The End of CD's

[elser]

And don't forget the move towards streaming with Apple buying LaLa. Those guys at Apple are so cryptic about anything they've got up their sleeves but surely they're cooking something up in that direction. Could have interesting implications for pirated music as well. If they were to start selling licenses to simply listen to music that is kept on their servers rather than selling the actual sound file.

For music creators though, thumb drives are really great and getting cheaper all the time.

[billg1]

Since I'm in the pre-production process of a new release I've really dug my heels in to do a lot of research since this thread started. I actually have come to some conclusions so thanks for starting this!

Main conclusion . . . .after sorting through a zillion threads concerning the piracy issues i've learned that most casual music consumers really don't think the music has value as "art" anymore & also because they really don't understand the financial commitment an artists makes in the CREATION of the music. In other words, the only thing they understand is the value in the physical aspects of the product. Most of these folks did not think (do not think) CDs are a good "value" because they relate them to CD-Rs . . . The packaging, inserts, etc. doesn't elevate the value of a CD to $15 (and like I said, the "music" value plays very little into the picture to the casual music consumer).

After figuring that a CD doesn't have the physical value being ask, an mp3 holds less value . . . really even no value. Even though a person may admit that they cannot hear a difference between a Mp3 and a CD, they know that a Mp3 is a compressed lower quality. So a lot of people see Mp3s as a compromise . . . no value but I can load up my iPod. The artist shouldn't care because it's lower quality and after all, the artists has no financial investment in this Mp3 (therefore I'm not really stealing anything).

An interesting note . . . the decline of CD sales is in direct proportion to the rise in iPod sales (no surprise there) . . . but the resurgence of vinyl is in direct proportion to the decline of CD sales and increase in iPod sales. Vinyl buyers talk about the "love" of the music and enjoyment of physical product which you don't hear much from the CD buyers or hardly at all from the Mp3 downloaders. So people who love music will spend money if they see value, right now they have no choices.

IMO there needs to be a new format that shows an artist's financial commitment to their art while at the same time something that consumers won't automatically place in the DIY or overpriced type of product like CDs/CDrs/Mp3/jumpdrives etc. It should be something that involves an investment to manufacture. If people who love your music know that you have invested in it they will be more likely to spend money on it.

The majority of Alt/Country artists are releasing and SELLING product on vinyl for all of these reasons. Vinyl is a very poor distributioin choice but right now it's the only thing that true music lovers will pay for . . . it's obviously not CDs or mp3s.

So CDs are dead, Mp3s suck, and vinyl is "clumsy" at best. There really needs to be another/better physical product for the industry to survive. In the meantime think about this . . . After buying the songwriting books, after buying all the gear, after all of the blood/sweat & struggling to learn how to use all of this to make a decent product . . . after all of this . . . do you really want to distribute your music as only a lower quality option like Mp3?

If as artists we decide the music isn't worth any distribution investment we can only expect that the people who might "love" our music will feel the same way.

and now I'll climb off the soapbox!

[mazz]

Some excellent observations, Bill!

I wonder if it's ever really only been about the music. Here's why I say that:

At the Road Rally, Ariel Hyatt was talking a lot about an artist creating "value" for their fans above and beyond the music. In fact, the music is a teaser for getting the fan involved in the artist's life and work. It's up to the artist these days to do what a label used to do: branding, promotion, "buzz", distribution. When you bought a vinyl album back in the "day", you were not only holding the delivery medium for the music, you were holding the artist's and label's vision for presenting that artist's music. The album cover art, any words written on the cover by the artist, possibly lyrics, etc. I'd spend hours looking at the cover while listening to the music trying to get a further glimpse into the soul and creative process of the artist/band. The package was a huge part of the experience. And then the label would put the artist on tour and they would do radio interviews and play concerts, sign albums, whatever promotion they could do, all of which would serve to enhance and reinforce the overall value of the artist to their fans over and above the music! Any extra interviews in Rolling Stone or tabloid attention further enhanced that perception of value to the die hard fan.

Now with the advent of downloads and postage stamp sized album "art" viewed on an ipod, it's even harder for an artist to create a brand and a buzz without the promotional muscle and reach of a label. Hence the rise in artists on Twitter, MySpace, FB, etc. If you look at successful indie artists, those without the support of a label, they have zillions of friends online and they are out gigging and promoting as much as possible, all on their own dime! But without doing that, they wouldn't be selling music, not to mention t-shirts, stickers, etc., which it seems like have taken the place of actual music as something of value you can hold, wear, etc.

I think an artist could do something like "if you buy the entire mp3 album, you get access to download full CD quality versions of 5 songs as well as pdfs of album art that you can print out and a login to see exclusive videos of recording sessions, backstage footage, etc." This gets them hooked on you as an artist above and beyond the music, which again is just a teaser to get them "in the door" so they will be a fan for life and buy cups, shirts, stickers, etc.

Honestly, I don't think much has changed on a basic level as far as the necessity of promotion goes, it's just that the job of branding and promoting is now in the hands of the artist and the delivery medium of the music has changed. And unfortunately, I think that musicians and a certain number of audiophiles and rabid music lovers are the only ones that truly care about the recording quality these days. Most albums are mixed so they sound good on ear buds and are highly compressed so they can be heard over the sound of whatever environment the ipod listener finds themselves in.

So maybe your market is people who really care about sound and the delivery medium. If that's true, then maybe a high resolution DVD audio release along with a limited vinyl release is the way to go and use the mp3 sales as a way to get people over to your site to order the higher quality product. You may have to do some advance promotion and surveying of your potential audience to find out what they want. It seems to me you'd be better off selling 500 vinyl albums at 15 bucks each to lifelong fans than trying to sell a ton of downloads at 99 cents to whoever happens to land on your music on itunes by accident.

It's a crazy time right now for an artist!

Good luck, I wish you the best with your music!

Mazz

[deankripp]

I've had a couple of chats with some tech industry execs in the last month and started doing some of my own research on the possible future delivery systems for music (and other media). I have found that there are currently billions of dollars being invested on the belief that in the not-too-distant future we will get all of our product from what they are calling "The Cloud."

What I am hearing is that real soon there will be no more downloading, no vinyl, no more cd's or even personal hard drives for storage.... everything we want or will buy will be stored in "The Cloud" on some distant servers at some hard-drive farm. We will stream everything. Your entire music, movies, games catalog (etc...) will all be available on your wireless cell-phone type device anywhere and everywhere you can get a signal (which will be everywhere eventually). There will be no more physical ownership of media...

That is kind of hard for an "old-school" guy like me to swallow - but I only need to look to history to see that this kind of advance has always taken place.

Sure, I love my vinyl, but imagine being that guy (or gal) 100 years ago who loved riding his horse every where he went. He fed it, cared for it, nurtured it back to health when it was ill - his horse was like a member of the family. There was no way that he would ever think of getting one of those new "Model A" or "Model T" car thingys.... But, someone saw that there was a whole lot of money to be made by building cars, constructing roads, opening up gas stations etc... and pretty soon our horse guy was out of luck. Oh, he could still have his horse - but now he could only ride it out in the pasture - not into town anymore... Yes, I love my vinyl - I have over 2000 records - but there's a whole lot of money-to-be-made that is driving my vinyl out to pasture.

The more things change the more they stay the same.

What does this mean for us??? I don't know.

I've also had a couple of interesting conversations lately about the sociology of music. In my day, I bought and album, brought it home, put it on the best system that I could afford, sat down in front of those big speakers and listened to it over and over again while pouring through the liner notes and credits and analyzing the cool artwork. The album, the artist, the artwork and the musicians had my "full attention" for days and days on end....In 2010 all the kids (and many adults) have an Ipod and listen to music while they are "doing other things" or they have music on their cell that they play while they are "doing other things" or they listen on their computer while they are "doing other things" like surfing the web.... Is it possible that music has gone from the forefront of our lives to the background of our lives?

Again, what does this mean for the musical artist of today? I'm not sure. Personally, I'm not trying to be an artist so I'm not really concerned with figuring that one out. I am, however, trying to write, record and produce music so I am curious where it is all going. Right now, I am just betting on that wherever it does go, whether we get our music from The Cloud or the whole world goes back to vinyl - whether we write music to be front and center in someone's life or whether it is the background soundtrack to their other activities.... whatever way it goes, I'm banking on people still wanting well written, well produced and well performed music... I'm guessing too, that the human mind will still be conditioned to want to hear catchy hooks and powerful choruses... maybe I'll be proven wrong - but I don't think so....

My suggestion is to let the invention of new technology and those who seek to exploit it for their monitory gain take us where it will.... It matters not - just go write and produce some friggin' great stuff - and it will find it's way.



dean k

[billg1]

My situation is that right nowI have an opportunity where the other artists I have to compete with have CD and Vinyl releases & the program directors admit that a vinyl release sets an artist apart (as far as a promotional tool).

I don't love the idea of paying for a vinyl release(don't even own a turntable) but it looks as though I'm gonna have to figure out a way to pay for studio time and a combination CD/Vinyl release if I'm to move forward with this opportunity.

Most program directors still seem to prefer having physical, retail packaged CDs sent to them. CDs aren't quite dead yet. (maybe on their last breath!)

[Hookjaw Brown]

Dean

Pouring over liner notes..........When I put together my last album, my sweet wife said the liners notes I wrote were the best part of the CD! (of course she had heard the songs in the various stages so many times that she would gag).

My friend released his last CD with a 12 page liner (book).

The ability to constantly update a song that is stored in the Cloud is also a cool thing. It is nearly impossible to re-release an updated CD if you have rewritten parts of a song. As we learn new Tricks we constantly update our songs for performance till they don't sound much like the last years release. I just tell our fans to go and download the new release and tell me if they like it better. The cost of updating a song is not huge, most of the work was done in the beginning. The fans dig it. When they buy a new release it is part of the deal. Any marketer will tell you that the first sale is the hardest, with the least profit....it is the second sale that makes money. Find your fans and cherish them.

DJ's and spinners used to use nothing but vinyl for their dance beats.....they have gone to CD's because they will last a few gigs longer. Go tell.

[Hookjaw Brown]

I have another question....the EQ for vinyl is wierd, and special vinyl mastering dudes with special EQ and ears would cut the disc before plating with nickel. Test stamping would be done, then the production run. Four color printing of the Album Cover was expensive along with assembling the protective sleeve, inserting the record, and shrink wrapping the album. Who does this nowadays?

All those guys with the special ears must be out of the business by now.

I have a turntable and high end cassette player. I have them wired into a good A/D converter and right into a DAW to try and reprocess them into something listenable. Nearly impossible for me. Extremely time consuming. I only do it to old vinyl and recordings of dead friends.

[mazz]

There was a special EQ curve for vinyl called the RIAA curve, which basically applied a rolloff on the highs and lows while mastering the master disc and then was built into all phongraph preamps to basically "decode" the RIAA curve in reverse on playback in your house. This was out of physical necessity because of the physics of cutting a groove and what too many highs or lows would do to the poor little needle vibrating inside the grooves. You could never get away with translating a CD directly to vinyl without the curve, the needle would jump out of the grooves. With the advent of the CD, we could now get away with massive bass response that we could never get out of vinyl records. The only people that ever heard that bass response in those days were the ones in the studio listening to the master tape prior to the disc mastering guy getting ahold of it! Ever wonder why a record didn't have more than a certain number of minutes on each side? It's because there was a tradeoff between the volume of a record (the width of the grooves, essentially) and the amount of vinyl real estate available, which was the time domain. There was a Todd Rundgren album I used to listen to a lot "A Wizard, A True Star", and it was long, and he put a note on the cover that basically said you would have to crank up the volume because of the length of the music on both sides!!

There's still people that cut masters for vinyl. I know Michael Romanowski here in San Francisco, and they do it at his place on Mission Street (in the old Coast Recorders building, BTW, home of several Neil Young and Santana records, among many others!), and he's not an old guy, so there's still those folks around!

http://www.michaelromanowski.com/

BTW: Here's a good article by Michael on mastering. A very good read, IMO:

http://www.michaelromanowski.com/5-thin ... o#more-365

[fusilierb]

"The Cloud" IS the next delivery method. It only makes sense (until an electro magnetic bomb is dropped and we're all back to sticks in the mud, but I grew up in the country, I'm gonna be fine ). But until then, think about it. It can deliver any bitrate and can adjust "on the fly" depending on the device its going to.

Everyone is going to have a device to capture it. Even your grandma! And it just the makes the most sense. My entire album collection lives "in the cloud" so I can get to it anywhere I have a device to access it. And I have an iPhone, which means ANYWHERE. (except, of course, San Fransisco and New York, thanks ATT)

I've kind of made my living off the cloud off the past three years by modifying databases that are "cloud based". They provide the storage and backup, they build the huge infrastructure necessary to really house and protect these machines and you essentially rent space. It's kind of a trip, but it makes a lot of sense.

It's going to deliver ALL of your content sooner than you think. It already delivers all of mine. But I'm a nerd.

In the meantime, I think personalized thumb drives are a great way to deliver content!!

B

[billg1]

here's a list of manufacturers for vinyl, a loit of them master or have links to those who do
http://www.totalsonic.net/vinylplants.htm

When I first heard about this "resurgence" a couple of monts ago it pretty much blew my mind, but thinking it was just with the more "old school" types of artists it made a little sense (google Americana chart and see if you can discover one charted artist w/out a vinyl release) . . . but many younger groups are going to vinyl releases . . . among others Paramore's new release is on vinyl and reportedly is selling in that format. I don't think the vinyl sales have been much more than a blip on the radar but sales are so bad that even a blip is welcome.

The idea of owning physical product is mostly what interviewed younger people mention when they talk about buying vinyl. The "cloud" doesn't do much to satisfy that, in fact that's the kind of thing that will probably give a boost to the "vinylites". It's a ccol way for musicians and others to store info but there is a segment of music buyers who are wanting to experience something other than small and portable, and it appears that they are willing to pay for it even in these bad economic times. When you stop and think of the implications of that it's pretty mind boggling. If I had the money to invest I would be looking at something NEW to replace the physical product market because I'm pretty sure that the resurgence in vinyl is ONLY because of a lack of choices. Most consumers feel ripped off by the marketing of CDs, know that most of the money did not go to the artists and now feel like they were never worth what was being ask for them. Come up with a new physical product with real value and you could own the market.

Maybe in the future all of the "oldtimers" will be diggin' the cloud thing and kids will be spinning wax!