Vinyl outsells CD in 2020

[ca1ore]

Reasons are self evident, but I thought it interesting that 2020 YTD, vinyl has generated more industry revenue than CD. Not so much LP growing as CD crashing.

 

[JustAnotherNanoTank]

Makes sense to me! Cars are being built without CD players for years now!

 

[KWT]

I gave all my vinyl to my son, along with about 400 hrs of reel2reel. He still collects vinyl to this day.

 

[tehmadreefer]

I’ll keep streaming for free.

 

[Blue Spot Octopus]

Vinyl's are fun, removing from the jacket putting it on the record player moving the arm over and dropping the needle, checking out the art on the cover. It is an experience, I loved the scene in The Mechanic with Jason Stratham.

 

[blasterman]

Everybody streams and CDs were always hideously over priced. Artists also decreasingly release full albums anymore and just singles.

I grew up after vinyl started to decline, but I had older friends that always bought the latest albums and in the 70s that was cool stuff. Artists made full albums.

Personally I find vinyl over rated from an audio perspective. However, reel to reel is also making a comeback, and studio grade reel to reel at full speed is nothing less than astonishing.

 

[NeonRabbit221B]

250ish records. I think I just like having a physical media and I can understand why vinyl is making a comeback.

 

[ca1ore]

Not clear to me that vinyl is actually making a comeback, just that CD has become irrelevant for the vast majority of buyers of music who would rather download/stream.

 

[homer1475]

Lets see... In CD's I would need a few large boxes to handle a few hundred songs. In this day and age of everything digital, I could keep those same few hundred songs/albums on my phone with room to spare.

In other words, when I was a kid I kept CD's in my car, god forbid it got super hot in your car, and they were everywhere! In todays world I can have those same songs, and many more on something smaller then a single CD. It's a no brainer to me.

Why the return to vinyl? I have no idea but i find vinyl to be rather unappealing for all the pops and cracks they produce. And yet some people find the cracks and pops to be the best part of vinyl.

 

[Opus]

Unfortunately with steaming you are loosing some of the fidelity of the music, at least with a lot of the services. I believe the critical listener group has grown over the last couple of decades and that has given rise to vinyl coming back. Take a look at the headphone market. The $200 to $500 headphone segment has really grown, and I'm not talking about Beats. Critical listeners want headphones that keep a neutral sound and don't add anything to the recording.

 

[Darren in Tacoma]

Analog beats digital in quality, digital beats analog in quantity. Records that are clean and have been taken care of have no pops and crackle. Not all pressings are equal, but a good, quality pressing from an analog master sounds amazing. You need to be picky when choosing a record, but the best records can't be beat. Reel to reel tape is also amazing. These are formats for people who want to become immersed in the music. Driving in the car and rocking out at the gym are obviously better served by digital formats.

 

[fish farmer]

I'm probably always going to gravitate to CD's.....so does this mean the used record store will have lots of CD's for sale?

I don't consume music like I did in the 80's..when it was vinyl dubbed to cassette tapes and played in your walkman. Most of the music I have now are CD copies of old and new music, I have 70's era stuff my buddy made for me I haven't even listened to. I have a lot of live Grateful Dead on cassette which some is finally is available on CD format.

I like to have a physical copy. I don't need every piece of music on a phone, stick, whatever, just a few nuggets on the shelf.

Records are fun if you are hanging out inside, but I can't bring the player outside by the fire. I don't have the space for records, we sold a bunch of stuff a couple years ago, some of my 80's metal and my wife's grandmother's records. My stuff went on the floor immediately, grandma's stuff went in the $1 box.

My wife is more the streamer....she has the nice phone and the JBL speaker. She also puts out her own music and has noticed many of her fans want a CD copy....but some do download.

 

[JumboShrimp]

I guess that makes me an in-the-minority CD junkie?

 

[fish farmer]

I guess that makes me an in-the-minority CD junkie?

Is that a shelf and a half of Dylan? And in jewel cases no less. I noticed a couple of CD's I bought this year come without cases, just card stock....much like mini record albums of old.

 

[JumboShrimp]

You have a good eye, indeed. It is a shelf and a half of Dylan, maybe 2 and a bit spilling onto the 3rd shelf-- the rest are at my office ( ). Heavy on Rod Stewart, Elton John, Jackson Brown and Jethro Tull there too. Lol. Dylan's latest CD came in the cardboard sleeve, as is the unfortunate trend with so many CDs today.

 

[ca1ore]

I believe the critical listener group has grown over the last couple of decades and that has given rise to vinyl coming back.

Not so sure about that - any data? I also wonder who is buying vinyl - I'd wager its not young people. I've got a couple of friends in the hi-end stereo equipment business and they say its dying out. Personally, I gave up on vinyl years ago - just didn't have the energy to do what was necessary to keep my records in good condition. Plus, hi-rez digital formats were going to dominate the market .... that didn't really turn out to be the case LOL.

 

[lapin]

Vinyl sounds good to me. Im a McIntosh guy so tubes rule. Love the hum........mmmmmmmmmm.
I have a few cds Punk, gothic and reggae. Not much well known stuff, as you could hear that anywhere. Vinyl was a bit more work to rip and hard to store. I used to buy 20 or 30 cds mabye 5 albums then trade some in for credit. Had to beat Apple to 500,000 songs. At last check I had 1.3m. Prob 2000 days at 24/7. Over the years I acquired a few extra cds. Esp after the stores would not give me much in trade.
Got to love them 8 tracks for sound. I have about 50 of them too.

 

[Opus]

Not so sure about that - any data? I also wonder who is buying vinyl - I'd wager its not young people. I've got a couple of friends in the hi-end stereo equipment business and they say its dying out. Personally, I gave up on vinyl years ago - just didn't have the energy to do what was necessary to keep my records in good condition. Plus, hi-rez digital formats were going to dominate the market .... that didn't really turn out to be the case LOL.

No data, just basing it on what I see being posted to the groups. When the $300 to $1000 headphones go on sale there seems to be a rush to buy them. Even the $300 to $500 ear buds seem to sell quickly when on sale. In the last year our local Nebraska Furniture Mart put in a high end headphone area so I assume they wouldn't do that if the demand wasn't there. Your friends business, do they do high end headphones? That seems to be where it is headed, at least from what I read on the forums. The young people would rather pay $1000 on a pair of headphones than on a pair of speakers. As far as vinyl increasing, I have no idea. I do see it mentioned a lot in deal groups now whereas 10 years ago it never came up. Is there a difference musically from a record or a digital copy (not compressed) if they both are done from the master recording?

 

[blasterman]

Technically vinyl is already compressed due to its limited dynamic range.

If you like analog stuff you need to check out Techmoan on youtube. He has a great channel and digs into a lot of retro formats and gets them working.

 

[mrpizzaface]

Not so sure about that - any data? I also wonder who is buying vinyl - I'd wager its not young people. I've got a couple of friends in the hi-end stereo equipment business and they say its dying out. Personally, I gave up on vinyl years ago - just didn't have the energy to do what was necessary to keep my records in good condition. Plus, hi-rez digital formats were going to dominate the market .... that didn't really turn out to be the case LOL.

I purchase between 50 and 100 records per year. I’m 44.