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Album Sales Are Dying as Fast as Streaming Services Are Rising (rollingstone.com)
In 2018, Best Buy decided to stop selling CDs, with the change partly brought on by record labels' increasing reluctance to even issue them. Both choices are symptoms as well as causes of a seemingly inevitable trend: Buying music is now going out of style nearly as fast as streaming music is rising. From a report: In 2018, album sales fell 18.2 percent from the previous year and song sales fell 28.8 percent, according to U.S. year-end report figures from data company BuzzAngle, which tracks music consumption. Meanwhile, total on-demand music streams, including both audio and video, shot up 35.4 percent. Audio on-demand streams set a new record high in 2018 of 534.6 billion streams, which is up 42 percent from 2017's 376.9 billion streams.
It's tricky to compare the specific unit numbers of sales to streams --since such a comparison would be pitting continuous playback of a certain piece of music against a one-time purchase of it -- but certain other milestones in the consumption market can help highlight just how much streaming is replacing physical sales and downloads in America. For instance: Even though total song downloads are still in the hundreds of millions, they're coming down in scale at the top. In 2018, there was not a single song that broke 1 million sales -- compared to 14 songs that reached that figure in 2017, 36 in 2016 and 60 in 2015. At the 2 million sales mark, two songs took that trophy in 2017, while five claimed it in 2016 and 16 songs made it in 2015, throwing the modest figures of this year's sales into even sharper relief.
It's tricky to compare the specific unit numbers of sales to streams --since such a comparison would be pitting continuous playback of a certain piece of music against a one-time purchase of it -- but certain other milestones in the consumption market can help highlight just how much streaming is replacing physical sales and downloads in America. For instance: Even though total song downloads are still in the hundreds of millions, they're coming down in scale at the top. In 2018, there was not a single song that broke 1 million sales -- compared to 14 songs that reached that figure in 2017, 36 in 2016 and 60 in 2015. At the 2 million sales mark, two songs took that trophy in 2017, while five claimed it in 2016 and 16 songs made it in 2015, throwing the modest figures of this year's sales into even sharper relief.
I'm not a fan of streaming, but there is almost literally no places left where I can go in and buy CDs just by looking through the stacks and seeing what they have -- which is how I've bought music for the last 15+ years. I'd just go in, wander around, and buy a couple of CDs I found.
If I can't buy it on CD and rip it myself, I'm not interested. I'm definitely not interested in paying to stream music which is then going to be subject to ads and analytics of my information -- I don't trust the streaming services not to be douchy assholes who share my information and violate my privacy, because at this point you have to assume all online stuff is douchy assholes.
So, I can't go anywhere to buy CDs, I refuse to stream ... which means I simply no longer buy music, and listen to my already very large collection of MP3s ripped from CDs I've bought.
I miss actual music stores, but at the end of the day, if they don't want to make CDs, and will only give me digital DRM'd versions of the music or be forced to stream it ... then I simply won't buy their product and will get on with my life.
The music industry didn't adapt to the modern world, and refused to sell a product in the form people wanted. Now, they're losing out on even more revenue.
It's so convenient: not depends of internet connection... if you, like me, stay out of a wireless network in a major part of the day, to listen offline is a necessity
CD's were always my default fall back when I couldn't find lossless audio compression file formats. Also, CDs are guaranteed to be DRM free. I hope lossless audio becomes more prevalent than it is now.
No good deed goes unpunished.
When music gets taken down and there is no physical back up.
I bought my first CD in 1981, and guess what, it still works. That is close to 40 years old. I've got records that still play from the 70's, albeit with some scratches now. Do you really believe your streaming service will be around in 2060?
Doesn't everyone just rip music from YouTube? Certainly good enough for the car, and alternate versions are usually available if one would like (radio sessions, non-released versions, live versions, cover versions, etc.)..
I just use a tiny USB stick in my car, with MP3 files.
At home, I gave in and we have Alexa the associated music service. Merry Christmas to me (I'm working on a couple of Skills)!
I need to run, there's a package from Amazon being delivered....
BlameBillCosby.com
I prefer to buy and rip, as no Internet connection is required to play an mp3, and I have full playlist control. And garage sales/used music stores are your best friends price-wise. Sample new stuff on the web and decide if I want to buy the album or track from there when I want something new, radio is unlistenable between the ads and repetitious playlists...
Got distracted while writing the post and forgot...
The main advantage to streaming is there are now CDs/Albums/Cassettes/etc. to store and take up physical space....
I thought that Video killed the radio star!
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
The higher-quality, lower price option (CDs) are fading yet the shitty quality high price (vinyl) is going up, albeit slowly.
I've yet to see any reason to subscribe to a streaming service for music. I suppose if I wanted to enjoy the feeling of listening to artists I like whilst simultaneously knowing that they're being as badly ripped off as I am, I might give it a go.
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
much more convenient.
Convenient for the vendor maybe, not the user. Sure, it may seem more convenient on the surface. One recurring payment for all the music you could want but once you get past the caveats, advertising, info slurping, streaming, data rates and limits, limited selections subject to change at any time, the risk of the service shutting down and many more. Is that really worth saving the bother of ripping your own cds and maintaining your own collection?
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I buy CD's all the time. I've got a couple of great local new/used music stores. Streaming doesn't work when there's no Internet connection or you want to hear a particular album.
I don't respond to AC's.
Yes.
Because I barely have any free time and sure as hell I'm not going to waste int in "ripping my own cds" and "maintaining my own collection". I did that 20 years ago, when i was 15 and had all the time in the world. Now? Not so much.
But I still have the "skills" to pirate anything I really want and was "taken away" by some suit who decided I'm not elegible to listen to this song anymore.
And lastly:
GET REAL.
A yearly subscription to Spotify gives you access to millions of songs. But only 3 CDs worth of music if you really want to "own" them.
I prefer to buy and rip, as no Internet connection is required to play an mp3, and I have full playlist control.
You don't need an internet connection to play a song purchased online either. Even streaming services will let you purchase and/or download some songs for offline listening.
The downsides of ripping CDs being
1) You cannot just buy the tracks you want from a given album
2) It takes substantially more time to rip the track than to download it
3) You accumulate discs on your shelf which gather dust for the rest of eternity
4) Takes more time to acquire the album
5) It wastes physical resources given that you are planning to copy it anyway
The only real upside I can see is that it gives you a modicum of better control over your collection and a backup in case or data loss (albeit with a ton of work to restore).
And garage sales/used music stores are your best friends price-wise.
Only if they actually have something you want to listen to. Personally the thought of spending hours combing through someone else's used music collection hoping their is something good there to buy on the cheap sounds like a horrendous waste of my time. You be you but I've got better things to do.
I pay $3 a month for millions of songs off Spotify. Anything else I can pirate. I don't give a shit about my "posterity" since I know my children won't give a fuck about about my "old music" as much as i don't give a fuck about my dad's "old records".
Also, How many CDs does $3 get you? That's what I spend in a month for music. $3.
It may suck to be someone who loses thousands of dollars worth of purchases when their gome burns down, a thief stoles their albums, or a child plays with their discs.
And - you can't leave your collection to someone after you die. It all goes into the rubbish heap.
https://www.marketwatch.com/st...
Check your premises.
While y'all are so busy yelling at each other like a divided bunch of little schoolchildren about blue this and red that, you've all been not noticing the corporations (all of them, really) moving to models that reduce or eliminate ownership.
And what's one of the most tangible ways we had to distinguish ourselves from heathen communists? Ownership. C'mon, boys and girls, all together now: Ow - ner- ship. It's your house, not the State's. It's your car, not the state's.
It's your music, not theirs.
But nooooo, you short-sighted, divided morons continue to fight amongst yourselves and you don't see this .. this thievery happening right under your noses.
The "Civilized World" jumped the shark ca. 1973.
Vinyl is a fad. It will go away and become a "niche" again. Only "hipster" types and curious kids are buying them.
I guess if you're in the hunt for older songs on CDs you can get them for a buck a dozen.
Assuming you live in an area with an assortment of flea markets or Goodwill. Otherwise you're out of luck.
Lossless is more about having an exact bit-for-bit copy of the original cd which is suitable for archiving. If music isn't exactly a passion for you then you probably don't even care about having your own music collection, and therefore lossless compression isn't much use to you. But if you do, the usual technique is to copy your original cds using lossless compression, put the cd away in storage, and from the lossless master copy you can generate lossy copies in any format, whenever you want. The master copy remains perserved as it was on the original cd: a true archive. Again, this probably sounds pointless to 99% of you, but for those of us who take our music collection seriously, it is the only way.
Speaking of collecting music, I have to put in a plug for secondspin.com. I've been buying used cds from them for about 15 years now, paying an average of about $4 to $5 per cd. I've built up a massive collection this way, and the best part is that the music I like most (jazz, fusion, classical, new age) is typically what other people like least, and therefore I have plenty to choose from at good prices. I have a list of artists/albums I'm interested in, hundreds of items long, and every 6 months I go to secondspin and simply run down the list of the currently "hot" items. I have an extensive system of shell scripts to do the archiving, tagging, and converting. It rocks.
The main disadvantage is that you're renting access to music. You buy it, you rip it, the CD, which is very small, goes into a spindle in the garage. You never pay for it again.
This is a copy-paste that I wrote for somewhere else, do as you will with it.
I have observed something, and it has increased with time, having recently brought it up to my father-in-law, who is also a tech field worker, he agreed with me.
The people - both voluntarily and at some prodding are giving up control and ownership of everything - slowly.
What brought it to my attention is streaming services. Despite being a quite technical individual I skipped out on the early part of the streaming fad, due in part to living in an area with unreliable web access and literally working in a faraday cage without WiFi access during that time period. I doubled down on the previous fad - ripping and compressing, instead and continue that to this day.
The result - people are lost without access to Spotify. No Netflix, no movies. You unplug the average person from the Internet these days and they no longer have the ability to use their entertainment systems.
I originally contemplated the pros and cons of going all online versus what I was doing - are we really missing anything by not owning our media? In time I began to realize it didn't stop at media.
Younger people don't want to own anything.
We are watching the formation of dependence culture.
Young people aren't driving anymore, which like everything else is a mix of good and bad. Even when I was privileged enough to be able to bike to work and back, and even for my grocery shopping and most everything else I still kept a license and a vehicle. Something I've noted at work - the younger a coworker is the less likely they are to have any damned tools to work with, and it doesn't appear to be tied to not having had enough time to accumulate them. While doing a little research about that tidbit I stumbled across an article about the non-ownership topic from the other perspective written in a way that meets my approval.
It's important after that last article I make myself clear. I am not condemning the passing of materialism culture. Far from it. I personally have reduced my materialism and even the footprint of what I personally own. I am however against submission and dependence culture - both of which are adopted when you give up your ability to do for yourself by depending on services - AKA being served - exclusively.
I want to go back to tools. Even though I've reduced the amount of junk I personally own, something I do own a healthy share of is tools. Tools are to me, a different kind of possession. They aren't possessions that say "Look at me!", they aren't something that I use as a status symbol, they aren't pointless possessions. No - tools are something that says "I've got this." I use my tools to make a living, to do for myself, to teach. My tools give me independence and if used properly can even be used to spread independence.
I think we're heading down a dangerous path. When most of the people rent someone still has to own what was rented. When people do nothing but stream someone still has control of the source material. When you don't have your own tools you have to depend on someone to provide them for you. When you can't control your own propulsion you can only go where others will take you. In situations where the many are dependent on the few, the few tend to get fewer in time as they are bought out or consolidated after deaths, etc... In turn the fewer the sources of provision are, the more power the providers have.
Eventually we all become slaves existing at the leisure of those who control the resources.
I just realized after typing that last line that it sounds like some sort of socialist manifesto - at least when that line stands alone. Quite the opposite - w
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
is it not niche? How many records per capita are being sold now, and how many in the 80s?
Yes. Because I barely have any free time and sure as hell I'm not going to waste int in "ripping my own cds" and "maintaining my own collection". I did that 20 years ago, when i was 15 and had all the time in the world. Now? Not so much. But I still have the "skills" to pirate anything I really want and was "taken away" by some suit who decided I'm not elegible to listen to this song anymore. And lastly:
GET REAL.
A yearly subscription to Spotify gives you access to millions of songs. But only 3 CDs worth of music if you really want to "own" them.
All the time it takes to click 'rip now' or 'convert cd' or whatever you program of choice says? Yeah whatever, you don't have to babysit the thing. Spotify is $9.99 a month. around the same price as cd. So about the price of 10-12 cds but if you want to treat music as a disposable thing and are only really interested in current pop then that's fair enough. Personally I haven't spent a penny on music in about 10 years. I just kinda got bored of new music and have more than enough in my collection that I don't feel the need to add to it, if there was anything I wanted to but that's a different issue.
Anyway. if you think the trade off is worth it then good for you. But no complaining when spotify shuts down and you're left with nothing but a dick in your ass for the hundred twenty dollars you've put in per year.
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Of the internet media (books, video, music), music is the only one where purchased tracks are generally *not* drmed, so I have no particular inclination to buy CDs and rip.
Video on the other hand, I buy and rip media rather than buying DRM encumbered video files that can go poof at the whim or misfortune of the vendor.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
It adds a lot of dimension over singles when artists put songs together into a collection.
I still think the easiest way to instantly pull together a playlist of thematically congruent music is to just plop 5 CDs in the changer. It lets you have just enough control while not wasting your time with fine grained song by song control of a shuffle playlist.
I find it's way too much effort to assemble a long song by song playlist and do that many times. And it's never satisfying when pandora or amazon or apple synthesizes a "channel" for me, in part because I can't play it over again when I like the combination.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Agreed, not an issue for me, but for "you youngins", many don't own homes and have limited space.
I agree with you, rather own the CD than rent access to a digital stream that can be removed from my access at any time for any reason.
A yearly subscription to Spotify gives you access to millions of songs. But only 3 CDs worth of music if you really want to "own" them.
THIS is the thing the "CD forever" people don't get about why their antequated medium is dying.
For the same price as I can buy a few albums, I can stream tens of thousands of albums, more new music than I could listen to in many lifetimes. No way am I going back to the limited selections we had back in the old pre-streaming days.
Once you have infinite music at your fingertips, you are not going back to buying music ever again.
On the other hand, for the same price as millions of shit songs I don't care about I can get a few albums of actually properly good music that I like. If you happen to like genres that aren't pop you've no guarantee they'll have the bands you like, the further you go the less likely, even then there's no guarantee the pop artist you like will be on there either because it's not all music is it? Not even close.
Quality>quantity
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I guess if you're in the hunt for older songs on CDs you can get them for a buck a dozen. Assuming you live in an area with an assortment of flea markets or Goodwill. Otherwise you're out of luck.
Or ebay, amazon, craigslist etc etc. The internet is good for more than just streaming you know.
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Sportify doesn't cost 9,99 in my country. It costs 99 pesos or USD 2.40. The family plan is 150 pesos or USD 3.75. CDs start at 650 pesos or USD 16.25, and vinyl records start at 1500 pesos or USD 37,50.
Also, you know how I know you've never used spotify? Because of the bullshit you just said about it being "current pop". I don't know how, but on Spotify I can even find records from local folklore records that were only released in this province.
Anyway, if you think listening for the same music for the rest of your life is fine, good for you. Music is whatever you want it to be. If you want to fetish it and get all snob about it, it's fine. I'm over 15 so I don't really care about listening (or not) to certain kinds of music to feel "in" or to exclude others.
You guys seem totally unaware that every major streaming service offers offline listening. Maybe the reason you don't like streaming services is because you haven't given them a fair chance.
Got distracted while writing the post and forgot...
The main advantage to streaming is there are now CDs/Albums/Cassettes/etc. to store and take up physical space....
I thought the main advantage was that you can disconnect your brain, the noises will just keep going all by themselves.
No sig today...
Well good for your country that prices it so cheap I wonder how much they are paying your local folklore records and if they are available anywhere else? Hondo Mclean, Johnny Truant, earthtone9, Skindred. Do me a favour, stick those in and see what comes up I am actually interested. As far as I can tell there's no way to check what music they have before you sign up I would assume you can get most of the big names but again, only if they have signed up because it's not all music is it? And even then it's a nightmare of international rights that even if something is available there's no guarantees it will be in the future. I think it's obvious I don't use spotify but I'm not pretending I'm too good for it, it just doesn't appeal, apparently the same way ripping cds doesn't appeal to you.
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The "industry" has been eating its seed corn since they got pimp slapped by Jobs. Music will continue and there will be some musicians who aren't Mac jockey lab rats and streaming services will continue to make money on the previous golden eras catalog and hobbyist singer/songrockers but the support structure to generate audio tracks with the quality of last century is gone. No gigs for beginners, no audience except friends from work or college, no money for audio engineers or live production staff, no meritocracy anywhere except rappers. Disposable background to fill up space between selfies.
You file sharing wankers of slashdot comment threads past got the culture you paid for: nothing. But you can listen to the great music of the past for free less the time/cost of one skippable youtube ad and it's enjoyable to watch youtube keeping spotify on a quarterly starvation diet.
I pay $3 a month for millions of songs off Spotify. Anything else I can pirate. I don't give a shit about my "posterity" since I know my children won't give a fuck about about my "old music" as much as i don't give a fuck about my dad's "old records".
About 90% of the music my kids listen to is "old music". They'd rather listen to Led Zeppelin than Justin Bieber. I still have around 500 CDs and they have that music on their phones. Actually, my older son has been going through that entire collection song by song and curating playlists with his favs.
Do you have ESP?
how much we gnash our teeth or complain - streaming will likely be the dominant music distribution method for the foreseeable future.
Personally, I hate monthly subscription fees. $5 a month here, $10 a month there, and suddenly you are spending $1,000s a year on services - services that you once considered a splurge (like buying a new CD) are now required for you to maintain access to your entertainment.
Between jobs, need to cut back on spending? Sorry. You'll have no entertainment this month because you have nothing to show for your years and years of monthly subscription fees to a streaming service. And there is something about having a physical copy of music to hold in my hand. It feels more real, more tangible, than gazing at an image on a screen.
On the other hand, having recently moved boxes and boxes of CDs, many of which I haven't used in years, I can see the appeal of having access to nearly every song ever made through my phone for just $6!
During the 1990s, the street price for a CD nearly doubled.
It would have been interesting if they came out with a DVD density, credit-card sized CD, with 24bit/96khz uncompressed sound quality.
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
How about a listener sponsored human curated eclectic internet radio station? So, if I make my own playlist on Spotify I am limited sort of by what I know and already like. Algorithm-driven streams like Pandora also wind up feeding you what you already like in a way. I do subscribe to a paid streaming service and that is great when I know what I want. But I love to turn on Radio Paradise and let the expert DJs choose stuff that is sometimes new to me and often familiar as well. It is eclectic in taste, but so am I, from jazz to rock to classical one might get any cut.
The new web player has a main stream, a rock stream, a mellow stream and a groovy (more ambient and psychedelic) stream. There is a smartphone app that lets you capture up to five hours on your phone for offline listening. Listener-sponsored so free unless you decide to kick in something. The DJs don't nag either. And they have forgotten more music than I have ever listened to. Let's not forget a song-relevant slideshow option.
FYI I have no connection to this operation except that I like it and am a modest supporter. And am known to talk it up from time to time.
"No fear. No envy. No meanness." Liam Clancy
I have a number of close friends that are working musicians, indie types. Every one of them counts the recorded music sales these days (whatever format or method) as a promotional expense rather than an income opportunity. Their income is from live performance. Except for perhaps a tiny minority at the top of the charts, recorded music is dead as a moneymaker for working musicians.
Yes your bands are available, I checked. You can sign up for the free ad supported plan to search before paying of course.
It may be worth mentioning that even back when record companies first started selling actual vinyl record albums, those sales were never the primary revenue source for the artists themselves; rather, concerts are and always have been their biggest income source by a pretty solid margin. So if you really want to support your favorite artist...
I buy more physical media, CD and SACD, than ever. Reasons: there is a huge used market and it's very, very cheap. Even new discs are relatively cheaper than ever. Even SACDs are rippable now (by using certain older networked Blu-Ray/DVD/SACD players, see Computer Audiophile forum for details). I get a lossless audio disc which is simple to back up/duplicate/rip. With classical music I usually get a full booklet which I can scan, and often I can download a full pdf from the vendor/label.
The only downside is physical storage space, but I quite like having shelves displaying my favourite music.
I'm not a Luddite, I do sometimes buy digital downloads, but it's usually cheaper to obtain the physical media and do the rest myself.
except for hondo, the names you mentioned did come up with a couple albums each. You can sign up for spotify for free (and use the free plan as long as you want) with only an email address. The only difference with the free plan is that it's like FM radio: you can't skip songs and you are forced to listen to ads every few songs. You can also try premium for a month for free if you enter your credit card (and cancel before 30 days).
Also it tries to convince you that you need to download the spotify app, but you can use the spotify web player if you don't want to download the app.
But remember, it will cost me 2.50 but 9.99 for you (same way Adobe Suite costs me $14 and it'll be $50 for you). But then again i make less than $800 a month and my salary is above the average. I whined for a long time that companies try to charge a "one size fits all" price but finally publishers are listening (to piracy).
Four significant digits? Clearly the surveillance state is further along—and far better managed by the inerrant, wage-slave minions of the Deep State—than anyone heretofore suspected.
I think the real difference is people who enjoy music vs people who listen to it. If you just listen you don't care what the song is or who its by as long as there's another one after.
In which case there is no point in caring about ripping CDs. Just subscribe to a streaming service and be done with it or just listen to the radio.
Speaking of data loss though, how long is streaming service x going to be available and what happens when it shuts down?
Who cares? If one dies then switch to another. There will always be another. That's like asking how long a radio station is going to keep playing. You don't subscribe to that sort of service because you expect them to be around forever. Nice if it does but don't have unrealistic expectations.
For me, an "album" is a whole experience. The music (all of it), the artwork, the notes, pictures, etc.
With that said, while I do keep all of that, I usually ditch the case (unless it's special too). Keeping the paper art work and then I rip to my media server and I do use that the most for listening.
There's a ton of stuff that is NOT on streaming btw.
I think what is missing in all of this is the number of folks that are "stealing", that is, downloading content without securing any rights at all or payment, esp. to the content producers (mainly talking about the artists). This number is significant btw, proabably accounting for 80-90% of those who are "listening" and not using a streaming service (something to think about).
I will never stream anything. I have enough music now to last the rest of my life. New stuff sucks anyways. As far as movies, I prefer high quality, hdr, 4k content on a high end home theater and sound system. I will never purchase a streamed pos low quality viewing. When they finally take away discs, I'm out. My plex server currently serves me around 32TB of movies. I'll just re-watch those till I die. Or, see what the pirates have in store for me for download.
For most people how many of them really care for the physical media.
As a kid of the 1990's. Most people had a CD Library. But a lot of them basically tossed away their jewel cases. and Put their CD's in a binder.
There was a disconnect between the normal people who wanted the music, and people who wanted the album, with the art and physical media.
The record industry was really targeted towards the people who wanted the album, so the majority of the people were paying extra for some plastic, and paper that they would toss away.
Still today the Record company doesn't really realize that some people may only want the music, and their value add has not value to them. Streaming is a cheap and easy way to go, even with all its flaws. Some people like music, but they don't love all aspects of it.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
It's a trap and too many of you are falling for it.
Yeah, to hell with that nationwide chain and its enormous dataset - I'm going to go with your sample size of one.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
There is a big difference between a store that has a few CDs of whatever the latest corporate pop stuff is, versus a record store that stocks new bands that are not overplayed/overhyped.
The dedicated record stores here in Austin are going strong. Cassette tape is actually booming, especially in niche genres like dungeon synth where the music is just one part of the entire experience. LPs, with actual room for artwork? Going well. CDs? Doing just fine. Heck, even reel to reel albums are selling.
Just because Bobby Middle Schooler doesn't bother getting the latest trendy track that his Fortnite buds are playing from a store doesn't mean stores are obsolete.
You're a fool to misunderestimate fools. Who is to say I can't use a $1000 cable from the computer that runs the streaming client, to the speaker? Who is to say a green marker on the edge of the case, and some gold solder on the case screws, wouldn't make my music sound better? You think you're so stupid, but I can out-stupid you.
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
Doesn't matter if I have a shoebox or a jumbo jet hangar for storage: If I'm paying for music, I want to buy it, not rent it.
My NAS box is small. It holds all my music and the disc space has increased over time, faster than the increase in size of my music collection. Several gig used to be big. Now I can keep a copy of it all on each laptop and phone. For what I can't buy as an mp3 download (usually from a Russian mp3 store) I get the CD and rip.
It doesn't help that my music tastes have drifted away from Western music so American streaming services typically have nothing of interest at all.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
Yeah because there can't be examples of these stores in other cities...oh wait....
Apparently not when you are paying for it...
My opinion too, I was just presenting a reason why a lot of folks don;t buy physical media as much
Some very beautiful voices out there accompanied by some very beautiful women you get to chat up after their songs... Now thats music beautiful dinner music. :)
[($)]
You are taking an extremely niche hipster vinyl Mecca and extrapolating that to refute data about larger trends. You may as well use the success of Federal Doughnuts to gauge changes in America's junk food tastes.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
My favorite Austin record store is down by Burleson and Montopolis. It's a by-the-pound Goodwill thrift store. Sometimes they get a bit scratched up, but you never know what you'll find!
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I make a point to get clamshell CD players when I find them at by-the-pound thrift stores, particularly the ones with anti-skip support. I can go to Half Price Books, sit on the floor, then start listening through the clearance CDs. (they put the discs back in the cases when they go clearance, and the clearance section is usually the bottom row of the shelves) You can find a lot of cool stuff that you wouldn't have gotten otherwise, and it's only 2-3 bucks each. (sometimes that much for a 2 or 3 disc set!) If I get at least one good song per dollar, I'm doing good, more than that and it's a keeper.
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It will go away when the hipsters finally discover cheap used CDs. Until then, I will partake of them without their competition.
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No, it's demonstrating that a niche market exists for vinyl. By no means could Best Buy start carrying 100,000 vinyl albums and expect to make any money except in niche markets like LA and San Francisco. You could probably also get away with it in other hipster hubs like Austin and Brooklyn.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
That would be their grandchildren the Boomers are selling to at a 500% markup.
Remember, the Awesome Generation (aka Gen-X) is in between the Boomers and Millenials.
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How does it feel to go through life so completely ignorant? Probably pretty good. My favorite part is how condescending you are when so blatantly wrong:
You know where that quote came from? Joe Goldmark, one of the owners of the SF store.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
all the shops where i was able to buy cd's are now gone, don't sell them anymore, or only in a few stores in the country (and those stores are too far to go to for buying cd's), i could probably still buy cd's online, i haven't really looked.
why? because i just buy my music digital, download put it on my nas and i have it available everywhere, much better then a cd.
i don't like streaming, i like owning my music (i know, i'm an old fart ).
what i think is funny is that you can find vinyl everywhere, in a regular supermarket, last week i even found them in a diy shop (what the hell are they doing there?). i don't like vinyl (i know, i'm not hipster enough) but it is being sold, and the joke is that this medium doesn't have any drm measures in place. which is weird, because, you know, the music industry has been telling us it is impossible to survive without drm in place.
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
"The reason you think the older records are better is more likely to do with the quality of production, before the audio was stamped onto either media, in the 1970s, than it does the medium. "
No, the reason it sounds better is because the music was better!
There are cases where an album from the 1970's sounds great on vinyl and terrible on CD. The CD should sound better, and would sound better if correctly mastered, but many CDs are being mastered poorly.
It is not possible to master vinyl that poorly. Vinyl can't do as much as a CD can, which turns out to be good when people are doing dumb things and the vinyl just doesn't allow the dumb things.
To be specific we are talking about mastering CDs with the gain set way too high, on the incredibly dumb theory that "louder" CDs sell better. Overgained CDs have measurable defects and a human listener can hear the difference.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war
I used to work at an audio company, and my boss analyzed a few very popular songs. In one of them he found that 50% of all samples in the song were the most extreme sample value possible. (Since CDs are 16-bit, what he found was that 50% of all samples had the value +32767 or the value -32768.) I used Audacity to look at one popular song and was depressed to find 15 samples in a row that were +32767. Audio is supposed to be a waveform, but that was clearly an example of a waveform so overgained that the top of the wave had to be sliced off. It's bad enough when it happens at all, but 15 samples in a row? That's just awful.
I have some Genesis CDs that I bought as soon as they were available. I've been told that more recent releases of the same albums on CD are overgained and sound worse than the old ones I have.
So it's not simply that the older music was better; the "loudness war" can ruin old music and new music alike.
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
Here on the internet it's almost a requirement.
I'm honestly surprised he didn't come back with some crazy cognitive dissonance thing. Perhaps he quietly learned something... maybe there is hope yet.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.