Will CD have retro like vinyls or is it a dead media?

[MIO Records]

What do you think guys?

Only rare CDs seems to be sold kind of easily and for a good price, the rest looks like waste right now and it reminds me the vinyls sales in the 90's but they did came back big time.
will this revival will happen with CDs?

I still need to move out 15K CD's ;-)

[revporl]

I think all physical media is dead media. Or should be. I'm in the same boat, not quite as many as you though.

[Monet]

I think all physical media is dead media. Or should be. I'm in the same boat, not quite as many as you though.

Personally, I'm not convinced of that. I mean, there will always be enough people who will want to have something in their hands, a nicely designed LP cover, a CD jewel-case with a booklet or just an original cassette album. Not to mention the timeless beauty of turntables and other components of the classic "hi-fi" equipment.

[Mascodagama]

I suspect there will only be a small band of cultists who maintain an interest in the format. CD will never have the charisma of 12” vinyl so I think it will be more niche.

There again we live in times when cassette tape has become hip, so anything is possible.

[Koreabruce]

I've heard that the fall of the CD is accelerating...

[revporl]

Personally, I'm not convinced of that. I mean, there will always be enough people who will want to have something in their hands, a nicely designed LP cover, a CD jewel-case with a booklet or just an original cassette album. Not to mention the timeless beauty of turntables and other components of the classic "hi-fi" equipment.

Well for years I bought into that completely, I still have a room stacked with CDs and records that I don't touch now. A laptop, a DAC unit and a nice amp and speakers is so much better, for ease of use and aesthetically. Plus you can cast the covers HUGE on the telly if you want while they play (I do!)

[Poisoned Youth]

I think all physical media is dead media. Or should be. I'm in the same boat, not quite as many as you though.

Personally, I'm not convinced of that. I mean, there will always be enough people who will want to have something in their hands, a nicely designed LP cover, a CD jewel-case with a booklet or just an original cassette album. Not to mention the timeless beauty of turntables and other components of the classic "hi-fi" equipment.

Once those who prefer or cling physical media begin to die off and/or once the major labels reach a critical point where it's no longer profitable to create it, all that will be left are small niches of collectors who want to recreate the experience imo.

That said, the difference between the "vinyl to cassette to CD era" as opposed to "physical media to digital/streaming media era" is that most of the music people would want to hear is readily available and accessible these days. Back during the 80s-00s, this was much less the case.

For now, I will probably just hang on to my collection. It's possible 10-20 years from now, some of these 10,000 or less CD pressings will become sought after enough to justify selling.

[clivey]

Putting a record on your state of the Art turntable became a ritual worth the reinvest.
proper Sleeve notes, gatefolds, skinning up table.Strobes, cleaner brushes running in front of stylus, Swiss watch weight adjust.

No. CD's are finished. Look after them.

Pressing vinyl is just so so expensive though .

[MIO Records]

In 2-3 generations who will know that something should actually spin in order to play music. Same people won't know how to navigate or even drive a car in 20 years, will they buy a 1975 Volvo? what for? nostalgia is the only motif, something like: my father used to drive a similar car. My father played a CD/Vinyl but progress will killing the turning round media for music. It is even correct IMHO, why should we bother to collect, pay so much, dust them off etc.... when all is available within clicks away including all the information about the artists.

The reason i am thinking about this topic today is that i created a Spotify NWW complete list and although some significant amount of albums are missing in spotify to complete the list, SO MANY are available there.
Then i thought, how nice would it be to combine youTube (without the Ads) and this list to make it complete? i found out that if you download from youTube (and its easy) you can add those to your spotify playlist.
So now, I am running in the last day random NWW list music and got ALL the albums in it, it's totally free (redundant monthly fee to spotify), the amount of work was fairly easy and I am enjoying it so much!
While listening in random playback i am also active with the playback and reorder or remove from the playlist the tracks i think they don't worth being there or just noisy without any progress in them.
What about the option to share your playlist! with young people who don't even know what's the NWW list.... they now can listen to 700 hours of NWW list music, a world on its own!

To think that for YEARS i have collected CD after CD to try and complete this list, paid so much money and wasted time, shipments etc.... and it's now somewhere in my storage room.
Viva progression....

If i would only listen to my father that said when i started collecting music in the mid 80's (I had about 200 CDs back then) that all the music in the world will be available in a box in the size of a lighter ;-)

M

[ca1ore]

I wonder what vinyl sales are now compared to it's peak in the 80s/early-90s. Nostalgia and preference for analog sound clearly propelling them .... won't last though as older consumers inevitably die off. Hard to see CD getting any kind of bump frankly. I'm an older consumer, and I have mostly switched to downloads, particularly when hi-rez is available, that get stored on a home music server.. I do still buy surround recordings on blu-ray though.

[yesman1955]

No. CD's are finished. Look after them.

I agree that we should take care of the CDs we have/want to keep. Most of them (especially the obscure stuff) will never be re-issued.

[Top Cat]

I also think the popularity of streaming is popular amongst many young people, and other age groups of course, who no longer listen to entire albums.
It's the equivalent to when I was growing up in the 50's to buy 45rpm's. As I grew older, many of the early rock n roll bands had great songs across an entire album.
But I don't think the attention span is there today, everyone wants something quick and move on to the next sound.

I don't stream any music, and it's either cd, dvd or vinyl that I listen to.
I have a very good cd player(Tascam Pro) that is also a recorder with great converters, and a Fluance 81 turntable I recently bought with stimulus funds.
I no longer buy used vinyl, after a couple of bad experiences of ebay vinyl, which I didn't notice had musty odors and quickly traveled through my collection like ants on honey.

Although I do buy cd's, the very thought of a non degradable cd disc filling our landfills for centuries makes me angry.
( there is a place in New York that will recycle them)

[Monet]

Once those who prefer or cling physical media begin to die off and/or once the major labels reach a critical point where it's no longer profitable to create it, all that will be left are small niches of collectors who want to recreate the experience imo.

That said, the difference between the "vinyl to cassette to CD era" as opposed to "physical media to digital/streaming media era" is that most of the music people would want to hear is readily available and accessible these days. Back during the 80s-00s, this was much less the case.

For now, I will probably just hang on to my collection. It's possible 10-20 years from now, some of these 10,000 or less CD pressings will become sought after enough to justify selling.

Well, I don't know. I don't have a crystal ball. But I remember, for example, that at the beginning of the Internet, it was said that books would die out and that we would read our favourite novels on the net. As we all know, books still exist.

[Digital_Man]

It doesn't seem that likely at this point but I'm starting to think cds possibly will have some kind of comeback like vinyl did. However, if it doesn't happen in the next four to five years then it probably won't happen. I think what has to happen first is the excitement for vinyl has to die down.

[Steve983]

Here in the UK our long standing chain of record stores HMV has announced they are opening 10 new shops. I was in my local branch a few weeks ago and they still have a healthy range of vinyl, cd's, dvd's, audio gear, books and T shirts. When I look around Amazon it seems to me that a lot of cd's are out of print but maybe HMV know something we don't.

[arturs]

Despite the fact that I still buy CDs, I would guess "no".

Why? If you want the tactile physical media experience, vinyls trump CDs. Nice large album covers often with gatefolds. Etc.

OTOH, if you want convenience, then downloaded files or streams beat the CD, without sacrificing sound quality. That was not true 10 years ago but is true now.

The disc format may have been saved if we had switched over to SACD or DVD audio 15-20 years ago when there would have been sufficient demand for new players to achieve a critical mass of new releases. We would all be enjoying better quality sound now on mainstream releases. Instead this market only took off in very narrow collectors' circles (e.g., Steven Wilson remixes)

[jefftiger]

It's very pleasing to hear that HMV is expanding in the UK. Their big Oxford Street flagship store closed some years back. I used to enjoy wandering through it in the mid-80s when I lived in England and I recall occasionally finding some interesting Italian prog rock releases. And they used to have the big Tokyo store in Shibuya that I visited once in 2008. It's sad to see the demise of these big flagship stores. Some day, I'd like to visit Disk Union in Shinjuku.

[Steve983]

It's very pleasing to hear that HMV is expanding in the UK. Their big Oxford Street flagship store closed some years back. I used to enjoy wandering through it in the mid-80s when I lived in England and I recall occasionally finding some interesting Italian prog rock releases. And they used to have the big Tokyo store in Shibuya that I visited once in 2008. It's sad to see the demise of these big flagship stores. Some day, I'd like to visit Disk Union in Shinjuku.

I mourn the loss of the Virgin Megastore that used to be in Oxford Street too. About 40 years ago I used to go up there on Saturday mornings and come back with bags of albums, that's where I bought all my Kansas LP's which I still have in pristine condition, happy days

[progmatist]

I mourn the loss of the Virgin Megastore that used to be in Oxford Street too. About 40 years ago I used to go up there on Saturday mornings and come back with bags of albums, that's where I bought all my Kansas LP's which I still have in pristine condition, happy days

Virgin Megastores literally went sky high...with Sir Richard's recent trip.

[moecurlythanu]

In 2-3 generations who will know that something should actually spin in order to play music. Same people won't know how to navigate or even drive a car in 20 years, will they buy a 1975 Volvo? what for? nostalgia is the only motif, something like: my father used to drive a similar car. My father played a CD/Vinyl but progress will killing the turning round media for music. It is even correct IMHO, why should we bother to collect, pay so much, dust them off etc.... when all is available within clicks away including all the information about the artists.

This is the generally accepted belief, but it depends entirely on which genres are being talked about. For example, I am a collector of British Folk Music. I have tons of LPs that were 99 copy releases and will never be reissued in a digital format. Their value is pretty high on the 2nd hand market when they do come up for sale. Because of the scarcity, they're not likely to lose that value either, and connoisseurs of the style will seek them out, or do without.

[JKL2000]

In 2-3 generations who will know that something should actually spin in order to play music. Same people won't know how to navigate or even drive a car in 20 years, will they buy a 1975 Volvo? what for? nostalgia is the only motif, something like: my father used to drive a similar car. My father played a CD/Vinyl but progress will killing the turning round media for music. It is even correct IMHO, why should we bother to collect, pay so much, dust them off etc.... when all is available within clicks away including all the information about the artists.

The reason i am thinking about this topic today is that i created a Spotify NWW complete list and although some significant amount of albums are missing in spotify to complete the list, SO MANY are available there.
Then i thought, how nice would it be to combine youTube (without the Ads) and this list to make it complete? i found out that if you download from youTube (and its easy) you can add those to your spotify playlist.
So now, I am running in the last day random NWW list music and got ALL the albums in it, it's totally free (redundant monthly fee to spotify), the amount of work was fairly easy and I am enjoying it so much!
While listening in random playback i am also active with the playback and reorder or remove from the playlist the tracks i think they don't worth being there or just noisy without any progress in them.
What about the option to share your playlist! with young people who don't even know what's the NWW list.... they now can listen to 700 hours of NWW list music, a world on its own!

To think that for YEARS i have collected CD after CD to try and complete this list, paid so much money and wasted time, shipments etc.... and it's now somewhere in my storage room.
Viva progression....

If i would only listen to my father that said when i started collecting music in the mid 80's (I had about 200 CDs back then) that all the music in the world will be available in a box in the size of a lighter ;-)

M

What is a Spotify NWW list? And are you saying a Spotify playlist can include local files on your PC? EDIT: Oh, NWW is Nurse With Wound I guess.

EDIT AGAIN: Now I see in Spotify settings you can sync local files. Interesting…

[progman1975]

18.9 million Units of CDs sold in the 1st 6 months in the US

[Digital_Man]

18.9 million Units of CDs sold in the 1st 6 months in the US

The first six months of this year?

[Dave (in MA)]

18.9 million Units of CDs sold in the 1st 6 months in the US

Yes. We keep getting stories about how vinyl (not vinyls) is outselling CDs, but they always mention revenue--because quite a few people are willing to pay $35 for a vinyl copy of an LP that they could get for $15 or less on CD. CDs continue to outsell vinyl.

The really strange thing to me is seeing listings where the new CD costs less than the digital download.

[progholio]

Interesting question and i would hope CD's at least stick around for a while if not gain some appeal.


I would hate to think that up and coming or some of the established but not well known bands that we all love to see live don't have to resort to selling download cards at their merch tables.
I never understood how some indy bands have cassette only stuff available at shows.