I have had better luck as of late, but I've also cut way back on vinyl purchases--there is now so much that rather than decide what to buy, I pretty much avoid buying it completely. 
In recent years though, my new vinyl purchases have been better than they used to be.
I avoid anything and everything that UMe (Universal Music) puts out, as they always find a way to f**k it up. Some in their Back To Black series sound awful--they are dull and also lack dynamics. My SACDs of The Police always sounded very close to my original A&M vinyl copies, but the 180g of Zenyatta Mondatta is completely lifeless. Another UMe title that was a total shame was the Dire Straits On Every Street. Beautiful sound, remastered by Chris Bellman at Grundman's, and pressed by shlockmeisters GZ Vinyl in the Czech Republic. This is a 2-LP set, and the records were grossly mishandled. I'm talking evidence of poor handling in the pressing plant such as visible scratches and scuffs, and the noise to go along with it. Got a second set from Amazon to replace the first--that one was bad as well, scratched/scuffed in different places. I couldn't even Frankenstein together a playable set out of both, so I now have both on my shelf. The Love Over Gold I own is also Bellman-mastered, but was pressed here in the US and sold on the Warner label. One last fiasco was the recent Carpenters vinyl box set--UMe cheapened production again and there were multiple complaints from day one about the noisy vinyl, even from casual non-audiophile buyers. You think they would frickin' learn...
(Supposedly the records were repressed for the set, and UMe would exchange them...but you had to send them proof you had destroyed the original copy you purchased! How lame is that? When I had a really bad off-center Rhino pressing of the first Black Sabbath record, all it took was my word, and a photograph of the record, and they had a new one on the way to me.)
Those original stereo Beatles 180g pressings were terrible also--I bought two that were Rainbo pressed and they were as terrible as everyone said they would be. Ended up getting the set from the UK--flawless. Mobile Fidelity's records have been pretty much good--I had one bad Dean Martin LP that they exchanged with no problem. But, their mastering isn't to my taste most of the time--I find a lot of their recent titles too bright. (And the Costello/Bacharach LP was just a bad idea...it's a poor cutting IMHO that should have been spread across three or four sides.) Some other bad recent 180g pressings have come on the Fantasy label--I have a Vince Guaraldi that is quite noisy. (But then again, it was orange vinyl.)
I've had more bad luck with off-center holes. The House of Chad (aka QRP/Quality Record Pressing) had an ongoing issue with that--seems like at least one third of the records I bought that were QRP-pressed were off-center. Even the last two Rush 180g titles I bought were off-center. The more recent pressings have been OK, although I've only been buying the 45 RPM pressings from QRP lately. (They sound phenomenal, BTW.)
As for another kind of "new" record...I have been burned way too many times lately with used records that look good but are unacceptably worn to me. With some that were owned by others (rather than sold by a used record store), it totally surprises me how they could not hear all of this distortion! I end up rejecting over half the used records I buy. As such, I've now taken to paying a bit more to find sealed new old stock LPs, and have been having quite good luck with it. It's rare that I get a bad one now! Very pleased. I only sort of got burned once--there was a mid 60s record that ended up having a "pinch warp" due to the record being exposed to heat at one point. It's a shame since finding this record used is difficult enough, and to find it new and sealed comes up maybe once a decade.
In recent years though, my new vinyl purchases have been better than they used to be.
I avoid anything and everything that UMe (Universal Music) puts out, as they always find a way to f**k it up. Some in their Back To Black series sound awful--they are dull and also lack dynamics. My SACDs of The Police always sounded very close to my original A&M vinyl copies, but the 180g of Zenyatta Mondatta is completely lifeless. Another UMe title that was a total shame was the Dire Straits On Every Street. Beautiful sound, remastered by Chris Bellman at Grundman's, and pressed by shlockmeisters GZ Vinyl in the Czech Republic. This is a 2-LP set, and the records were grossly mishandled. I'm talking evidence of poor handling in the pressing plant such as visible scratches and scuffs, and the noise to go along with it. Got a second set from Amazon to replace the first--that one was bad as well, scratched/scuffed in different places. I couldn't even Frankenstein together a playable set out of both, so I now have both on my shelf. The Love Over Gold I own is also Bellman-mastered, but was pressed here in the US and sold on the Warner label. One last fiasco was the recent Carpenters vinyl box set--UMe cheapened production again and there were multiple complaints from day one about the noisy vinyl, even from casual non-audiophile buyers. You think they would frickin' learn...
(Supposedly the records were repressed for the set, and UMe would exchange them...but you had to send them proof you had destroyed the original copy you purchased! How lame is that? When I had a really bad off-center Rhino pressing of the first Black Sabbath record, all it took was my word, and a photograph of the record, and they had a new one on the way to me.) Those original stereo Beatles 180g pressings were terrible also--I bought two that were Rainbo pressed and they were as terrible as everyone said they would be. Ended up getting the set from the UK--flawless. Mobile Fidelity's records have been pretty much good--I had one bad Dean Martin LP that they exchanged with no problem. But, their mastering isn't to my taste most of the time--I find a lot of their recent titles too bright. (And the Costello/Bacharach LP was just a bad idea...it's a poor cutting IMHO that should have been spread across three or four sides.) Some other bad recent 180g pressings have come on the Fantasy label--I have a Vince Guaraldi that is quite noisy. (But then again, it was orange vinyl.)
I've had more bad luck with off-center holes. The House of Chad (aka QRP/Quality Record Pressing) had an ongoing issue with that--seems like at least one third of the records I bought that were QRP-pressed were off-center. Even the last two Rush 180g titles I bought were off-center. The more recent pressings have been OK, although I've only been buying the 45 RPM pressings from QRP lately. (They sound phenomenal, BTW.)
As for another kind of "new" record...I have been burned way too many times lately with used records that look good but are unacceptably worn to me. With some that were owned by others (rather than sold by a used record store), it totally surprises me how they could not hear all of this distortion! I end up rejecting over half the used records I buy. As such, I've now taken to paying a bit more to find sealed new old stock LPs, and have been having quite good luck with it. It's rare that I get a bad one now! Very pleased. I only sort of got burned once--there was a mid 60s record that ended up having a "pinch warp" due to the record being exposed to heat at one point. It's a shame since finding this record used is difficult enough, and to find it new and sealed comes up maybe once a decade.
