
Vinyl LPs Sell More Than CDs for the First Time in 3 Decades - anigbrowl
http://www.synthtopia.com/content/2020/09/10/vinyl-lps-sell-more-than-cds-for-the-first-time-in-3-decades/
======
antfarm
I grew up with records and cassettes, but got rid of the few that I still
owned about ten years ago. MP3's and streaming were much more convenient and
everything was available in an instance. I kept the ~50 CD's as they don't
take up much room.

Three years ago, I started buying records again, the first being Bitches Brew
by Miles Davis. My main interest in music nowadays is in Fusion Jazz, R&B,
Funk and Soul Music from the early 1970's. I also got a decent Dual turntable
from the 1980's to go with the nostalgic vibe.

To me, playing a record is a totally different and more conscious experience
than playing a song on Spotify. Even just the necessity to remove the previous
record before playing the next one feels archaic in these days where
everything is available immediately. Limited availability is similiarly
humbling: not owning every record I would like to, but also not even being
able to acquire every record I'd like, as some are simply not available or
expensive collector's items.

Then of course there is the haptic sensation, plus all the information you can
get from studying the album cover. My generation's music discovery was full of
surprises, when you had a record played for you at the record store that you
mainly picked for the weird cover graphics or artist's name.

But the most important reason for me to buy records is to one day allow my
daughter to discover this strange music from more than half a century ago that
was always playing in the house when she was still young. Good luck trying to
convince a teenager to have a listen at your Spotify playlist ;)

~~~
yomly
Sorry to delve off topic but I have recently found myself in a similar point
in music but have very little background knowledge of the area as I have
basically just relied on following the rabbit hole of hip hop samples.

Can you recommend some albums to get me started?

~~~
antfarm
Some of my favorite records:

    
    
      Donald Byrd - Ethiopian Knights (1972)
      Cannonball Adderley: The Black Messiah (1972)
      The Cannonball Adderly Quintet - Country Preacher (1970)
      Jimmy Smith - Root Down (1972)
      King Curtis - Live at the Fillmore West (1971)
      
      Donny Hathaway - Live (1972)
      Baby Huey - The Baby Huey Story (1971)
      Various Artists - Wattstax (1973)
      Gil Scott Heron - The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (1974)
      Marvin Gaye  - What's Going On (1971)
      The Temptations - Masterpiece (1973)
      The Meters - Rejuvenation (1974)
    
      Miles Davis - Bitches Brew (1969)
      Miles Davis - A Tribute To Jack Johnson (1971)
      Miles Davis - On The Corner (1972)
      Weather Report - Black Market (1976)
      Jaco Pastorius - Jaco Pastorius (1976)
      Herbie Hancock - Head Hunters (1973)
      Herbie Hancock - Thrust (1974)
      Billy Cobham - Spectrum (1973)

~~~
always_swapping
You must include Miles Davis - "Live - Evil" on that list!

Other than that, I have some new albums to check out this weekend. Thanks for
the list.

------
Mizza
I love records. There are plenty of reasons why records are great that don't
usually get mentioned here.

* The big one: There is tons of music out there that isn't on streaming services. If you like punk, breakcore, UK dubstep, noise, really anything even a little bit out of the mainstream, or from the past - you can't find the best stuff on any streaming services. If I could only make one point, this would be it. Spotify! Doesn't! Haven't! Everything! You'll never dance around your living room to the good version of This Bike is a Pipebomb's 'Better Off Dead', because you don't have the split 7".

* Vinyl is a good value store. If you keep good care of your records - and you have good taste - you'll find that your collection _appreciates_ in value over time, unlike other forms which _depreciate_. Some of the records I picked up in high school are worth over a hundred bucks now! Not that I plan on ever selling them, but it's nice to know I could.

* Vinyl is something to do while traveling! It's great going to another country or city and browsing the record shops and finding something you're after, or something funky looking in the $2 bin. Random finds in dollar bins are a bit like Magic: The Gathering cards - usually crap, but occasionally brilliant. Plus, whenever you take it out, you get to remember the trip you got it on.

* Sampling. I make hip hop, and samples from vinyls just sound better with that real grit. They just do.

Records! Yeah!

~~~
bluGill
Don't buy vinyl to make money in the future. You don't know how long the fad
will last. I've seen many other collectors markets be strong for years and
then die. Buy vinyl because you love it, and don't worry about long term
value, if it goes down it just means you can get more for less money.

Don't confuse the above with making money now. There is currently a market for
vinyl and there are a number of ways you can go into business selling to that
market. However this is about flipping your inventory, not investing in it.

~~~
pessimizer
> You don't know how long the fad will last.

Also, note that if you were like me and bought records because of the music on
them, and think digital music is a very recently unimaginable blessing; this
is the time to sell. Don't wait until the bottom drops out (like baseball
cards in the 90s.)

They paid me a fortune for my record collection. My mindset was 20 years old,
and I only brought records to sell that I thought were "good" or "rare." The
prices paid for even the marginal ones convinced me to go back and fetch the
leftovers.

------
siquick
Been buying records pretty much non-stop since 97. Aside from a few pictures,
photos and gig ticket stubs, they're pretty much the only physical form of
reference to my cultural interests I have from the last 25 years.

This is probably anecdotal, but I can recall a huge amount of my collection
pretty much instantly when someone asks me which records I have by artist X,
or which records did I buy in 2019. I have the complete opposite for books I
read on my Kindle - if someone asks me which books I read last year or who the
author of the last book I read was then I find it a challenge to recall.

The tangibility of physical media just seems to give me a better connection to
the album, artist, label and songs.

But yes, moving house is an absolute pain and it's a ridiculously expensive
hobby.

~~~
soylentgraham
Who's records (new music) were you buying in the early 2000's? Genuine
question; I cant recall anyone selling releases on vinyl around then.

~~~
armadsen
Can't speak for the OP, but in the early 2000s, I was buying new-pressing
indie, electronic, and some classic rock musicians (e.g. Neil Young) on vinyl.
But mostly I was buying older used records, which at the time were cheap
(they've gotten much more expensive around here). Some of the new pressings I
bought back then go for a fair amount used now, because they were pressed in
very limited quantities and there were way fewer people buying vinyl.

------
mtts
Guy I know owned (owns) a music store. In the late 90s, he thought he knew
were things were going. He started saving up for his pension, thinking that by
2015 or so no one would be buying cds anymore.

Now, he says, his music store is doing better than ever. He was correct in
that no one buys cds anymore, but vinyl is selling like crazy. The store,
which has always been popular ever since the 1980s, is making crazy amounts of
money and his pension is becoming _very_ comfortable.

Only thing he can’t come to terms with, however, is that his younger patrons
for some reason insist on buying Dire Straits records. He can’t for the life
of him figure out how something that used to be a signifier of having
absolutely no taste in music has become so popular with music connoisseurs.

~~~
samplatt
Your bar is _way_ too high if Dire Straits is the bar for poor taste. Even for
the 90's.

Mark Knopfler's americana-spirit might be a bit much for some people, but ALL
those guys are A-class musicians and they've never done a bad song.

~~~
xioxox
Twisting by the Pool? :-) I don't dislike any others. I think this poor taste
thing seems to occur if something becomes too popular, it becomes poor taste
in the eyes of many people, even if that thing is actually good. I'm not
convinced anyone can seriously listen to Telegraph Road and say that doesn't
have artistic merit. Similarly there is Phil Collins that has a huge
background in prog rock and is a top class musician, that is now maligned by
many people because he wrote some highly catchy and accessible pop songs.

~~~
wiredfool
Dire Straits is better if you forget that they made anything past Brothers in
Arms, just like U2 probably should have stopped somewhere around Rattle and
Hum.

------
glitcher
> The supremacy of vinyl over CDs is the result of several factors.

And then goes on to cover none of those factors. I like the topic and am
interested in more info, but this tiny article is written very poorly.

I would love to read a deep dive on the pros and cons of the two, especially
about how each medium holds up over the long term. Isn't vinyl much better for
archival purposes because cd's can start to disintegrate over time? Or have
manufacturing processes improved?

~~~
brundolf
Speaking anecdotally: people I know who buy vinyl tend to do it for the
novelty/because they're audiophiles. These are the kind of people who
buy/build fancy sound systems specifically for listening to music. They
usually get a vinyl record player to go with it.

Whereas CDs are stuck in this awkward middle-ground: they're not as
evocative/interesting as records for the enthusiast, but they're not as
convenient as streaming or even MP3's for the casual listener.

Personally I still buy a CD on occasion when I want to actually own an album,
because it's a high-quality source that's easy to get onto a computer. But
there aren't a ton of usecases for doing so these days.

~~~
chrisseaton
> because it's a high-quality source

I wonder - does anyone produce and distribute streaming audio at a higher
quality than CD? A lot of people talk like CD audio is a definitive source,
but I mean it's still a limited sampling rate and a limited bit-depth.

~~~
thatcat
The full bit-depth is present on the audio cd. You can buy 24-bit 196 hz flac
from tidal as a download or you can rip it from a cd.

~~~
chrisseaton
> The full bit-depth is present on the audio cd. You can buy 24-bit 196 hz
> flac from tidal as a download or you can rip it from a cd.

Well this is exactly what I mean... what do you mean by 'full' bit-depth? It's
finite. It's 16-bit on a CD. It could be higher.

If you rip 24-bit audio from a 16-bit CD... you don't actually get any more
data, do you? What would be the point in doing that?

I'm asking - does anyone sell audio mastered and distributed at 24-bit? Or
32-bit? Better than CD quality. According to the comments here 'yes' so it
clearly isn't 'full'.

~~~
kilburn
24bit audio makes sense in the studio to avoid compounding errors from all the
effects used to produce the track, but it doesn't make sense for the final
piece because 16-bit perfectly represents everything we humans are able to
hear [1].

[https://web.archive.org/web/20200202124704/https://people.xi...](https://web.archive.org/web/20200202124704/https://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-
young.html)

~~~
chrisseaton
> 16-bit perfectly represents everything we humans are able to hear [1]

[1]:

> It's true that 16 bit linear PCM audio does not quite cover the entire
> theoretical dynamic range of the human ear in ideal conditions.

~~~
kilburn
Keep reading. Later on:

> Thus, 16 bit audio can go considerably deeper than 96dB. With use of shaped
> dither, which moves quantization noise energy into frequencies where it's
> harder to hear, the effective dynamic range of 16 bit audio reaches 120dB in
> practice [13], more than fifteen times deeper than the 96dB claim.

> 120dB is greater than the difference between a mosquito somewhere in the
> same room and a jackhammer a foot away.... or the difference between a
> deserted 'soundproof' room and a sound loud enough to cause hearing damage
> in seconds.

> 16 bits is enough to store all we can hear, and will be enough forever.

------
notRobot
Makes sense. Vinyl and cassettes are both cool retro tech. CDs are just...
meh.

I have one friend who listens to music on (or at least collects) vinyl. I have
another friend who listens to casettes and makes mixtapes. I don't know anyone
who uses CDs.

~~~
temporallobe
Personally, I consider CDs to be retro tech, after all they go back to 1977.
Though not perfect, they are the ideal audio format - uncompressed, high
resolution, excellent dynamic range, DRM-free, and compact enough to reduce
space while being large enough for at least some artwork. I do enjoy the
“experience” of vinyl records more, but after years of messing with finicky
turntables, expensive cartridges, and preamps to achieve marginally better
sound, I realized CDs had perfect sound in the first place with no fuss aside
from the occasional scratched discs. One of the problems I have with vinyl is
that with every usage you’re degrading it. For that reason I’ve stopped
playing some of my most valuable and treasured vintage records for fear of
making them unplayable. I typically make a high-res recording of the vinyl and
listen to that instead (and yes I realize that defeats the purpose of the all-
analog signal chain, but my ears can’t tell the difference).

~~~
matheusmoreira
> that defeats the purpose of the all-analog signal chain

What is this purpose?

~~~
User23
Analog is continuous and digital is discrete and that implies a loss
information. Theoretically at least, any digitalization in the signal chain
involves a significant, if not perceptible, loss in signal information
content.

Personally I'm borderline tone-deaf so I can't tell the difference, but I'm
not going to call the people who say they can tell the difference liars.

~~~
coldtea
> _Analog is continuous and digital is discrete and that implies a loss
> information._

Analog loses even more information.

First, something being "continuous" doesn't make it an accurate representation
of the original continuous signal, or a better than digital representation.
Among many factors, how deep/heavy the head goes into the groove for one
affects the fidelity of the signal and how much DR you can have (that's why
heavier vinyl is for more expensive/premium releases).

There is other loss of information between the signal (e.g. voice) and its
transfer to the vinul, more so than with digital.

Vinyl also has more compression and more equalization thrown in to cut
frequencies (heavy bass can make record player heads skip, so it's cut at
mastering).

Cassete tape also has more compression (loss of signal dynamic range), more
noise (loss of signal), than CDs, plus wow, flutter, etc. It's not even
comparable, despite being "analog".

Also, contrary to popular belief, and simplified "layman" posts, digital
doesn't produce "square-ized" versions of waveforms due to quantization.

If you digitally sample a pure sine wave, it comes out as a pure sine way when
you play it (you can check that on an oscilloscope).

What vinyl does offer better than CD/streaming is lack of convenience (I
consider it a pro: it forces more focus and dedication when listening), better
tactility, better collectible value, better sentimental value (patina, etc),
and extremely better showcase for the cover art.

~~~
mywittyname
> Also, contrary to popular belief, and simplified "layman" posts, digital
> doesn't produce "square-ized" versions of waveforms due to quantization.

I've known musicians who think this way! So it's not just layman.

Anyone who thinks this should look up the Nyquist–Shannon Theorem.

------
systemvoltage
I got into the whole thing and now my records are shelved in the attic and
tone arm has been dead for over 5 years. Records are a real pain in the ass. I
understand its a hobby, good for you.

[https://i.pinimg.com/originals/b2/7d/cb/b27dcb7a032184951f28...](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/b2/7d/cb/b27dcb7a032184951f287de69c6fd63f.jpg)

~~~
armadsen
I got into vinyl in my teens (I'm in my mid 30s now), before the "vinyl
revival" really started. I still listen to and buy it as much as I ever did,
and my collection is quite large. I also listen to digital music, both
streaming and stuff ripped from my CDs, downloaded from download cards that
come with vinyl, and digitized directly from my LPs. There's certainly room
for both. But when I put music on for the family, or want to sit down and
really _listen_ to a record, it's always on vinyl. To each their own, but this
statistic itself shows that there are plenty of people who truly enjoy and
find value in vinyl.

~~~
dsubburam
Does vinyl work well for classical music (what I listen to mostly)? I've seen
posts like the following saying that the large dynamic range isn't captured
well (in particular, soft sections sound too noisy):

[https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/what-s-wrong-with-
cla...](https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/what-s-wrong-with-classical-
music-on-vinyl)

Curious to hear your/others' more recent/informed experience.

~~~
te_chris
Vinyl is terrible for complex classic music - orchestral. ~40db of dynamic
range against nearly 100 on CD and more on SACD

~~~
systemvoltage
People have downvoted you because you speak truth and provide facts. HN, we
can do better.

------
qalmakka
I think the main reason CDs outpaced vinyl records in sales in the last
decades was convenience. CDs are smaller, players are more compact and they
can be read and burnt by computers easily and on the cheap.

Nowadays you can just connect your phone to your car and stereo using
bluetooth, or stream everything everywhere from Spotify or Apple or Youtube,
so physical media such as the CD or a record has become more of an experience
than a necessity, and I think that taking a record out of its sleeve and
playing it is much more satisfying than just popping a CD in; it's a
pleasurable experience in itself, and not just a way to play music.

I think it's like how riding a horse has become a leisure activity nowadays,
because people don't need them as a tool for their daily activities any more.

~~~
dfxm12
...and as CD burners and players become less ubiquitous, it follows that CD's
are becoming less convenient. New cars still have CD players, but not
necessarily new computers or home audio players. In the mid 90s, there were at
least 5 CD players in the house: 2 stereos, 1 discman, PSX, PC. Now I have 1:
PS4.

------
RedShift1
If only they would master CD's properly... The loudness wars really killed the
audio quality and persists to this day. That's probably one of the reasons why
people associate harsh and sharp to digital audio, even though CD made before
the loudness wars sound absolutely brilliant.

~~~
stan_rogers
No, the very earliest brick-wall filtered CDs were far, far worse, and largely
where the CD's poor reputation came from. The ability to oversample and
downsample largely dealt with the truly grating effects of phase shift in the
higher frequencies (harmonics being nowhere near in proper phase with the
fundamental tones). The godawful remasters once the technical problems were
overcome just added insult to injury, really.

~~~
AdmiralGinge
Either way, it seems like the whole debate is kind of misplaced. Analogue and
digital systems have pros and cons, but crappy mastering will make almost
every single one of them irrelevant in terms of sound quality.

Personally I think vinyl often sounds better simply because it takes a higher
quality of engineering to make it work at all. It's the limitations of the
medium that mean you can't just compress it halfway to buggery and crank the
loudness up like you can with a CD.

------
dusted
I bought Ladytron's new album, i got FLAC+Cassette.. I have a cassette player
in my car, and was looking forward to listening to it there. I was very
dissapointed to find the tape of absolutely horrible (by tape!) quality, it
sounded so bad I couldn't use it.. Totally a gimmick. I ended up just
recording the flac files onto another, blank tape and they sound just fine (by
tape standards, actually, by most standards).

I hope the new-vinyl is not as gimmicky as new-cassette.

~~~
menybuvico
The mastering of the newer generation of metal records is usually done for
digital, and they don't really re-master anything for the vinyl release. Most
new vinyls sound OK, but in most cases a record released in the late 70's or
late 80's will blow a new one straight out of the water.

Many, many vinyls come with digital downloads, though. Personally, I like
having a physical media to hold on too. I'm almost too old to hear any actual
difference anyway. :D

------
LeoPanthera
By dollar value, not by units sold. In 1H 2020, CDs sold: 10.2 million,
records sold: 8.8 million.

So the headline is extremely misleading.

~~~
armadsen
Yeah, I agree that's misleading, but I don't know about _extremely_. The fact
that sales are within a few 10s of percent is pretty remarkable, and I say
that as someone who has been avidly buying vinyl since the early 2000s when
CDs were still selling an order of magnitude or more units. Of course, vinyl
sales have grown, but just as importantly online music sales and streaming
have caused CD sales to decrease sharply over the past 10-15 years.

------
jmull3n
I'm a DJ that likes pretty underground house and techno. Most of the vinyl I
purchase isn't available in any other form, and will tend to be made in a
limited quantity. I find that this creates much more memorable performances
that make them stand out from others. Vinyl's fun to DJ using turntables but I
can't say the same with CD's. They're just inconvenient and I'd rather use an
USB that stores more files. I think there's also a pretty big myth around
vinyl sounding better, which might contribute to the popularity of it.

~~~
schrijver
For me the trend of labels releasing vinyl-only limited edition feels quite
elitist, i.e. if you’re somehow not ‘in the know’ than you don’t get to enjoy
the music. I prefer labels offering the choice between a limited edition vinyl
and an unlimited edition digital download. That way the people that care about
owning and spinning the rare object still get that experience and those who
discover the record two months later can still buy the digital version and
experience it.

It happens all the time that I discover music on Bandcamp, and since I’m not a
super connoisseur it has been released for some time and the vinyl has long
since sold out, but I can buy the digital version and enjoy it and spin it at
parties and thus share the experience.

~~~
globular-toast
Back in the day, it wasn't done due to elitism but rather necessity. Vinyl was
the only distribution format for club tracks because of the unique way the DJ
can physically manipulate the record for the purposes of beat matching,
cutting and scratching. Since a mass production of vinyl incurs a large
initial overhead lower quality "white labels" were produced in small numbers
for newer releases.

Nowadays I'm sure it's just done for marketing purposes, though, as there's no
reason not to release the track digitally.

~~~
crtasm
A lot of the releases I listen to are only sold as short runs of vinyl due to
unlicensed samples.

------
crispyambulance
It's not too shocking. To be fair, CD's, Vinyl and Cassette are _all_ legacy
media at this point.

A real shocker would be a decline of streaming in favor of Vinyl/CD. That
ain't ever gonna happen. Welcome to the future.

~~~
bob1029
I wouldn't be so sure about all of this. I just bought a copy of the You Only
Live Twice soundtrack in physical CD format because my streaming provider
(Spotify) only offers 3 tracks from the album. Repeat this story for anything
not created in the last 20 years.

The realization that I could permanently lose access to some older media just
by way of my streaming providers not caring to continue carrying the tracks
has reignited my datahoarder spirit animal.

For some reason the thought of losing access to movies and TV shows is
substantially less troubling to me than the thought of losing access to more
obscure forms of music.

------
the_other
I recently made the decision to only buy 2nd hand vinyl (and thus not often),
and for all my new music to be digital. Bandcamp, Bleep.com and Beatbport are
simply amazing in their own ways.

Digital music is easier to carry (I sometimes DJ). I also wonder if digital
has a lower environmental burden overall, compared with new vinyl. I've not
done any research; in fact, I don't even know how to begin such research.

I used to love "albums". I've definitely moved to playing more singles. Partly
through DJing again, partly through the convenience of Spotify... but I think
mostly because there's so much new music that if I'm listening to an album and
don't enjoy half of it, that's time I could have used finding the good singles
from another album. I don't claim this is a good practice, only that it's a
novel perspective I've gained recently and offer it up for inspection.

~~~
sjm
For me it's vinyl for the albums I _really love_, and digital/streaming for
anything else. I understand buying digital ultimately supports the artists
more, but as a library/collection, digital files just can't compare to LPs or
even CDs.

~~~
52-6F-62
I do the same. And most new LPs come with digital downloads anyway.

These days I have kept my existing album downloads but I sub to Apple Music so
I can grab almost anything on the fly, download it so I’m not constantly
streaming (I listen to whole albums, not shuffles or playlists really) and
listen to that often at work or on the move but buy LPs for everything else.
It can just be an expensive hobby so it’s usually pretty filtered.

Also used LP shopping is just a hell of a lot of fun. Seeing how much good
stuff you can find for what it would cost for a new copy elsewhere.

------
coldtea
Well, with psycical formats dwindling to little as a total of sales, it makes
sense that the more collectible/nostalgic/hip(ster) one will win over the
other that mainly had covenience on its side (and which is now better served
by streaming)

------
OldHand2018
I remember reading a story about some folks setting up a
manufacturing/pressing shop a year or two ago. From what I remember, pressing
vinyl has a high error rate/low yield and that newer equipment improves upon
this, driving down the costs significantly.

You can probably assume that people are setting these up in most every mid-
sized or larger city, possibly even some small ones as well. So it's likely
that with a mature supply chain and a distributed manufacturing base, vinyl
will be able to have a wider variety of music and low prices (even more so
than now).

I doubt that CD manufacturing facilities are seeing any expansion at all;
probably still consolidating and controlled only by the large labels.

------
taylodl
I don't buy CDs any longer, I certainly don't buy LPs (the last time I bought
an LP was in the early 90's), and I don't stream. I _do_ buy a lot of music on
iTunes. I've stopped buying select songs too, preferring to buy albums. You
get to know the artist and their work better. When listening to music I tend
to listen to albums. For better or for worse my iPhone is now my sole music
player. The audio engineers mastering for iTunes are doing an excellent job.

------
Balgair
One thing I've noticed is that the quality of vinyl presses for recent songs
is not good. It seems worse with colored records like pinks and reds and the
like. I had to return an album three times to get a record that wouldn't skip
all over!

------
ponker
My favorite thing about vinyl collecting is that there's no digital
obsolescence. You can build a record player out of a motor and a piece of
paper. It's like having a paper book vs. an e-book or photographic slides vs.
a terabyte of JPEGs.

~~~
tialaramex
The text in the _book_ whether paper or electronic is digital, like PCM or
JPEG. The slides and vinyl decay gradually and irrecoverably even within a
lifetime.

You can illustrate the principle well enough with your player built "out of a
motor and a piece of paper" but the music will be too distorted to want to
listen to it. So I don't think this has much practical meaning.

The use of digital data means the CD transport is completely independent of
the music on a CD, if you aren't interested in spinning plastic discs and
laser diodes you can dispense with that part and keep all the audio as it was
- and indeed of course in fact we mostly did. The sound of vinyl is wedded to
the physical manifestation, the grooves, the stylus, the rotating disc, but
PCM data doesn't care how it is stored.

~~~
ponker
True all this. But still there's a joy in holding a record or photographic
slide because there's no inscrutable digital device in between the artifact
and its sensory experience. If you have a hard drive of photos you need a
device that you can't build, can't see (at the transistor level), and probably
can't fully understand to see the photos. And a hard drive of photos looks the
same as a hard drive of songs -- the specialist media has a form molded to its
content. Can't describe the joy. Just like it.

------
thrownaway954
it's great that it's selling more than cds, but that's like being the best in
the losers bracket. i don't know a single person in my life who actually buys
vinyl records. everyone i know has a spotify or panadora account.

------
sli
This doesn't really surprise me. Between music streaming, cars more commonly
having extra inputs (AUX, USB, Bluetooth), the market for CDs is probably
shrinking while vinyl appeals to the same enthusiasts year after year.

------
lmedinas
I think this is really interesting information. As Vinyl has less quality than
CDs, uses more space and its way more expensive. But I guess some people like
to get the immersion of buying a piece of music and enjoying it in a more
vintage way, of course there is nothing wrong with it.

On the other hand i find also interesting the discussion between streaming vs
physical and what motivates people to go physical when there are less and less
motivation to keep people buying physical. I speak even for myself where i
hate the idea of paying 10 Euros a month to have _all_ "borrowed" music i want
as long as i keep paying it. On the other hand buying 1-2 CDs per month
exceeds the 10 Euros budget but at least i own the media, after one year would
be more expensive than Apple Music 1y subscription. Difficult to decide which
one is more reasonable.

~~~
Xylakant
> As Vinyl has less quality than CDs, uses more space and its way more
> expensive.

Owning and listening to vinyl is a different experience. Parts of it is show.
The modern vinyl pressings often come in a beautiful packaging, nice booklets,
something to marvel at. You can look at your shelf and contemplate what you’d
like to listen to, in a way that scrolling through a playlist doesn’t. You
also pretty much have to listen to the album in the order the artist intended
to - no shuffle, no playlists, no skip.

CDs to the contrary offer little difference to digital and still use space. So
if you’re buying for the physical experience, it makes sense to go for vinyl.

~~~
mytailorisrich
> _So if you’re buying for the physical experience, it makes sense to go for
> vinyl._

I still buy CDs because I want to own a physical medium and CDs are far
superior and more practical than vinyls.

It's also actually easier to 'contemplate' a shelf of CDs than one of vinyls.
;)

I think it is that practicality that actually makes CDs less desirable than
vinyls by some. Vinyls are not very practicals and require a ritual to play,
and that's what some people are looking for and that is visible in other
trends (coffee, tea brewing, etc.). I think that 'less practical' is often
seen as 'more authentic'.

------
chrisbolt
Previous prediction was by the end of 2019, off by a few months

Discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20908197](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20908197)

~~~
sixhobbits
I'm sad that I clicked on this article and the parent one and neither had a
basic line graph showing the trend. It would answer so many questions I have
about whether on is trending up etc

------
grilledcheez
I think it is worth pointing out that the figures are from the US only. I
wonder how this compares to the rest of the world.

------
himinlomax
Better title: CDs now sell even less than LPs.

~~~
globular-toast
Neither title paints the whole picture. Vinyl LP sales have been growing year
after year for more than a decade now.

------
Tepix
I've considered buying Vinyl LPs not to listen to them but to hang them on the
wall and enjoy the large cover artwork.

------
mikece
There is the concept that constraints drive artists to make better art within
the defined limits. Vinyl has so much less tonal and dynamic information
recording capacity than CDs... today’s artists spend more effort and energy
“exploring the limits” rather than creating great art. Outside of classical
music and opera, what forms of music are unquestionably better on CD than
vinyl or cassette?

~~~
aidenn0
I have some Dire Straits albums from around 1990 on CD, and they sound
amazing. Mastering seemed to go way downhill in the late 90s.

Cassette has no advantage for me other than nostalgia, and the fact that a lot
of music wouldn't exist without such a cheaply available recording medium.

[Edit] corrected year from 1900 -> 1990

~~~
scns
nice typo. Made me laugh. Had to comment on it even though i know humour is
frowned upon.

[edit] added explanation.

~~~
mikece
It’s late and I’ve been drinking red wine... what did I misspell?

~~~
aidenn0
It was my typo. I have no CDs from 1900...

------
kekebo
There is a bit of a sad downside to vinyl: it seems to release toxic chemicals
into the air where its being played or even just stored [0]. I hope there are
ways to find alternative materials because I thoroughly enjoy the medium
overall.

[0] [https://youtu.be/aZ2czFuIYmQ?t=681](https://youtu.be/aZ2czFuIYmQ?t=681)

------
matthewfelgate
Awaits personal anecdote to contradict prevailing trend.

------
anilakar
Anecdote: I acquired a crowdfunded, limited run LP earlier this year, and it's
one of the two audio recordings I've ever bought in physical format during the
fifteen years I've managed my personal finance. I already owned the same album
in FLAC and only wanted to support the artist.

The other one was a CD album that I also owned in a digital format, but which
had to exist as a physical copy in order to be eligible for radio playback
under the bulk license at that time.

