I stream, therefore I am…
I have a confession – nothing earth shattering – but while I hardly consider myself a reprobate, I still buy CDs and Vinyl music albums.
Don’t get me wrong.
I’m not like Craig Glazer or that Stomper character.
I’m actually quite adept at using my smartphone and computer and I can stream Netflix, YouTube and Amazon with the best of ’em. I’m also a bit of an electronics buff and have forged a part time career helping friends and acquaintances sort out their audio-video, electronics and computer purchases and problems…free of charge.
Yeah, I’m that kinda guy.
I’m also the kinda guy that got great seats to Ed Sheeran at Sprint Center last night and who drove all the way to Des Moines this past weekend to see an alt rock band out of Baltimore called Future Islands. And then was blown away buy a new band called Operators that opened for Future Islands.
But when my wife went to the merch table to buy Operators album reality set in.
It wasn’t out – and I’m not sure if the word “yet” is even in the equation. What is out is the band’s new five song EP, available only as a digital download for $3.99.
So I’m in, grudgingly I’ll admit.
Chances are though that I’ll buy the download and burn it onto a – wait for it – CD. You know, the old ways die hard.
But make no mistake, they are dying.
Walmart barely stocks any CDs. Target for some reason still has a bit better selection. Sam’s? You can maybe find like a dozen titles – maybe – usually greatest hits compilations of bands you wouldn’t want if they paid you to take ’em.
Yet for some strange reason, we still read in newspapers, magazines and websites about the new albums being released each week. And which are the top selling.
Bob Lefsetz has a take on that:
(Album) SALES ARE DEAD
The fact that news outlets trumpet them is testimony to their ignorance, not the stats’ relevance. It’s almost like it’s the year 2000 all over again, when the public knew what was going on but the media did not. Something is happening here and you don’t know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones? Bob Dylan famously sang that about a “Time” reporter, but at this point it’s the acts that are ignorant. They continue to believe in old paradigms that are now history. Tchotchkes generate revenue. It’s called merch. Your CD/vinyl is a souvenir, see it that way.
So just how dead are album sales?
According to Billboard last week – the longtime and still reigning king of recorded music – “Album Sales hit a New Low.”
My man Wiz
“The market for albums continues to recede, following a (now) long-standing trend that has been accelerated by streaming’s success,” Billboard adds. “This week’s 3.97-million album sales tally is the smallest weekly sum for album sales since Nielsen SoundScan began tracking data in 1991. It’s also the first time weekly sales have fallen below four million in that time span.”
The top selling album was by a dude who goes by Wiz Khalifa.
Perhaps you’ve heard of him, but my guess is you have not. That said, the 26 year-old American rapper is no new kid on the block.
This is his 5th album, people.
The dude is so mainstream that the Pittsburgh City Council (he’s from Steel Town) declared 12-12-12 Wiz Khalifa Day.
Memorable stuff, eh?
Yet only 90,000 album sales is all it took to make Wiz Numero Uno.
Even superstars Coldplay sold just 168,000 albums its first week earlier this year.
Go back with me in time now for a minute to November 1999.
That’s when Dr. Dre – I know you’ve heard of him – released his album 2001 and sold 516,000 copies the first week.
However, the good doctor was not No. 1, he came in second.
The somewhat obvious net result?
“Larger retailers and CDs, vestiges of an older record business, have been hit the hardest,” Billboard says. “Through August 24th, CD sales are down 19.2 percent year-over-year while sales at mass merchants and chains have fallen 23 percent and 25.6 percent, respectively.”
And while some record execs claim streaming is making up for sliding software sales, don’t bet on it.
“‘This year the bottom fell out of digital sales to a degree that we never anticipated, which is why many companies are not meeting this year’s revenue projections,” laments one indie distribution executive.'”
As for me, maybe this will be the year I get a new iPhone 6 with enough storage to make my move to full time streaming/digital/bluetooth.
Lord knows I’m overdue.
As for Stomper and Glaze, last one out turn out the lights.
Ask Radiohead about their last couple of album sales.
kicking and screaming into the future I guess I will go with it’s soulless, compressed sound. paraphrasing joe walsh, “I’m an analog man.” so is tom petty who said, while speaking of the demise of analog recording, in the documentary “Sound City,” “I wanna turn knobs!” that said, the cd players in the good ol’ Bose Wave are malfunctioning. a sign of the times, I’m sure, and my iPod is oh so 2005.
Tune in Tokyo! Tune in Tokyo!
that’ll work too, dude!
I’m not so much trapped in the analog past…
Not that there’s anything wrong with retro. Maybe it’s kind of like cooking – you know – food prepared a certain, old-fashioned way. Like over cooking your TV dinners versus nuking them.
I do think CDs are superior to many MP3 files and I know that Beats is basically a kids version of Bose – as in much ado (mostly) about nothing.
That said, I’ve got a Beats system in my Fiat that blows away the Bose system that came in my first 500.
I’m definitely digital.
I just haven’t crossed over completely to using my iPhone and computer files as my primary listening sources. But I’m getting close.
It’s all a matter of “rights” a CD or vinyl record has different ownership rights than a downloaded MP3 file. When you own a CD or record your rights are in your favor, you can copy the music on either of these two formats as much as you want. Download music is limited as to how many times you can copy it to a limited number of devices.
So why are Mills Record Company and Records of Merritt – two relatively new places that stock mainly vinyl and are based in Westport – still around? There’s a third vinyl only place in Olathe, I’ve heard. Add to that Renaissance Vinyl (two locations) and Zebedees who’ve been around awhile not to mention Half Price Books which carries some new vinyl reissues and this town is cultivating what I think is a saturated market.
Everyone knows streaming is where the action is. But vinyl and CDs – while increasingly marginalized – aren’t going anywhere.
Vinyl is on the upswing. It has done this in the past. Left for dead and then a wave of nostalgia brings it back for awhile.
I’ve been to one of the new Westport vinyl boutiques.
And clearly the vinyl thing is up and coming.
Alas it’s far from mainstream and highly unlikely to ever reach that point.
I do think it’s nice that people are harking back to record albums though.
It’s a great way to appreciate music.
Believe it or not, cassette tapes are trying to forge a similar comeback.
Enough so that Future Islands mercy table was selling a cassette of one of their albums.
I suppose cassettes also featured an analogue sound and I custom recorded some amazing compilation tapes way back when.
And if you recall, they were quieter than albums if you recorded them before your vinyl started picking up extraneous noises.
I am not a snob about records. I get it if you don’t want to spend the time or cash on finding a record when you have basically every damn song you want through Google Play or Spotify. I use those services constantly and I am damn happy they exist. But for me personally it is tough to beat the experience of taking that thick slab of vinyl out of the sleeve, putting the needle down, and turning The Stooges way the fuck up. I just can’t quite get that by pushing play on my phone.
Agree, Rick M…
Not for awhile, anyway
Yep Roc still presses vinyl.
I get a mailer from them weekly.
Turntablists unite!
I’ve got a Rega RP6…
However most of my music sounds better somehow on my Rotel CD player.
So you know, I’m conflicted
Digital has gotten better lately hearny.
It just took a decade or three to happen.
Hey, where’s Chuck on this topic?
He’s home waving his hard penis after spending all day spurting his hate of black people over at Tony’s Klansas City.
Both inches, mind you.
aint that the truth buck!
You gonna bark all day little doggies, or are you gonna bite?
I wrote about this subject on my blog a few years ago…here is an excerpt if I may..
…Back then, it was word of mouth between neighborhoods that made the stars of their day. The main way to spread the word about a new artist was to hear them on the radio or go buy their new album.
Albums. LPs. Virgin black vinyl.
LPs stood for Long Playing. When I was much younger, we had a number of Jo Stafford songs on “78 rpm” records. The turntable spun so fast, you could only get one song on the disc. “45 rpm’s” had a little better fidelity, they were more compact, but, still, only one song per side per record. Then, they slowed the turntable down to 33 1/3 rpm to get more songs on a record. My generation benefited from that technology.
There is something about an album that requires many senses. At first, I look at it and see if it has the “eye appeal” that provides instant recognition on who it is or, something to be inspected in greater detail. First sense. Of course, I must feel the album while inspecting it, looking it over in greater detail. Second sense. Certain albums had a certain “smell” to them. It wasn’t the album per se, but, whatever it was, the paper, the vinyl, the card board, whatever, there were certain albums that had certain smells. I will never forget the smell of a new album freshly unsealed. My enjoyment of listening to Fragile by Yes was definitely enhanced by the album cover and the little booklet inside but also the smell. I still have the album 40 years later and it still smells the same. One whiff and I’m back in my bedroom under the headphones. Third sense. Sometimes, there were unexpected pleasures when you opened up the album cover for the first time. I know that when I took “Dark Side Of The Moon” home for the first time, while I was listening to the album, I explored all the cool stuff inside. Remember the poster and the pictures that accompanied Dark Side of the Moon? Just about everyone from my generation had those stickers and posters prominently displayed and their room…because they were cool.
So, let’s review. You make the investment in the music of finding it in the store, bring it home, pull it out of the bag, carefully unwrapping the cellophane that surrounded the album to keep the investment safe, you open the album up and inspect the inside, then gently pull the beautiful piece of virgin black vinyl out of it’s paper sheath, trying all the while to NOT touch the grooves or the vinyl in any way, shape or form. You then gently place the record on the turntable and oh so gently lift the needle onto the one solo groove that fills the vinyl. Then, of course, you hear the end result of your “sensual” investment. Fourth sense. Usually while you are listening to your musical investment, you can read everything you needed to know about the band by glancing through the liner notes.
Before you ask, I have never tasted an album. We can only go so far with this.
When CDs came along, the music sure sounded better but then the trade off was the artwork, the product was smaller and not conducive to letting groups put a lot of attention to the visual stimulation that accompanied this great sounding invention.
Sadly, today’s youth will never know that opportunity of making an “investment” into a piece of music . All they do is order a song on line or download a song from this website, or that website and wham it’s in their computer or Ipod. No getting in the car, no work at all….
Well written. Very accurate description. Brought back memories of opening Jethro Tull or Moody Blues albums. Man I’m old.
right with you stomper on the moody blues’ records. and many others. but for awhile they were my favorite band and would listen to each new release over and over and over again.
album cover artwork back then was just that, art. bands went to great lengths to do great art, as randy more or less point out above.