I voted for all the options. For me, “record” is the most used, referring to any speed and size of vinyl/shellac disk. Album and/or LP only if it’s actually an album, and I use the term for an album on any format. I sometimes use vinyl, usually as a collective, but occasionally for a single item (“I’ve got that album on CD and vinyl.”)
Other terms I use: 12-inch single (pretty self-explanatory), 78 for 78s, 45 for 7-inch 45-RPM singles, EP (can be either 12" or 7") for multi-song disks that aren’t full albums… and since I have a few, cylinder.
“Record.” Born in 1975. “Vinyl” is acceptable in the sense of something being available “on vinyl.” I will be careful, though, when I want to refer to an entire album to refer to it as an “album” instead of a “record.” “Album” covers the work and all the formats it may be available on. Also, there’s the Grammy award definition of “record,” which refers to a single recording/performance of a particular song, so I avoid the word to avoid confusion for that reason, too. I will say something is available “on record,” or that I have a “record of that album,” or variations thereof, but when I want to say I love XXX’s new full-length release of multiple songs, I will say I love “XXX’s album” rather than “XXX’s record.”
The pretentious douchebags who use the term “vinyl” refer to the individual records as “pieces of vinyl” for that extra-douchey “gotta punch them in the face” effect.
I voted “albums” but I think “record” is really the term I use more. Those two are pretty close to interchangeable to me, though I would call a CD an album but not a record.
Other, or rather all! The choices in the poll are not synonyms (except for albums and LPs, as those words are used in this context - although even then I think an album may be either a vinyl LP record or a CD, whereas an LP can only be the former), and each is appropriate in some contexts and just plain wrong in others. It is like asking whether this animal in front of me is a dog, or a Labrador, or a mammal, or a gun dog, or a pet, or a living organism, or a hairy hunk of meat. It is all and any of those, depending on what you are trying to communicate about it.
In practice, other things being equal, in the majority of contexts I would probably most usually refer to one of them as a “record”, or possibly an “LP” if it actually was an LP, but there are contexts where I would prefer one of the other terms, even “vinyl”.
Record for an album, 45 for a single, and 12 inch for a single on a 12 inch format (mostly a DJ term).
I had recently bought a pre-amp for my stereo (modern systems tend not to have phono inputs). I dug out my old turntable (SL-1200!) and a bunch of records on Saturday,and started listened. I had no idea it was Record Store Day! Quite the coincidence. Now let me tell you what I accidentally did without knowing it was 4/20…
All are Records. This is my least specific and most used term.
Ones larger/longer and almost amways have multiple songs per side are albums.
They are made of vinyl.
Ones of the 33.3 type are LPs.
One of my sisters had a Victrola which was hand cranked and played only 78 records. A very fancy gramophone - really a piece of nice furniture much like the old console TVs.
Record. I think of an album as the songs released by a singer or band in one grouping. I don’t use LP and I only say vinyl if I’ve somehow found myself talking to a hipster and I might say something like “sick collection of vinyl” before excusing myself to escape out the bathroom window.
In my childhood in the 70s, I called them records. I still might, but the problem with the word “record” is that it has long had (even in those days) the second meaning: a recording of a single song (as opposed to an album). This is the sense in which the word is used in the Grammy award for “Record of the Year,” for example.
Nowadays I would use “vinyl” to refer to the specific physical medium, as that’s the only word I know that unambiguously refers to those black (usually) grooved spinning discs.
ETA: Although a “record player” is, unambiguously, a machine that plays those discs.
A bit of pedantry: Victrola was a brand name of the Victor company (which RCA bought in 1929). People who collect these types of machines get testy when someone uses the brand name as a generic term. They prefer “phonograph” or “gramophone.” I have even encountered collectors who insist that the word “phonograph” should only be used for Edison cylinder players, since it also was originally a brand name.
Personally, I don’t care if you call it a non-Victor machine a “Victrola.” An in-group shouldn’t expect the general public to know or care about their specialized jargon.
LPs shall always be long-playing ‘records.’ My LP collection far outnumbers my CD collection. I still have all of my 45s AND I have my parents’ 78 collection.
