It’s cheap and it sounds fine, but playing it on wax is a complete bummer.  If I just wanted the music, streaming would have been fine.  I bought it on wax because I wanted a more immersive experience with the music I love.  This physical product is horrible.  I wasn’t able to track down where it was pressed (help welcome!) but Discogs tells me that the record label (Sanctuary) licensed this out to INgrooves.  Until I see different, I’m not buying any vinyl records associated with INgrooves. Their product is not concurrent with my QC expectations of what a vinyl record should play like. 

So, is this a fair assessment?  Do these details also matter to you, when shopping for new records, or am I just way too OCD?  I’m curious to read your responses and engage in conversation. 

LISTEN