[Brian R Pateman]

Most 1970s music centres sounded pretty good. Some of the higher end Hitachi and similar offerings sounded very good indeed and could hold their own against some of the mid range hi-fi systems of the time.

I suspect that the problem with the modern "Bush" is that it is, as you describe it, a horrible plastic thing. The problem doesn't lie with the cartridge or equalisation. If you were to connect it to a decent pair of speakers you might be surprised at the difference.

The proper Bush was provided with a good quality speaker and was housed in a good solid enclosure. Plastic is fine for cheap mass production but absolute rubbish from an acoustic point of view unless you are talking about engineering composites. These are very specialised and much too expensive for application to cheap mass produced equipment.