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After Brief Respite Music Industry Slump Deepens
Carl Bialik from the WSJ writes "Sales picked up for the record labels late last year, but 2005 has been bleak. The Wall Street Journal ticks off evidence: 'During the crucial Thanksgiving week, for instance, the top 10 albums sold 40% fewer copies than the top 10 albums the same week in 2004. ... Sales of individual digital tracks on services like Apple Computer Inc.'s iTunes Music Store have increased -- but not nearly enough to offset the slide in CD sales. According to an estimate from SoundScan, overall sales of recorded music are down about 4.5%, if one considers 10 individual tracks the equivalent of an album.' The WSJ also lists familiar reasons for the decline -- 'online piracy, CD burning, high prices and competition for consumer dollars from videogames and DVDs' -- while adding, 'Lately, people in the music industry have said the same basic issues have been intensified by the growing popularity of pricey gadgets like Apple's iPod and Microsoft Corp.'s Xbox 360, as well as the rising prices for games that go with the new platform.'"
Personally, with all the issues circulating around the music industry today concerning price fixing, piracy, shady companies shipping their CD's out with crafty little pieces of spyware, and bands spending more time bitching than creating, I've turned to satellite radio to solve the problem. I pay a reasonable yearly fee (monthly if I wanted to) and then simply avoid the record stores. I've got it in my car; I can listen to it over the 'net at the office. The unit in my car detaches and can be placed into a dock at home. If I want to hear a certain song, I call the request line. There's plenty of entertainment available to keep my occupied. Sure, the on-demand aspect of owning CD's isn't there, but at least I know I'm not paying for something I don't want. Besides, it's just a matter of time before satellite radio begins to provide some form of on-demand programming...after all, it happened with satellite television.
this timeline also explains the thanksgiving slump. funny how tfa does not mention that.
I wonder if they ever thought about the Quality of the music they sell??
It's not just the quality of the music, it's the quality of the entire industry. I used to buy 3-4 CDs a month, but I'm so disgusted by the behaviour of the music industry representatives that I now only buy from local bands. I get a lot of good stuff from http://www.archive.org/audio/etree.php too - there's more than 29,000 tracks there.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
But, there were rumours that like radio airplay, the promoters had figured out a way to rig the charts as well. Something like spend a large sums of money on buying back your albums and then sell them back. That way the albums climb the chart even though no-one is buying the CDs.
I'm not 100% sure of this. But, I think it somewhat explains why the charts are so weird. I'm an avid music listener but I out of the top 100, I would only consider listening to at most 5 of them (even though it's the same 5 for the whole year).
I know what you mean i use http://magnatune.com/ they have a wonderful service and good music at good prices.. and you can download in just about any worth while format including flac... I wonder if the "Industry" even considers that there is "other" stuff out there that we might be listening too and not just the pre-programed crap that they have been putting out..
'...if only "Jumping to a Conclusion" was an event in the Olympics.'
If you read the actual article, they address this (even using a sh*t-related metaphor):
"Don VanCleave, president of the Coalition of Independent Music Stores, says blame lies with "an absolute, gigantic cesspool of really bad bands.""
Indeed. I haven't purchased any music over the last decade from a group that started durring the last decade. I also haven't downloaded any of that crap, either.
I want strong, classically trained musicians, not talented singers pulled off the street who think the act of writing music is simple experimenting with what "sounds good." You gotta learn the rules before you can break them, otherwise you're the backstreet boys.
Back in the late 1980's an import record shop in my area had the idea of putting together compilations on the fly for customers and burning them onto CD. The technology was available if expensive at the time, and the intention was to pay royalties to the copyright holders for the tracks which required just a really simple database. I suspect local agents for the record companies involved quite liked the idea, because it got as far as a press release - but then apparently threats of legal action followed. Only now, more than fifteen years later, a PC manufacturer is making a lot of money doing effectively the same thing with iTunes. In the meantime people have been burning their own music compilations for many years - one thing which long record company inspired delays in the release of consumer CD burners did not stop.
They are not going to move with the times - it may just look like they will because they may be bought out by groups that do. The studios are as bad/worse/often the same people - the long delay of consumer DVD burners is evidence of that and hopefully they won't hold up newer formats for as long.
--frank[at]unternet.org
In europe in some countries they already levy a "tax" on mp3 player. In Germany I think this is levied on all storage devices, including hard drives. In Finland they currently only levy a tax on CD's and tapes.
Now is it me, or does this mean that the state has given up its monopoly right to taxation? I remember something about a war taking place due to taxation without representation...
Some say he is made with ascii, others that he is eyeballed daily by millions. All we know is, he is known as the Sig
What the music industry wont tell you is that people are getting sick of the same old manufactured artists, boy bands, girl bands and pop groups that really have no tallent and a good PR and marketing campaign. Today the kids are exposed to so many bands / groups and artists that really dont care about the music they just wanted to be famous. Where is the tallent. I know that there are some really great artists emerging but how much air time do they get? And if they do get air time how can the 14 year old girls and boys afford the CDs when the latest Xbox or game has come out. People get sick of having no tallent crap bands and artists. Most of the music when I turn on the radio is just all sooo similar it almost all turns into one big blab blab blab of noise. Its got to the point where I dont listen to the radio any more. I can listen to the music I want online and download the music that I want so that I dont have to listen to the Dj talking garbage about stuff they often know nothing about. The record industry is its own worst enemy. They want the money, they want the PR, but they dont want to premote the artists with the tallent... its all about the beautiful face on the CD cover, and the music clips that have lots of half naked girls dancing sh*t moves. Wake up Record companies are killing themselves. Anyway thats my bitch for the day.. time to move on..
Ir CDBaby, where we order, sometimes.
They give such good custoemr treatment. Accodring to their confirmation letter, their entire staff sings as they march MY cd to shipping, on a gold pillow. What service!
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
"MP3.com was going towards that but was torpedoed and killed off."
as a former mp3.com artist that's NOT how I remember it.
Mp3.com started this way, and had a lot of potential. what REALLY happened is that they were after the traditional music market - and that's where they were headed - the idea of the music-suitcase (which, incidently, robertson is reviving now) - where mp3.com hold the traditional cataloge and people can access it anyware (I remember robertson talking about cellphones back then) as long as they have the original CDs, the plan was, probably, to move twards a download based buisness model after the database gets reasnably large.
I don't think the record companies really cared about mp3.com untill it started messing arround with the lables back cataloges.
it didn't last since the record companies layers were on that in no-time, with no itunes precident they just DIDN'T GET IT. in the end mp3.com got bought - first by universal and later by cnet - and ALL the cataloge was lost. here is the one lable who actually knowingly deleted their own back cataloge.
I have noticed a phenomena not mentioned. Once I ripped my collection, then weeded the collection of the songs I really didn't like, then I had a condensed collection of all my favorite music. Put it on random play and it is like my own private radio station.
On random I have enough music that I never get sick of my own collection.
The implication for me: I don't listen to music radio anymore, ever! Think about it, I don't actually hear new music anymore. I have all the music I need. This is what they really need to fear. I notice my friends doing the same as well.
I do think other factors are crap music, while others discount boycott, I have been on a 3+ year boycott of RIAA now and it will never end. I don't need any more music, so their near monopoly is now dead to me. If I encounter a new band in a small venue that I like, I could by their album straight from them, but the RIAA will never get another penny of my money.
RIAA has more to fear from the IPOD than from downloads. Big random play collections replace the need for new music once it reaches a critical mass.
1865 - Locomotive Act (amended 1878) - restricted the speed of horse-less vehicles to 4mph in open country and 2 mph in towns. Act required three drivers for each vehicle - 2 to travel in the vehicle and one to walk ahead carrying a red flag... - the Red Flag Act.
1896 - Repeal of 1865 'Red Flag Act' after nearly two decades of strong support from horse interests. Horse-less vehicles now free to travel faster than walking pace! Royal Automobile Club founded. First RAC London to Brighton run held to celebrate the new era of speed. Race was won by Americans who didn't stop for lunch like the rest of the contestants...figures...
RS
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
All too true. But I think there's another paradigm at work here.
If you go back a couple of decades, the radio dial could bring you unprofessional, unpolished stuff along with the produced stuff. You could flip around and hear people performing--horror of horrors--live. It made people actually care about the performers a bit more, to be able to hear their little foibles, agonize with their mistakes, and cheer them on silently from this side of the air waves.
Now the airwaves are full of stuff that's been produced to completely eliminate any evidence of the production process. Synthesizers, vocoders and digital editing suites have become more responsible than the actual artists for the results. The few cases where this isn't true, any and all evidence of the singers themselves being human (breathing, hitting a note just slightly wrong) have been eliminated to bring up production values.
Add in the fact that, no matter where you hear it, be it at the grocery store, the dentist's waiting room, the bowling alley or in your car from your personal copy, it'll always be exactly the same song. You never hear the singer do something different. You never hear an extra interlude somewhere in the middle.
For all you know, the actual song ISN'T reproducible; it was a one-shot thing that the artists are struggling to this day to reproduce even a shadow of.. There's a song on The Killers' album, for instance, that they used their basement-produced tracks of because they couldn't do it as good anymore.
This is what we're fighting for, really. We need artists who ARE artists, who can step up to a mic, and/or sit down with their instrument, and step up to the challenge of actually honing their craft, improving themselves, striving to give us something new and better with every performance. What you record should just be a sample of what you've got; not the sum total of your repetoire.
If you look at the classic rock legends, you'll see this holds true. Likewise country music stars like Garth Brooks. Tons of material, they were always working to improve themselves. We remember them, not the one-hit-wonders like Men Without Hats or Right Said Fred. (Yeah, I grew up in the 80s) The key is that the music industry has been rewarding one-hit-wonders for too long, trying to get as much mileage out of them as possible without banking on people who would rather go the distance.
To make a comparison, it's like today's music industry is trying to make several furbies, tickle-me-elmos and cabbage patch dolls every year, and then scratching their heads wondering why people aren't lapping it up. We need those building blocks, legos and playing cards of the music world. Otherwise everything just looks the same.
Today's pop music is the new grey.
This may be more of a valid point than you think. The above statistic along with what I would consider to be popular music tends to be marketed towards people that are either to old, to young, or to technically challenged to share/pirate. That pretty much leaves out any educated person between 16 and 40.
So it is not surprising that if you are between 16 and 40, it is really hard to find something to buy that you liked. You are just not part of the market.
The CD is dead and Sony fucking killed it with their rootkit stunt.
... and none of my CDs were on the list, and none of my computers were affected. It was an entire year before anybody had a clue that the rootkit was out there - and in the past year and a half the technology of evil has gotten even better.
Quite honestly I don't trust commercially packaged CDs any more, because of a) the rootkit stunt in the first place, and b) the passive agressive bullshit they pulled with their 'fix'
I mean get real - after Japan pulled their shit in 1941-1944 - the world didn't trust them to have a military.
After Germany pulled their shit during WWI - the world didn't let them a military.
After Sony pulled this rootkit business, causing potentially more damage in not adjusted for inflation dollars (not including lives, just trashed hardware - and yea, that's just a guess if anybody wants to do the math) than the Germans caused in WWI - I don't trust them not to do it again.
Perhaps CD sales are down 40% specifically because of the Sony rootkit, and I say they deserved it. That's still 60% more sales than they got from me this season.
Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
You clearly don't get it. As the elite they're entitled to their taxation of our society. Buy more "fitty sent" albums. Represent!
Is it just me or are the bulk of hip/hop rap style music entirely aimed at people with IQs in the 40s with only base instincts to guide them? Like I like video-hos like the next guy but bling, cash, cigar smoking and video-hos can only be the theme of rap videos for so long before people realize YOU AIN'T SIGNING REAL WORDS!
Oh, and can someone please just invite lohan, spears, simpson [both of them] and timberlake to a nevada test range or something?
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
So, they consider it amazing that given the opportunity to buy the three songs on an album that are worth listening to more than twice, consumers are actually taking advantage of such a system? It would be interesting to do the math based on 3 or at best, 5, songs per album, since that's all most people want anyway. We've finally been given a method to bypass album filler content, without, apparently having to subsidise it, and the industry is complaining because the consumer gets what they want.
Amazing.
Well, no, not really.
How's my programming? Call 1-800-DEV-NULL
I'm willing to bet money that after the news of the Sony fiasco hit the airwaves, CD buying decreased overall. Think about it, the average consumer probably doesn't pay attention to which musician is on which label and following Sony's Rootkit Extravaganza probably stopped buying all CDs.
And, of course, the Wall Street Journal blames piracy. Right....
Guidryp, you're right about random shuffle and large collections. I don't think it's I-pods specifically, however, it's just the "big random play collections" that are the real threat to the music industry.
While my wife owns an IPod, I do not. But I do maintain our music collection, which has become -- by my standards when I was a teenager -- immense. I've spent 2-3 years digitizing every piece of vinyl and cassette tape I can lay my hands on, including my old not inconsiderable record and CD collections and hundreds of used records, cassettes, and found/garage-sale CDs. It's all in a database of about 2300 hours of MP3 files on our home stereo server, and it's all legally acquired since (to my knowledge) we own the original copies and use the collection only for ourselves. I might occasionally order a CD from a particular artist I like -- but most of the time we just listen to our own customized "radio" station. We went walking through Best Buy the other night and I realized that we have more albums in our online collection than their entire store music section - about 2,000 albums.
Why should we pay full price for hit-and-miss on new albums when we have so much stuff we like already? It would take a full year, 40 hours a week, to listen to the whole collection. Unlike the source material, it will never wear out with additional play or abuse (and we keep an offsite backup).
The same thing is happening with children's records. Although we have a child on the way, we are not part of the market for children's recordings and music, because we have over 100 albums of children's instructional songs, stories, and folk tales left over from our own childhood. We digitize 'em, pull out the pops, and remove the background hum -- and the 30-year-old records sounds better than when they were new. Why fork out $15 for a copy of Peter, Paul, and Mommy when I've got one right here? Why buy some crappy abridged version of Grimm's Fairy Tales when we have records of unabridged readings - with music -- that were cut in the 1960s? Why buy the soundtrack of our Disney DVD when we can get the music directly off the disk at the same quality as the CD in the store?
Big, accessible collections are displacing event DJs too. For our wedding we didn't hire a DJ, we hooked up a subset of our music collection and (after the first few songs) let the guests themselves choose the songs from a small web client right there on the dance floor. It was a big hit. I've been to several events since then that used the same idea. It's a natural thing to do once big hard drives became available.
Everyone seems to be going on and on about why music sucks, etc... or RIAA or whatever... but here's the real reason:
Gift Certificates. People buy music as gifts during this period of time right? With the availability of Amazon GCs and iTunes GCs don't you think that maybe just maybe people are getting those instead of trying to guess what music their gift recipients really want???
Let's take a look at music sales just after Christmas... say the week after, and see how much it is up compared with 2004.
I'm betting it will be higher... probably high enough to overcome any 'slump' seen during november and december.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
I think overall, top 10 format radio is down from prior years. as people decide to listen to the music on their iPods, or satellite radio, which offers a lot more variety than can be found in the Top 10. Also witness the populatiry of stations like "Jack FM" which play a varied playlist instead of the same 20-30 songs over and over again. People are listening to more music, and for the most part, better music than what can be found on the charts.
I've also noticed that the back catalog has become cheaper, you can get some decent albums from the last 10 years for the price of $9.99 (Canadian) or thorough 2 for $20 deals at most CD shops, which works out to about 8 and a half bucks U.S, cheaper even than used CD's sometimes. This has cannibalized from marginal releases - I'd rather wait until it goes in the bargain bin in a few months, and get the chance to become more familiar with other songs on the CD before buying.
Has anyone thought that declining sales of CDs might be tied to a general trend in wealth distribution? Specifically that as wealth becomes more concentrated in the US (not sure what the trends are in EU, Japan and other traditional CD consumers), there is less disposable income for most of the populace to throw away on CDs?
Just a thought, not even a theory.
Wow.
First of all, if you were to conduct a random survey of 100 people, I'd say at least 80 people would say they don't know what a rootkit is. At least 90 would know nothing of the Sony Rootkit. Saying the damage they have caused is on par financially or otherwise of Japan or Germany's military is simply absurd.
Also, I'm sure that sales in a multi-billion dollar industry are down almost half based on sony's rootkit.
*** For a better tommorow, change your life today ***