This was at a time when "Anti-Skip" technology was a thing of the future. The CDROM2 drives are VERY sensitive. I mean, shit this was 1990. When I lived next to the train tracks, I would lose the audio in Gate Of Thunder when the Union Pacific would go by every evening... and until the game advanced the music to the next track (like for example, beating a level), the sound effects would remain, and the audio would be gone.
It got slightly better in the Duo models (1992), and the Duo-R (1993-4) had cushioning and a one-piece CDROM reader that sits on 3 posts absorb shock to further improve audio playback.
Unless I'm missing something this is totally normal. CDROM2's look space-age but aren't even on par with a mid-90's Discman.