I’m curious to know what will stack upon one another in the music landfills of the future. Something tells me they’ll be shiny like jewels in cases, tiny orbs refracting rainbows back at the sun. Times change. Technology evolves and weeds out the weaker links like Darwin’s garden. But some things remain the same; the classic constant, maybe phased but never fatally dazed – in this case, the LP.
It used to be all about singles for me. I’m talking tapes. The paper sleeve that would crease just a little bit more on each insertion; the black reel to reel that you would scrunch too often, forcing you to stick a pencil in the bottom to flip it back over; the pop of the deck when the side hit the end. “Practicality” was not yet a word in my vocab. But phrases like, “U Can’t Touch This,” “Ain’t Too Proud To Beg,” “Ice Ice Baby,” “That Girl Is Poison,” and “Let’s Talk About Sex” all existed.
Then came along the CD revolution in the early 90s, but I kept it pretty real with the singles. Add to vocab, “Kiss Me Back,” “Slam,” “True Fuschnick,” “They Want Efx,” and “OPP.” Also add, “lazer,” “scratch,” and “skip.” Blasting from my Mega Bass Sony box that I got for Hanukah were a whole slew of other words that I could never share with my parents but felt all-the-fresher for memorizing (even if I only comprehended half of them). The single format was so pure. No intros, skits, interludes, outros or formulaic filler cuts. Only the most banging heaters, skimmed by some major label big wig from the top of the pop melting pot. There was even an eye level row at the Wharehouse (my local music outlet / video rental spot) that would take the guesswork out, pointing me to the hottest gold and plat cats of the moment. Those were the days.
As I matured, I began to understand and appreciate the full-length. The intricacies explored and concepts achieved through a fifteen track journey. Personality, depth, humor, tension, intermission, and resolution. Admittedly though, I still found myself skipping around to my choice cuts, wearing off the paint on the “Repeat” button from continuous touches.
Music was more than an intangible floating consortium of sound in time. It was an actual thing, a commodity, something that you could hold, and see, and break, complete with album art and inserts, liner notes and lyrics. It had character and nuance and provided the owner a sense of investment and thus, a connection to the artist. You had to leave the house, ride your bike/car for miles, find a spot to park, walk in the store, find the proper section, finger through hundreds of titles, analyze cover art, make a selection, carry it to the cash register, pull out your wallet, pay, put the change back in your wallet, walk back to the bike/car, but as you’re leaving the security sensor goes off accidentally, so you go back to the register, they desensitize the purchase again, you walk out (again), hop back on/in your bike/car, ride back home, unlock the door, bust open the shrink wrap, pop the disc in the player and then… actually hear the music. The physicality of not only the product but the process made it a trillion times more rewarding.
Now, in this digital age of ripping (off), downloading, and sharing, technology has taken the work out of an esoteric art form. Music has become long lists of bit rates, file format abbrev.s, and metadata tags. It’s now shamefully easy to download any album you have the knack to hear. Why would anyone buy a CD? If you are having doubts, try this little exercise I developed…
Step One: Think of any album you want to own (and I use the word “own” loosely).
Step Two: Type in the Artist Name, Album Title and the word “BLOGSPOT” into a Google search.
Step Three: Click on any of the top five results and find the download link within the post.
*If this doesn’t work you have two options:
a) go out and buy it
or
b) go fuck yourself
I was stuck in denial for some time, covering my eyes as fellow music heads pointed me towards the impending Death of the CD. Maybe it’s because I had invested so much time and money into the shiniest of formats, or maybe it was the purist in me who had grown to cherish the “press play and let the album do the work” approach. Either way, the Compact Disc can now be buried alongside the 8-track and tape in the Family of Forgotten Formats wing of the graveyard.
But the vinyl LP just won’t disappear. The original household conveyor of sound left for extinction some twenty years ago, refuses to go quietly. Bulky, analog, space consuming, easily damaged, effort demanding, and at least 4x times the production cost of a CD, the record is experiencing a resurgence that goes against common sense but pivots on the very nature of music: Feeling.
In short, nerds still need something to hold.
As music acquisition gets easier and more homogenized by the nano-sec, it has become a decree of a fan’s hipness and individuality to opt for inconvenience. Vinyl requires work from the listener. Placing the wax on the platter, manipulating the needle, flipping it over upon a side’s completion – a less isolated, more organic music experience that one grows to relish with time. It’s the aged wine to MP3’s frat boy keg stand. And as such, vinyl collecting has taken on an air of snobbishness unrivaled in music consumption. With in-your-face art, like band t-shirts or posters, records are branded merchandise that show off a fan’s allegiances. An assertion of “mine not yours” accumulation that emphatically stomps out the pervasive presence of unabashed sharing and begs the question, “How cool are you?”
But don’t get me wrong, despite the rapid spike in vinyl sales over the past few years (officially up 89% from ’07 to ’08, not even including independent retailers, used sales and ebay), vinyl still remains a niche market, thwarted by digital singles and albums. To put things in perspective, LP sales were a measly .01 percent of the total units of music sold last year according to the Nielson SoundScan.
The digital tide is clearly the wave of the future, but the commodity still has a draw, albeit not as attractive as before. Many major labels are amping up their vinyl offerings for the first time in decades and a growing amount of LP releases now include download cards. This hybridized release style may prove to be the only way to sell music physically as time transpires.
So where do we go from here?
(The Million Dollar Question)
Who knows, but my thought is that something tactile must remain in the mix. Collectors’ items, art, apparel, exclusive incentives, free tacos, something… anything REAL that will elicit desire in order to stand out against a growingly convenient and mindless digital market.
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