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Is the CD Becoming Obsolete?
mrnomas writes "What's to blame for the declining CD sales? Is it that manufacturers are putting out more and more 'safe' (read: crap) music while independent musicians are releasing online? Is it because iTunes is now the third largest music retailer in the country? Or is it just that CDs are becoming obsolete?" Quoting: "Forbes.com [ran] an article showing that CD sales are expected to be down 20% in 2008 (slightly higher than the 15% drop initially predicted). Why such a drop? What's truly happening is a gradual shift away from physical media to downloadable formats. What this indicates, so far, is that US sales of digital music will be growing at an estimated rate of 28% in 2008, however physical sales will drop even further, resulting in a net overall decline.""
Maybe others feel the same way?
1. It's a high-quality, DRM-free copy of the music which I can convert into FLAC and other digital formats I choose. (Yes, there are exceptions, but it's much better than most online stores).
2. I have a semi-permanent copy which I can re-rip as many times as I want.
3. Shiny.
At least, I hope a physical medium for purchasing and keeping your music is not on the way out.
I hate downloaded music, I hate having nothing but some files and a printed out cover to show for my money (or no cover etc. if I'm not going to back them up individually).
I love having shelves of cds, with their cover art, their liner notes etc. I love the hard, physical format of them.
I'm forever worried that I'll lose or misplace, erase or whatever the tracks I've legally downloaded...
I want physical music delivery to remain dammit!
I bought a CD on saturday, and I'm enjoying listening to it. There are quite a few reasons I bought it in a CD format.
1. I like it uncompressed, I probably couldn't hear the difference with the new iTunes DRM-free tracks, but I don't have to worry about recompressing them later and having the flaws come popping out.
2. I run linux and it's really a PITA to boot over to windows to use iTunes, and eMusic doesn't have some of the artist I enjoy.
3. The cover art and the convenience of having a disk for the car premade with a nice pressing is enjoyable.
4. I want to buy from artists I enjoy so they can keep making music
I don't see online distribution quite solving these things yet. ALthough, I will admit, most consumers are a lot more apathetic about these issues than me.
Heh.
Back in, um, '92? I went to my favorite used music store, and they had set out a milk crate filled w/ abandoned albums that had scratches and the people who brought them in weren't able to sell. I bought the whole crate for $3 and covered a wall with them.
Higher Bit Rate music sounds better on even poor quality sound systems. The problem is, is that most people who say they don't care just haven't heard their music in +384kbps and don't know what they're missing.
The music industry should realize the CD is a fading format. They need to start pushing 192khz audio dvds. They have almost the same manufacturing cost as CDs. And considering the number of homes that have surround sound system in the US, this is quality that could easily be appreciated.
(under 25 and appreciates good sound quality)
A record album was a fairly large thing, and, covers were small posters in their own right.
Yeah, I grew up with them, loved them, and I remember people bitching about the small size of CDs when they came out, but I never missed it. Probably because I got a booklet with the CD (probably same total area, so it was a push.)
Then the booklets got smaller and I never missed it. Probably because by then I had the web and didn't need to stare at physical liner notes while listening to an album.
Now I've got D/Ls and iTunes and cetera, and any 'album' I listen to I've probably created myself, so I know why each song is there.
One man's -1 Flamebait is another man's +5 Funny.
I still prefer CDs over MP3s. First, I don't like paying for something that I consider ephemeral. I still like to have something physical. It's convenient to purchase music online. Then I have the hassle of backing up this music if I reinstall my OS, or get a new machine. And that's assuming I'm allowed to make copies.
Second, it seems like I'm more restricted in how I can use my music when purchasing online. It seems easier for a company to control content that way. Sure, there are ways to defeat any copy-protection, but sometimes it's a hassle.
I'd rather buy a CD, convert the songs I want into MP3s and be done with it. That way I have the comfort of knowing I have a reliable, high quality backup which I can even stick in my sound system when I'm so inclined.
So going online I'd spending as much as I have with CDs, but I end with with nothing physical to show for it. No album art, no booklet, not CD, nothing. Just some crappy 600x600 jpg if I'm lucky and an MP3. Maybe I'll embrace that medium some day, but only when it's evolve far beyond its current form.
I agree. I've bought music online before from iTunes. And I likely will again (if it's just one song or two that I want rather than entire CD).
But 98% of the time, I will buy a CD and then rip it. I will get much better quality with my own rip than I will buying from an online store. Even worse are the files on P2P networks. Legal issues aside, most of them are ripped by 15-year olds that have no clue as to how to rip a high quality file (i.e. with high bitrates).
If the online music stores want to switch from AAC or WMA to FLAC at very high bitrates (and DRM-free), then I might stop buying CDs.
And maybe I'm old fashioned (and just old) but I guess this goes back to my days growing up with vinyl. I like liner notes (although I need a magnifying glass to read them on most CDs these days) and cover art. And perhaps even lyrics (that I know haven't been butchered by some bozo who contributed to one of the online lyric sites).
Another plus for CDs: if my hard drive crashes and takes my music collection with it, I can always rip the CDs again (been there, done that).
And you're right, it's the under-25 crowd that doesn't care about any of this stuff. Just as long as it sounds decent on their iPod or WalMart bought boombox "Stereo".
For the record, I don't own an iPod or any kind of portable music player. But my computer doubles as my home stereo (that's why I invested in decent speakers for it).
So unlike the under-25 folks, I do care about good sound and right now that's best had with CDs (or even better - SACD or DVD-Audio).
Since the under 25 crowd are the people who have always been buying the most music, it makes sense that CD sales have plummeted.
Oh and yeah, and most of what's on the radio these days sucks anyway. I generally buy music based on reviews or word of mouth.
But I digress....
Scott
©20014 angrykeyboarder & Elmer Fudd. All Wights Wesewved
The RIAA. They've made the situation worse for themselves at just about every opportunity with their "this is the way it has been, this is the way it always will be" attitude. All things change in a dynamic environment, only the short sighted and naive believe the status quo can be maintained indefinately. Instead of accepting the coming changes they faught them every step of the way.
Recently I bought the new Nine Inch Nails album. Not because I felt the need to support their label, not because I prefer my music on CD's (I don't), and not because it was a good album (though it was). I bought it because a glimmer of imagination and creativity went into its production. The CD appears black until it's played, once it's been heated up by the laser it turns white and reveals previously hidden writing on the CD itself, along with a bit of binary code that can be translated into a URL. Finally, a reason (albeit a small one) to own the physical media again. A little something extra that's pretty interesting and can't be owned without buying the album. This is adaptation, and it's a trend the rest of the music industry should be following. It's time to offer more than just 12 tracks burned to a CD in a cheap plastic case, it's time to justify the $20 price tag in an age where the same music can and is being distributed globally for free. And for god's sake it's time to let some good music through, instead of this constant stream of generic crap.
Most of all, it's time for the RIAA to go away and make room for a new generation of music entertainment, one that isn't terrified by change.
Murphey's fighting Occam, and we're in the stands.
I would say that (for the past few years at least), good solid albums have stuck out more in my mind than individual singles have. This is especially true among independent artists.
A few somewhat recent albums that I've enjoyed as a whole (in no particular order)
and the list goes on.... There have been quite a few high-profile "popular" albums released by popular artists such as Green Day, My Chemical Romance, Justin Timberlake, and The Red Hot Chili Peppers, all of which are very much intended to be played as an entire album.
At a show I recently went to, I bought the band's CD on a whim because I enjoyed the show. As the guy handed it to me (he was the band's bassist), he encouraged me to copy it, share it, email it, or "do whatever you want to get the word out." The side you don't hear is that most small artists owe much their very existence to the internet.
So, no. The album is far from dead. Even though popular music has almost completely gone to shit in the US, the independent music scene is arguably the best it's ever been.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
I've only found CDs to hinder my ability to DJ now that I've experienced good software built for the purpose. The greatest single benefit is that I can choose from close to 30,000 mp3s rather than be limited by the number of CDs I can/want to carry. How many times did I scramble to cue the right track on the right machine when I was juggling CDs at the college radio station? It's a pleasure not having to worry about that in a bar or club.
When I was teenager, we used to listen to LPs.
They were big, heavy, when you carried them home or to your friend's party, everybody saw who was your favourite band.
The covers used to be great mostly. Later the double albums were invented, then the cover artwork became even more interesting.
But that was not all, they could stuff into the big cover a folded, even bigger poster, which could end up on the walls of your room.
The best photographers, artists created the covers and you could watch them for weeks after you finally brought them home.
It seems like much less records were released. It was before everything, including politics, economy became just a clip, then a soundbite.
We used to listen to much less variety of records, but we listened to them much longer. We used to be curious of every minute of the album from our favourites. I don't think that they had better ratio with the great and not that great songs, but somehow even the not that great ones had something to offer. There were actually songs, which started to make sense only after listening to them over and over as "fillers" between the better songs, simply because you could not set up play lists and skipping was more difficult and inconvenient on a record player. You also risked to scratch the track.
There was also something magical watching the LP spinning, the light had a strange dance on the black tracks.
I love my iPod, don't misunderstand me. It's beautyful, small, extremely convenient.
I have also developed some attention deficit disorder, due to the fact, that you can have so much more these days.
I am also guilty of skipping if the first 20 seconds does not hit a raw nerve.
But sometimes I slip back into the past and listen over and over the entire CD, just like when I used to listen to Led Zeppelin, the Stones as they were just released and it seemed like the entire world was just waiting to see what they've got to give us.
Sometimes it happens, like lately with Sam's Town from the Killers. When I look at the tiny graphics on my iPod I wonder how the cover of their LP would look like, if they were stars when we used to be young.
I never wanted to go to Vegas, but now I am curious, for sure.
Some things don't change, I guess.
99% of under 25 are not buying cds or singles, they are downloading for free (or swapping via itunes in colleges). Those older than 25 are not buying cds because cds sound like sh!t because of compressed dynamics and digital clipping introduced as a result of the loudness wars. The audiophiles if you want to call them, I think of them more as those that still actually listen to music (as opposed to hear it like most people these days), are buying used 15 year old cd's for 50-150 bucks on ebay because you cannot buy a lot of it or what you can buy sounds worse than a cassette tape! Every possible bad decision the studios could have made have been made. It is pathetic, there are mental defects in the organizations. Oh... And lets review how we can get music today....if I wanted a cd I would have to pay lots for special shipping and wait days or weeks because there aren't any physical cd stores anymore... or I could pay the same or more for a sh!tty low quality mp3 most likely with DRM and no album art and nothing... or I could download any quality of any album with album art and everything for free this instant... Which route would one most likely take? PATHETIC.
Why do people always confuse "lossless" or "uncompressed" with "perfect copy"? The CD's sampling rate is only 44.1kHz 16 bit IIRC, whilst modern music is recorded at least 192kHz, 24/32 bit. Once higher quality discs are released... oh wait, DVDA and SACD can do that. CDs are on the way to obsolete, and once more albums are released on SACD/DVDA they are basically deprecated.
For those who like album-oriented music AND the option to rip said music, losslessly, to hard drive, the CD is a very good distribution medium. There are potentially better sounding formats (no, not vinyl, but DVD-Audio or SACD), but neither is normally rippable in full quality via digital means. Downloads are these days generally in fine consumer quality for one's MP3 player, but at a lower quality than a CD.
The problem with CDs is one largely created by the recording industry themselves, in particular, the major labels. In their continual efforts to marginalize artists and own an increasingly large portion of the market, they have drastically cut artist rosters, and increasingly relied on Big Hit Records to maintain their profit levels.
So a funny thing happened... they replaced "real" artists with those manufactured by the labels; not 100% across the board, but enough to make the hits extremely mandatory, every year.... there were no longer enough established artists with a long-term fan base to fill in the holes between hits. And art has never been something you could put on a production line.
In addition, most people have a fixed entertainment budget. When I was a kid, you could buy a record or a book, or go see a film, that was pretty much the extent of consumer media. These days, there's music (purchase or download), DVD, videogames, rentals, online subscriptions, etc. All competes for the same buck.
Legal downloads have become a kind of pressure release valve for much of the listening public. Rather than add to sales, they've reduced them.. the same people who might have chose "CD" over "Game" this month can now just download that hit or two, they only songs they really wanted anyway, and still spend most of their cash on the DVD or game or whatever. I grew up with album-oriented rock radio... I still listen to whole albums, still buy them. But the recording industry destroyed this model with their push to Hit oriented radio... sure, they'd like a CD with multiple hits, but in the downloading model, you have to win each hit purchase, not simply that first one that bags the CD. Most kids don't think in terms of albums, period. This is the same culture that took compilation CDs away from bad K-Tel TV ads and put them (the "Now that's what I call music!" series, for example) into the top 10... that's just another form of single.
I don't think CDs are necessary anymore, but until there's a lossless download available, with similar pricing, I won't be buying downloads. I did subscribe to eMusic.com sometime back, when they offered unlimited downloads (128kb/s MP3, yeah, but DRM-free), but I dropped it when they went to a limited model... which was single-oriented, even on an "indie" oriented service like eMusic. I can't see spending the same money for a lesser product. The CD is still superior to downloads, but doesn't necessarily remain so forever...
-Dave Haynie
This is totally flamebait. As another poster pointed out, you're wrong about the master-to-vinyl vs. master-to-cd process. But that's not why I'm replying...
I buy a lot of vinyl. Not because I think it sounds better, just because I like it better. Here's why:
As far as the sound goes... my LPs sound every bit as good as your CDs. Yeah, my turntable is an ornery pig sometimes, but it's usually just a loose cable or something. So, are CDs obsolete? I think so. Especially in the retail world. Every now and then, an album comes out that I want that isn't available on vinyl--in that case, I usually cave and buy the CD. Like I said, though, it's becoming more and more common to find every new release I'm interested in on wax.
PS: Between the time I started typing this and the time I pressed preview, your post got moderated down by 2. BONUS!!
...Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.
Churchill
Not quite correct - the Shannon theorem states that 44.1 KHz is the bare minimum required to sample a 22.05 KHz wave without aliasing; not that a 22.05 KHz wave will be sampled perfectly. This becomes obvious when you consider that when sampling at 44.1 KHz we are only sampling 2 points on each 22.05 KHz wave. Not sufficient to reproduce the wave perfectly, but enough to make sure that we do not misinterperet the wave as one of a lower frequency - aliasing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aliasing
Are you honestly claiming that you can hear frequencies higher than 22.050 kHz?
Actually, yes. I can. Last time I had my hearing tested, I heard frequencies up to 24.5kHz.
Careless, thoughtless production and over-processing I can all too readily believe in, but not problems with the essential theory at the heart of it.
The trouble with the theory is that it is just that. The theory of using low pass filters to smooth out quantized signals works very well. In practice, however, low pass filters have to be matched to a proper power output stage, or else you get slewing, and a corresponding spectral shift.
Seriously, get your hands on an oscilloscope and a cheap CD player. You'll be able to measure frequencies into the 25kHz range coming out of the power output, despite Nysquist's sampling theorem. This directly corresponds to information loss in the audible range.
2 inch tape is still the best recording medium ever made.
After all, I am strangely colored.
But as insightful as your post is, why do you say If they had moved up market, and included AAC/WMA/MP3 files ON THE DISC and not a single lossless format among them?
I'd say FLAC+WMA would be the premier choice, the one being high-end for audiophiles, the other being playable on dang near any modern (car) stereo. (And yes I could have said MP3 instead of WMA, but Fraunhofer's licensing is even more bonkers than Microsoft's.)
"Good news, everyone!"
The advantage of CDS, or at least full album's worth of mp3s as opposed to singles is the sense of the album itself- an album is something constructed, not a bunch of tracks thrown together. I still buy CDs (not new releases) because I like the feeling of an abum as a whole, even If the first thing I do is rip it for my iPod
Kids! Bringing about Armageddon can be dangerous. Do not attempt it in your home!
All 22KHz sounds are not equal.
There's a difference between a 22KHz sine wave, square wave, sawtooth wave, etc. which you're not going to capture by sampling at the Nyquist frequency (Personally: I think this is the reason why vinyl sounds better than digital).
There's also a problem with aliasing. Try sampling a 21.5KHz wave at 22KHz and you won't get the original wave back.
So yes, there's definitely a need for 96KHz/192KHz @ 24 bits and these days the technology to do it wouldn't cost $0.01 extra.
No sig today...
Translation: It is the size of CDs that affect sound. Records are bigger. Bigger is better. That's just common sense. The replies are certainly worth reading too; it's not an all-out attack on Dylan- he has his defenders, but having read them all, I'm not convinced that Dylan's attitudes are worthy of attention any more than any other angry old man's.
And the guy was *never* technically brilliant. Quite the opposite. It's somewhat strange to be lectured on issues like sound quality by a guy whose sound was.... rough. I don't deny the guy's influence, and he's undeniably recorded some important stuff, but that doesn't make him God, or even stop him being a Grumpy Old Man.
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
My music is on my iPod, my computer & my backup drive. If all 3 die on the same day, ill be screwed. If your house burns down, or gets burgled your screwed - same as me. Except I'll probably be out when that happens & have my iPod with me, so I still have it all. How many CD's do you have in your car? 'Cause I just have this iPod with 4000 songs & it works in the car fine because you can transmit the signal & pick it up on your car radio. Not really. I have bought maybe 5 CD's in the last 2 years & I listen to more music now than I did because it's more accessible. In the 'olden days' I would buy 2-3 CD's / month & now they are all in attic boxes because they take up 8000% more space.Umm, so if you burn it to CD anyway, why is DRM music an issue - you can still burn it & then you have the CD you always wanted. You DO get Cover Artwork & Track order. You don't get lyrics, but typing "slow train to dawn lyrics" into google brings it up pretty fast. It's true you don't get the physical object. I agree here. I used to enjoy paging through the booklet or looking over the album cover while listening to the album - in a way, indeed, something has been lost in the experience.
In fact, as a previous record collector, I should agree with you 100%. I spent 1000's of hours & cash on collecting vinyl. Time's change.
It would be nice if this kind of thing was provided in video clips, pdf's or whatever. Let's hope some of that extra value makes it's way into the digital music, there's no reason why it can't.
If you buy an album track-by-track online you normally pay more, no one would do this - if you buy the whole album as one, then it works out cheaper. Not obsolete yet, but getting there. Thinking into the future, there is no doubt that there will be a new format for music/video. Be it Blu-Ray or Krypton Crystals, either way I'm optimistic.
The way I see it, as the world becomes more virtual: you pay for something & it's accessible to you - wherever you are. Actually, you don't get anything physical at all - but magically your TV can watch it, your player play it, your brain imagine it.
PS: Even though I have disagreed with mostly all your post, it was interesting & well put. I wouldn't have replied otherwise - Thanks for posting!
* Game Over * High Score: 264,846,927 -- Your Score: 14
Out where I am, a new CD costs in the neighborhood of $18-$22. Considering that most CDs have perhaps one or two songs that people know about, and even after purchase it may go as high as 5 songs on a CD, that $18 price seems very high. A large part of this price comes from the high costs of distribution, and also needs to cover the need for the retailers to make some profit on each sale, but in general, that is a huge part of the reason there are fewer sales.
That really is the problem with the industry, higher and higher costs due to inflation and gas/energy prices(gas for distribution, and energy prices causing the price of everything to go up). When you can download tracks legally, and get only the tracks you want without paying for songs you don't want, you end up better off with a music download. The quality of a CD will be higher in most cases, but why pay $18 for what may be one good track on a CD that you otherwise don't know anything about. As a result of this, you have the people who will download the CD illegally to see if it's worth buying in the first place, but in sampling the music, they find the quality is acceptable, and may not go out to buy the CD.
Perhaps a better model for the record companies to go into is to push for a change, where customers can walk into a "record" store, and request a bunch of different tracks, which can then be burned to a legal CD for the price. You may end up paying the same $18 for 8-10 tracks, but at least you get a set of songs you actually want, so don't feel ripped off. In addition to this, the store is providing a service(making a mix CD for you), so you feel you get your money's worth.
The problem isn't with frequencies higher than 22K, but 44.1K sampling can screw up a sine wave as low as 6k signifcantly. Check out http://www.mother-of-tone.com/cd.htm for some good graphics describing this.
My posts are definitive. Reality is frequently inaccurate.
In the last few decades, recorded music has met with a steady decline on all fronts, not just sales. It's the quality aspect that bothers me. Much has been said about the way record companies hack the sound to pieces by making everything sound like it does on the radio (as if radio isn't total crap). Even older recordings are "remastered" in this way, thereby removing any incentive I have to purchase albums that might be missing from my collection.
Production: What is interesting is the reviews I see occasionally complaining when a band "sweetens" the music too much -- in other words, adds instruments, or perhaps a whole orchestra to make the recording sound like it wasn't made in somebody's basement or garage. Let's not equate primitive production for good sound, folks.
Then there's the artists. For every great singer out there, there are a dozen Bob Dylan wannabes. Hey, let's face it, Dylan sounds like he gargles with broken glass every morning.
Songwriting quality: where are all the pop bands with something to say, other than how much they want to rape and abuse women? Rare, indeed.
Record companies: In their greed to promote the big hit single in this digital age, they've abandoned the artists capable of holding your interest for an entire album, artists with long-term playability. Pop music today is down right *boring*. The old artists are either dying off or have lost their touch (e.g., Paul McCartney should just give up music and open up a vegetable stand somewhere), while the new artists pay too much attention to what the companies tell them.
Buy CD's? What on earth for?
I'll tell you something. My fourteen year old has discovered my LP collection from the 60's, 70's and 80's (about 1200 have survived the ravages of time), and he spends his spare time digitizing them onto the computer. He loves the music and the sound of these old dinosaurs, and will "rip" an LP even where I already have the CD. He hates what's on the radio, and feels like he's found buried treasure in these old archives.
Buy CD's? Why on earth would he want to do that? He's not finished listening to my LP's yet!
And there's perhaps the real reason CD sales are in decline: it has too much competition from what people already own. Something like Windows Vista having XP to contend with, I guess.
"My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right." --Senator Carl Schurz (1872)
I would argue that Bob's hearing is as good as it ever was, probably better... he's just a bit 'deafer'. I work for a guy who is rock royalty on the engineering side, as well as the electronics side of things... if you call his name while his back is turned, he can't hear you at all, but when he's listening to music on some system or other, he can hear things that no ordinary person can hear.
Now keep in mind that these guys don't have to 'recall' what the old days were like... in the case of my boss, he often compares new digital equipment by doing crazy things like double blind tests using 1/4" analogue masters from the 70's.
Dylan is probably right in that certain characteristics of vinyl, and I suspect he doesn't mean vinyl, he means high speed analog tape with good spectral noise reduction sounds better than modern digital techniques, but this is incorrect... they just sound different.
Analog tape was the first stage of mastering, and when mastered at a standard or even high flux (up to 520 NW/M) will accentuate the tape's natural dynamic compression which takes the form of a hysteresis response. Noise reduction such as the dbx or dolby SR reduction again will add certain dynamic characteristics, most of which were palatable to the ear.
The you had to take that desk master and master it for vinyl, which involves another layer of encoding (RIAA equalisation) and a whole lot of techniques to do things like keep the album inside 12 inches, stop the needle popping out of the record etc.
The point here is that the mastering process that made stuff sound great, was that they were made for their medium. Modern tracks are made for their medium, and so have a completely different sound. Just as people mastered things for vinyl in the old days, people master for highly compressed FM radio and MP3 these days... so modern stuff can sometimes sound better on new formats than it would have on old formats.
Some would argue that digital is no where near the good old days of analog, but in reality modern digital production equipment is light hears ahead of it... don't let an audiophile tell you differently, they're not engineers.
The consumer formats have a long way to go, and eventually when I can get an uncompressed 24/48 or 24/96 consumer recording, I'll be happy.
I suggest you try searching the newsgroups. Get a newsreader like News Rover that offers an indexing service to seek out specific mp3s. Like others have said on here, most of the CDs I've purchased in the last 15 years were to replace my vinyl, and the CD format usually makes them sound even better. But, there are a huge number of remixes and re-releases that for some reason aren't available in the states, but are available from Usenet posters in the UK or other parts of the world.
Finally, as a diehard R&B fan (Temptations, Whispers, etc) I'd be out buying new CDs if these guys or contemporary artists released this type of music. But, someone in the management chain of the record companies figures me and the other millions of baby boomers wouldn't spend the money, even though we've got plenty of it to spend and a whole lot of people over 50 people own a whole lot of iPods.
After all, we're the generation that used to buy the high end stereo systems for our dorms or apartments and countless vinyl albums. We love our music and the fact that performances by old school artists always sell out should indicate how strong the market is.
The record companies are really clueless by missing this market.
== First cross river, then insult alligator.
People don't care about sound quality. Now that they've seen that they can put their whole music collection on a little box the size of a deck of cards, the only thing 99% of people care about is size. Take it from someone who owns a high end stereo store. The number one request I get is for "wireless speakers." This is followed closely by "a tiny amplifier." People just want invisible music. They're not listening seriously, it's all for background. And now that they can download anything they want, why the hell would they buy space-taking CDs? The CD is dead. Ironically, the only people who do care about quality have gone back to vinyl, largely because the CD selection locally is dwindling to the same size.
A lot of people long for that short period of time in the 70s when FM radio was in its infancy. That is when a lot of good music was on the radio because a lot of DJs at the time were given the freedom to play what they wanted. They played the artists they thought were good and played deep tracks off albums and made them popular rather than a single being pushed by a record company. This created the entire catalog of music known as "classic rock".
Once FM radio listeners started to match or exceed the numbers of AM listeners the days of the freewheeling DJ was over. FM became the same systematic crap programming as AM. The last decent radio station in these parts died around 1981.
The music being made then was not any better than music being made today, you just had a reliable source to hear some of it. Now there are so many outlets for music; radio, tv , xm/sirus radio, internet, etc that no new music can reach any real level of popularity unless it can be mass marketed via the pop or country formats.
Exactly, when I listen to my copy of Desperado on a CD with a good set of Sennheisers, I can really hear the quality of the recording. It probably isn't as good as the original vinyl was, but the quality is just so far beyond what an MP3 or some of the incredibly compressed 90s albums sound like. Granted, it can be an artistic statement, like with grunge, but most of the time it is just ignorance. Same goes from my old Jazz CDs or 70s era Funk, the sound quality is so much better when the compression is just enough to get it onto the disc
Vinyl has certain properties that limit acoustics. It is a physical process, so if you go to heavy/light on one part of the range, the needle would skip. That physical limitation means that if one is is releasing a Vinyl version, someone that knows how to master vinyl does the process. Often the CD and Vinyl releases have separate mastering processes.
CDs, being digital, can send whatever you want. Years ago, companies would send out masters to a few mastering engineers to get back their version. Every time, the contract went to whoever made it sound loudest, because on a single listening, especially an A/B comparison, the louder track sounded better. As a result, the only mastering engineers that stayed in business were those that learned to sound "loud." As a result, there is less interesting sounds, and only a fraction of the 16-bit range was used.
This had three effects... 1) MP3s sound almost as good, who cares if you drop the low-bit range if it is over-powered by the rest. 2) synthetic instruments and drum machines, which were improving with cheap processors anyway, sound closer and closer to the real thing as you compress the range that people listen to. 3) the need for a perfect studio environment/mixing environment went away as you just weren't releasing stuff as good.
This slit the throats of CD sales, as nobody cared that the MP3 "lost acoustic range," because Pop/Rock doesn't use that range anymore. The need for a band was lessoned, and studios focused on solo vocalists which was cheaper, and used drum machines instead of drummers and the occasional work-for-hire musician for instruments as needed. In addition, the explosion of independent labels in the 90s (that were bought up by the majors) benefited from the studios destroying the need for expensive studios... Sure the independents were mostly bought up, but if you think that letting competitors enter the market so you can buy them up at a premium is good for shareholder value... well then you'd be a corporate executive.
Loud sounds better as background music (but all my stereos have a volume knob), and on the radio when people listen over FM which nukes detail anyway and cars are noisy... but there was no reason not to "do things right," and master for vinyl, transfer that master to CD, and take singles you want radio play for and do a radio master, over-compressed and loud.. It would have cost "more," but mastering engineers are NOT the expensive part of music production.
That would have preserved the oligopoly's hegemony, and not alienated DJs from the record industry as the vinyl releases were few and far between (and CDs/MP3s can be beat matched, but it takes the skill out and limited DJ expression). It's easy to say that teenagers don't care about audio quality, but I don't know that it's so true... crap sounds like crap... whenever an actually talented musician succeeds in pop, the other labels find knockoffs, who normally lack the talent, and don't become huge. Marketing people try to turn things into metrics that they can analyze, but if you don't have a good product, it shows in the end... the music industry stopped putting out good product. The teenagers that I encounter (friend with their parents), are not NEARLY as into music as we were 10 years ago, and we weren't nearly as into music as those whose teen years were in the 60s, 70s, or 80s... I don't think its the commercialization, that's been pretty constant since the 50s, I think it's the lousy quality.