OMG, People Buy Records? Vinyl In The News Thread

its the HOT STAMPER dude - http://www.wired.com/2015/03/hot-stampers/

fuckin' audio oenophiles

http://img1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130209140042/house-of-cards/images/6/6a/Doug_page.png

here come the hot stamper

I've seen two medicine commercials with record shoppin' scenes.

http://jesseengland.net/index.php?/project/universal-record/

That's rad. Feel like I could make a better one. Would anyone buy it?

Stereo would be tough.

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/arts-entertainment/we-get-that-fcking-vinyl-is-back-says-everyone-2015041597356

record libraries are newsworthy now? this is a strange place in as much as it's a beautiful building containing not really all that many records:

http://www.factmag.com/2015/05/28/seoul-music-library-understage-vinyl-library/

aaaaaagh kill me now

"the warm and wonderful crackle of vinyl was finally fighting back against cold, compressed MP3s"

https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2016/dec/09/vinyl-record-sales-up-but-indie-labels-dont-see-benefit

(article is actually OK imo)

In April 2015, when Sonic Cathedral joined forces with Bristol agent provocateurs Howling Owl to begin our Record Store Day Is Dying campaign, we flippantly suggested that every day should be a record store day.

hmm, where have I heard this before?

it's over, y'all

https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-vinyls-boom-is-over-1500721202

When is the "hiding your dumb vinyl story behind a paywall" boom gonna end tho

Repost here (scroll down a bit):

http://www.reddit.com/r/vinyl/comments/6oxff7/why_vinyls_boom_is_over_gillian_welch_david/?st=j5gv5hhr

https://www.channelnews.com.au/vinyl-sales-slump-quality-blamed/

In the first half of 2015, sales of vinyl records jumped 38% compared to the same period the prior year, to 5.6 million units, Nielsen Music data show.

A year later, growth slowed to 12%. This year, sales rose a modest 2%. “It’s flattening out,” says Steve Sheldon, president of Los Angeles pressing plant Rainbo Records. While he doesn’t see a bubble bursting—plants are busy—he believes vinyl is “getting close to plateauing.”

Old LPs were cut from analog tapes—that’s why they sound so high quality. But the majority of today’s new and re-issued vinyl albums—around 80% or more, several experts estimate—start from digital files, even lower-quality CDs. These digital files are often loud and harsh-sounding, optimized for ear-buds, not living rooms. So the new vinyl LP is sometimes inferior to what a consumer hears on a CD.

“They’re re-issuing [old albums] and not using the original tapes” to save time and money, says Michael Fremer, editor of AnalogPlanet.com and one of America’s leading audio authorities. “They have the tapes. They could take them out and have it done right—by a good engineer. They don’t.”

As more consumers discover this disconnect, vinyl sales are starting to slow. In the first half of 2015, sales of vinyl records jumped 38% compared to the same period the prior year, to 5.6 million units, Nielsen Music data show. A year later, growth slowed to 12%. This year, sales rose a modest 2%. “It’s flattening out,” says Steve Sheldon, president of Los Angeles pressing plant Rainbo Records. While he doesn’t see a bubble bursting—plants are busy—he believes vinyl is “getting close to plateauing.”

is this really the reason vinyl sales are slowing, that newer vinyl consumers are realizing the source is digital, not analog? i doubt it. later on it says another reason is the high cost of vinyl and that maybe seems more likely to me. people maybe getting tired of paying $30-$40 for an album

I do think more people are aware of the "4 Men With Beards" style of crap CD-sourced pressings. But I'd imagine the stupid prices factor into it as well. Also, not as cool as it used to be, thankfully.

lol

Resurgence Of Vinyl Is Secret IKEA Conspiracy To Sell Storage Units, Claims Former Employee

(not a serious article)

"This At-Home Vinyl Record Cutting Machine Could Change Mixtapes Forever"

Likely nothing more than a novelty, but a fun idea.

https://www.okayplayer.com/music/world-first-home-vinyl-record-cutting-machine-set-2020-release.html

everything is so fucking expensive and it’s getting worse. Fuck this shit.

yeah the bubble's never going to pop it's awesome

secondhand-wise i'm still finding great &/or interesting stuff at decent prices, but new releases/reissues no thanks (with the odd exception)

Still gonna be a while yet before the Earnest New Vinyl Collectors of the aughts start getting divorced, downsizing, and/or dying

yeah but it'll happen
& some kids will get lucky the way i did when a bunch of suckers "upgraded" to CDs in the late 80s
good times, somewhere down the road

Rainbo Records pressing plant closes in Los Angeles. They pioneered the flexi-disk.

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/music/story/2020-01-27/rainbo-records-vinyl-pressing-plant-closes

everything is so fucking expensive and it’s getting worse. Fuck this shit.

yeah flipping through the new arrivals at the local store I saw a bunch of LPs that I could swear were $1-3 back when I started collecting a decade ago that are now priced around $8-12. I understand it in the case of Gentle Giant or XTC, since those bands always seem to attract the more obsessive types and there aren't exactly a ton of copies floating around, but mixed in there was a $12 copy of Thriller, which last time I checked was one of the highest selling albums ever. there was a $7 copy of the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack, an album which every thrift store on the planet used to have a half-dozen copies of. I just spent 10 bucks on a copy of Gary Numan's Dance, which is about the sum total I paid for his first four. I could've gotten Dance for a buck or two back then but I didn't feel like it. It was one of those albums you couldn't give away.

Condition is everything, were these (Thriller, SNF) in great condition? Because I imagine most copies out there are beat to shit.

i don't even bother going through dollar bins/3 for 10 bins or w/e anymore, should i?

i see copies of dance going for $20+ these days

xp
Depends on where you're shopping.

so glad I did most of my upgrading/re-buying in the mid 2000s

it's definitely getting worse

A fire has destroyed one of the two facilities in the world that manufacture the lacquer required to press vinyl records https://t.co/SZHMmJdZM3

— Pitchfork (@pitchfork) February 7, 2020

heh I bumped a different thread but this will do

Sorry, didn't see that!

Much like the squeeze in the run up to RSD, I'm sure it'll be the small labels who really get hit hard by this

man that is a bummer

i see copies of /dance/ going for $20+ these days

i see copies of /dance/ going for $20+ these days

https://www.stereogum.com/2111728/vinyl-just-had-its-best-sales-week-ever/news/

... in the SoundScan era

the guy at the local record store definitely thinks the pandemic has helped the vinyl resurgence...kinda one of the few hobbies you can have right now

Sadly, my favorite spot in Bushwick (Northern Lights on Lawton Street) appears to have closed indefinitely, I assume undone by the effects of long-term quarantine closure. Maybe they're still maintaining their online business, but I'm not sure where that is/was. It was a super solid spot where I bought all my first jazz acquisitions and a lot more besides that, and all at non-insane prices that put every other spot in the area to shame.

(thankfully, the hole-in-the-wall Rebel Rouser, on 'hipster alley' between Belvidere and Locust on Broadway, is still kicking. you don't find as many irresistible bargains, but essentially every single record is labeled as to its condition, genre, great deep cuts, "WOW," "Beat but plays great!" etc. has a solid niche in the vague but comprehensible Nuggets->power-pop->glam->punk zone.)

I love Rebel Rouser, always hit it when I'm in NYC. Been trying to support them online a bit since I'd be sad to see them go.

OTM re:irresistable bargains/labeling. A lot of my record collector friends are super bargain-obsessed and idk I guess I'm different in that, while I love finding a spot with cheap prices obviously, I also dont really mind paying a fair price a lot of the time - as long as I know what I'm getting, trust the grading, etc, plus just liking the store, which RR checks all the boxes for me.

https://djmag.com/longreads/pressing-issues-end-vinyl-revival
no surprises but a good read nonetheless

A month ago a label I like announced one of those "first time on vinyl" reissues....for September. Maybe. It's nuts out there. A lot of the things mentioned in that article don't seem like permanent trends - virtually every industry has been affected this way the last couple years. But the markets sure do seem to assume that a bunch of albums just aren't gonna get repressed. idk if this is gonna kill interest in the format - it seems more popular than ever - but something's gotta give

guess the big question is how many people actually expect to get the record on release day to listen to for the first time, as opposed to downloading/streaming it and then buying it later if they like it. I'm in the former category but I suspect I'm very much in the minority there.

haven't been buying much new vinyl but I'm still annoyed that all this results in a lot of people delaying the release of their new music by 6 months. the Vibe Shift might have already happened and I'm late hearing it!

lol