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50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

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Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#181

Post by tracker1 »

Finnucane wrote: post #154

If they really want the old-school analog experience, you need a turntable and a cassette recorder so you can make mix tapes for your friends. We didn't have 'playlists', we had mix tapes. Also, to have in the car for road trips. Also, I must go and yell at that cloud now. Excuse me.

I would be pretty happy if I could get the Android version of Winmmp back... or something very similar... my phone has as much storage open as the biggest ipod I ever had, and it's pretty much always with me. That said, it's just easier to use a streaming service... the issue is that new music discovery just sucks at this point.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#182

Post by Bayart »

microtonal wrote: post #44
thechao wrote: post #20

My dad grew up in the 50s & 60s. During COVID he purchased my daughters' the, I quote, "shittiest briefcase record players" he could find. Both girls listen to their music on their devices, but also buy vinyl. The other day, my eldest came down from her room complaining that her vinyl "sounded awful". I told her to bring it up with their Grampy. His response: "you can't appreciate good playback until you've heard awf…

I was going to ask, when are the youngsters going to discover CDs? Much less prone to degradation to vinyl, lossless ripping, superior quality.

CDs suffer from different forms of degradation. I wouldn't trust a 50 year old CD if there was one as I do a vinyl record I picked.

Using the same master a CD would always sound better than a vinyl record, but I and many people would always take vinyl over a CD because of the praxis. Set and setting is important, in the end. Vinyl is more demanding in every aspects, it imposes more care and respect for what you're listening to.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#183

Post by roywiggins »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #145
xboxnolifes wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it is to happen, CDs and CD packaging would need a rebranding. Part of vinyl popularity is the large sleeve surface that provides a large canvas for a piece of art. Another part is that you get a physically large analogue object that, while previously would be cumbersome, has become interesting in a heavily digital age.

Afaict this has already happened. Vinyl is about the big art, CDs are all about the pack ins. You get small books, pictures, stickers all packed into a cardboard box the size of a novel. Not jewel cases. At least for the K-pop artists my daughter listens to.

In my experience your average indie CD these days comes in a cardboard sleeve or a digipak, which are slim and more resilient than jewel cases (which love to crack) but idk how to store them neatly, since the sizes vary in at least two dimensions. And they tend not to come with anything outside the disk, you're lucky if you get a booklet.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#184

Post by anshumankmr »

I myself am a DVD enthusiast (in so far as I have a copy of TDK trilogy and Raimi trilogy plus a few other classic movies/shows and songs from the 00s). There are a few shows that I enjoyed as a teen and the fact is I no longer have a way to even legally watch them in my country, so for me the ability to never lose those movies despite streaming platforms being around is the main motivator. (However I do not have a functional DVD player anymore which sucks).

So I think lets not shame people for what they do on their own time that affects none of us really.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#185

Post by RileyJames »

superultra wrote: post #129

I oversee pressing for over 150k+ records a year. We eliminated download cards a while ago because the redemption rate was so low. I wouldn’t doubt if the number of buyers who don’t own a record player is even higher tha 50%, and that the percentage of people who actually play the records is actually 10-20%. I don’t have data on that, it’s just a hunch. Many of us in the indie music industry (hip hop sustained record…

I’ve been buying vinyl for the sake of collecting it, with limited intention to ever play it.

And I’ve been wondering why would anyone buy the cassette or CD? (And I own more cassette players than the zero vinyl players)

I recently found out that some of my favourite vinyls, that I’ve been collecting, ONLY include the art/lyrics booklet in the CD version. These are from the early 2000’s (peak cd?).

I reckon I’d buy an art / lyrics booklet over a physical medium of the music itself. Particularly if it included flac download of the music.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#186

Post by buildsjets »

I make up for them buy currently owning 10 of the damn things. One for the main house stereo, 2 in a DJ setup in the basement, one for my all-tube Harman-Kardon setup in the office, 4 in the ready-to-sell stack, and 2 nostalgic display pieces that just collect dust.

880 full length albums in my 12" collection, with pressing dates between sometime in 1955 and this October 2025. 70 years... They all get fairly regular rotation, I alternate between choosing something I feel like listening to, and using the Randomize button in Discogs.com where I track my collection.

A someday project is to figure out how set up an automated workflow to use ambient song detection/recognition to magically recognize when I am playing an album and scrobble it to last.fm to track my plays. It's nothing I want to do manually but it would be neat to see my own analog spotify wrapped summary.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#187

Post by petepete »

zkmon wrote: post #29

And 50% of that are for showing off their oddity in their social networks. The WTF factor. Do something archaic.

The same thing's happening to books where being seen as 'a reader' is a much higher priority than being well read.

https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/culture/article/booktok-tiktok...

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#189

Post by Epa095 »

jwagenet wrote: post #9
toomuchtodo wrote: post #3

I am one of these people. I buy to support the artist (usually $40-$50 for an album), but listen to the digital versions via Jellyfin and Plex (to avoid Spotify). I’ll also donate directly to artists, or buy tickets to their shows even if I cannot attend. Great analysis.

IMO, please continue buying records, but don’t buy tickets to shows you can’t attend. I can’t speak for live music, but in SF there is/was an issue of club nights selling out, but having low attendance due to people buying tickets as an “option”. This is a problem because it screws up venues planning for bar sales as a revenue source and deterring last minute buyers/door sales (who may either be heads or punters) who…

I have some friends on the east coast of Canada playing in a indie band. They have experienced this many times, that the venue is sold out but then only 15-20 people show up. Supposedly a lot of these places have people buying annual access packages to support the venue, but don't end up going.

They have now started touring in Europe instead. Many cities with short distances, and people actually show up for the show. Much more rewarding to play with actuall audience.

Re: 50% of U.S. vinyl buyers don't own a record player

#190

Post by GauntletWizard »

superultra wrote: post #129

I oversee pressing for over 150k+ records a year. We eliminated download cards a while ago because the redemption rate was so low. I wouldn’t doubt if the number of buyers who don’t own a record player is even higher tha 50%, and that the percentage of people who actually play the records is actually 10-20%. I don’t have data on that, it’s just a hunch. Many of us in the indie music industry (hip hop sustained record…

I buy vinyl for the album cover. If somebody were to sell me a digital download which also ships me an empty slipcase, I would buy it, for almost the same price that I pay for vinyl. I do have the record player, but I don't think I've used it more than a dozen days in my life.

There's a lot of value to the physical artifact, but the precise nature of the physical artifact is up for playing with.

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