The record label has nothing to do with CD or digital sound quality. It's the recording and mastering that makes the difference. Some labels do have a reputation for better sounding recordings overall. But to paint it in broad brushstrokes and say all of a label's recordings are good or bad is misleading. I've heard terrible recordings on "audiophile" labels, and I've heard decent sounding releases on budget labels (although that is not as common...but it does happen).
Quick rundown of lossy vs. lossless, as I didn't see it mentioned from this perspective. Maybe it will help.
Lossy means the file is "data compressed," to where musical data is actually discarded when the music is encoded. MP3, WMA, AAC, Sony's ATRAC (used for MiniDisc), OGG, and a few others are lossy file formats. The theory is that the encoders will "throw away" parts of the music which we theoretically cannot hear. Yet, many of us can hear the difference anyway. Lower bitrates mean that more of the music discarded, and smaller file sizes; higher bitrates will have larger file sizes and sound closer to lossless. MP3 is the most mainstream of the lossy formats, and was originally used to transfer music files over dial-up telephone lines and slow Internet connections, as well as fit on the smaller playback devices that were popular many years ago.
Lossless is "pure" digital in that nothing is thrown away due to data compression. Downsampling from DSD, or PCM at 24/96 or 24/192 to 16/48 or 16/44.1 is
not lossy--it only creates a smaller and lower-resolution lossless file.
Lossy vs. lossless isn't an opinion or an argument in semantics--it's the widely accepted standard definitions for both.
The top two are Sony Classical recordings and the bottom is a Laserlight one. I have several Laserlight discs and all are great sounding as are the Sony discs. On the flip side, I also have discs that sound like crap. I’m not going to waste my time ripping them. I’ll just have a lossless, perfect copy of a crappy disc. 