Vinyl records make a return

also - according to wiki jack white sold 44,000 vinyl of his new album that's kinda nuts

Yeah, they were saying on Sound Opinions how its the best selling new release on vinyl since Pearl Jam's Vitalogy, twenty (!) years ago.

Vinyl for Vitalogy was released a week earlier than the CD/Cassette, iirc. Also, that vinyl for the new JW album looked beautiful, and was gimmick-packed in the best way.

Vitalogy landed in the Top 60 on it's opening vinyl week too.

yeah but but vinyl has a better chance of survival having already survived an extinction level event and rebounded

― u2 removal machine (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Sunday, September 28, 2014 1:34 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This is true on several levels: vinyl is the only format that can be played without electricity.

haha i didn't even think of that but yeah...but overall, i'd guess vinyl survives CDs just because it went though all those transitional pains of going from a mass market to a niche, specialist product and has somehow not only survived but improbably flourished...

What's the secret to finding cheap records at UO?

I used to stop by all the time assuming they'd be blowing shit out and it never happened.

Same here. I think I'll ask someone there next time. Maybe they only do it certain times as aged inventory or something.

Amazon clogs up pressing plants with most pointless reissue series ever

was in HMV yesterday and there was a sign pointing upstairs that said "Music and Vinyl"...

need that mint Dave Grusin "Theme From the Goonies" for parties

I'm happy with the prices of vinyl going up - basically this means that when I sell all the stuff I collected when nobody really gave a shit, I can make myself some serious dough! Thanks, hipsters!

get ready for the windfall! Thanks for the new ride, hipsters!
http://www.welsh-house.net/images/andy-festiva2.jpg

Have any new plants been built lately? It seems like the best thing for the industry would be Amazon or Apple or Urban Outfitters or whoever team up to build some new record plants. Then again records are made out of oil so that's more carbon from the vinyls being made and the additional pollution.

Maybe start 3D printing records in mass w recycled stuff.

I don't know about new plants in the US, but that Czech place has been building new presses for themselves.

Tesco is to tap into the rapidly growing vinyl music market this week when it sells the new album by British rock group Iron Maiden.

The Book Of Souls, the band’s first studio offering in five years, will be released on Friday, with the triple LP format going on sale in 55 of the chain’s largest Tesco Extra stores.

It is believed it will be the first time Tesco has sold vinyl albums, as CDs were the dominant format when supermarkets started selling music in the 1990s. In the past few years, the vinyl album revival has been gaining momentum, with sales increasing by more than 50% in 2014.

Vinyl has bucked the downward sales trend of other music formats such as CDs, which fell by 6.5% in the past year, and downloads, which dropped by nearly 9%. Streaming increased by 78% last year.

Tesco’s music buyer, Michael Mulligan, said: “In the last year, we began selling record decks in our largest stores and initial sales are very encouraging, so giving our customers some new vinyl to play on those decks seems like the logical next step.

“And there can be no better way to launch this trial than working with one of rock music’s most iconic bands and their eagerly anticipated new album.

“We are anticipating demand for The Book Of Souls to be as high as Iron Maiden’s last album, which was the band’s most successful to date, reaching number one in 28 countries including the UK.

“If this trial is a success, then we would consider selling more vinyl albums before the end of the year.”

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/aug/31/tesco-sell-iron-maiden-album-book-of-souls-vinyl-format

run to the tills...

That Amazon thing is silly but hardly most pointless reissue series ever, I reckon most reissues are pointless these days

when I see something with a BACK TO BLACK sticker on it in a record shop it's almost always a top 40 record that was never hard to find - at least that's my experience, I may be wrong http://www.discogs.com/label/197898-Back-To-Black

http://www.factmag.com/2015/08/26/virginia-plant-open-viny-press-motherload/

hey that's cool! wonder if they had to retool them at all, like the folks who bought those Indian 78 presses

I buy vinyl exclusively; I won't rehash the reasons because there's tons of threads like that - but as far as supply and demand goes, I will say that I would buy a LOT more new vinyl if major reissues could get priced at the point of, I dunno, new releases on Kill Rock Stars. I hear what people are saying about economies of scale and shit, and I'm no economist, but I'm pretty sure if KRS can put out a $12 record Sony should be able to. The REM cited above is a case in point, actually all their vinyl post-New Adventures has been one continuous gouge. WTF, guys?

― Doctor Casino, Friday, May 1, 2009 12:25 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I'm sure there's another thread for this but it doesn't seem quite suited to the "scams" thread... but seriously this has gotten just insane with the huge gaps in price for brand new single LPs. Slap a "180-gram" label on it and all's fair I guess - that's been true for a long while - but come on. Brand new editions of the two big Shins albums - $11 apiece. Cool! I assume it's bare-bones but you know what, I don't remember that record having any lavish extras when it first came out so who cares? Keep flipping through the bins - brand new edition of Last Splash - $25! Pod, from the same reissue campaign, is only $21 though. Every Smiths LP at least $25.

But the funniest thing by far are the $18-24 reissue copies of, like, Still Crazy After All These Years. I like that album just fine, but do the people greenlighting these releases know that anybody who wants to hear it on vinyl can find it on sale for $2 or less, in VG condition somewhere in any city in the country?

I think they're counting on people not knowing that, or not caring. There are a few oddballs who LIKE new vinyl because it's clean. In theory.

Noticed some of the majors jacking prices up recently, so a single LP is $30 on some of them. Joy Division reissues (via Rhino) went up 5-6 bucks I think. So annoying. At least there's still a fair amount of punk and indie stuff that's like $15.

But the funniest thing by far are the $18-24 reissue copies of, like, Still Crazy After All These Years. I like that album just fine, but do the people greenlighting these releases know that anybody who wants to hear it on vinyl can find it on sale for $2 or less, in VG condition somewhere in any city in the country?

The real deal HQ vinyl reissues (on Friday Music and such, mastered from original tapes) DO sound amazing, though. The people buyng them already have 10 original copies of Still Crazy.

also, rich people like new shiny things

$8 in 1980 is $23 now. They really aren't all that crazy.

I don't like 180 gram vinyl because people operating the pressing plants often don't know how to prevent warps when taking the press off, but I'll say something in defense of budget releases versus premium releases.

I buy vinyl almost exclusively, and I'm kind of indiscriminate about whether I buy used, budget, or more expensive releases (including imports). Some of the budget records I buy are clearly made with old plates. You can hear the age of the plate, and you'd often be better off buying an old used copy or finding the tracks you like on compilations.

Some of the premium releases are more expensive because they've made new plates and the label is recouping that cost. Some records just have more packaging, and you'll pay $2 or $3 extra for the packaging. Download cards (never use them) also increase the cost of new records. Licensing increases the cost of records put out by labels that don't own the rights to the recordings.

Often the actual cost of producing the music will figure into your price (which is why a house 12 inch will cost less than an LP, even though both records are basically the same piece of plastic). New (and good) masters and proper sourcing will increase the price. Bootleggy records with shitty mastering and sourcing (like those Todd Terje boots sourced from mp3s) are often very cheap. Importing a record obviously boosts the price anywhere from $5 to $10. And as you've suggested, small batches of records will cost more than large batches because of the economy of scale.

KRS has always had dirt cheap records, and I think labels like KRS have cheap releases because a) they're pros who have been putting out records for 20 years or more, b) they have low overhead, c) they stretch the life of their masters and plates, d) they have a punk aesthetic compatible with a "good enough" attitude toward their product, and e) they own all the rights to the music they put out.

Since the 90s, major labels have never stopped gouging on new records. They often press in relatively small batches, they make bullshit "deluxe" packaging decisions, they employ people who make a buttload of money, and they don't care about music fans. Major labels also have some of the worst mastering for vinyl in the industry.

xp Yeah, but he has a point that new records are still sold for $10 or $11.

Talking about old vs. new prices, last year my friend did a tribute set on his radio show for the anniversary of Tusk. He dropped some factiods between songs, the most jaw-dropping of which was that upon release, the album listed for $16.98, which is over $50 in today's money. "No way!" I thought, pulling up an inflation calculator. Whaddya know, $55.63 (as of today)!

$8 in 1980 is $23 now. They really aren't all that crazy.

On that note, inspired by the impending Petty poll roll-out, the dollar difference in the proposed issue price for Hard Promises in '81 works out to a little over $2.50 now ($8.98:$23.50::$9.98:$26.11).

brimstead, bamcquern, those are all great points. i think for me it does come down to that major-label gouging thing. i'm not at the audiopphile level where i can hear a lot of the other differences and tbh i'd be surprised if most of the intended market for these records can either. i would be comforted to know that still crazy is going to get bought by a paul simon die-hard thrilled that at last all the detail of the electric piano on "i do it for your love" will be coming through clear as a bell. but it seems fairly likely to me that if it gets bought at all it's going to be buy some ignorant newbie trying to build out their collection, who doesn't know what's out there. this would have seemed absurd to me a few years back, but in the world of #vnyl i have to reckon with this weird unfamiliar version of a vinyl consumer.

again though that's distinct from the megafan shelling out for the $150 superdeluxe box set package or whatever, where they've really bought the same album many times and are excited by this new form it's going to be in, the packaging, the object, the giant booklet printed on old set-lists, whatever. they wanna do that, more power to 'em.

was $8 the standard record price in 1981? new releases or catalog? list price or sale price? sincere questions - i wasn't there! i'm thinking of all the like, $5 "NICE PRICE" type stickers i see on stuff from that era. $5 or $6 in 1981 dollars is more like $13-15 now. it was $8-10 in the late 90s so no wonder CDs seemed like a huge rip when you'd see serious catalog filler going for $16. music industry's a racket i guess - who knew??

List price was probably $8.98 or $9.98 if you were a Steely Dan fan, so yeah you could probably get stuff on sale for less than $8. Nice price was back-catalog stuff that they sold for a few bucks less.

from wiki

This was the second Tom Petty album on the Backstreet Records label. The album's release was delayed while Petty and his distributor MCA Records argued about the list price. The album was slated to be the next MCA release with the new list price of $9.98, following Steely Dan's Gaucho and the Olivia Newton-John/Electric Light Orchestra Xanadu soundtrack. This so-called "superstar pricing" was $1.00 more than the usual list price of $8.98.[11] Petty voiced his objections to the price hike in the press and the issue became a popular cause among music fans. Non-delivery of the album or naming it Eight Ninety-Eight were considered, but eventually MCA decided against the price increase.

From what I gather (Doc, I think we're about the same age), catalog titles were usually a couple bucks less, with some corner cutting re:packaging (deleted gatefolds, exclusive inner-sleevese etc.*). A lot of stores would knock a buck or two off "New Arrivals".

*Many years ago I found a used copy of a 'budget' reissue of Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, which was reduced to two records in black sleeves inside a doublewide outer sleeve.

http://images.wolfgangsvault.com/images/catalog/detail/RS348-RS.jpg

this stevehoffman thread has some good, if all-over-the-map information. poster kwadguy cleared up the nice price for me:

In 1979, you'd pay between $5 and $7, on sale, for most front-line product. It was around this time that the labels went to a two-tiered pricing scheme (the so-called "Nice Price" for CBS, for example), and that's when you could start to get back catalog much cheaper (typically as low as 3/$10 on sale). Prior to the two tiered system, a lot of back catalog was either completely out of print or sold at a similar price to front line stuff...(maybe a buck different list in some cases).

obviously, one wouldn't expect these to just exactly track inflation. other changes in costs and most obviously in economies of scale since it's really not a mass medium. i guess i should be grateful i can buy the damn things at all... but still, those cheaper sub pop and KRS catalog releases lead me to only shake my fists at the other ones. because i'd totally buy last splash for $13, sure, what the heck.

steely dan weren't thrilled about the price hike either.

but no threats to retitle the album "gouge-o," petty wins on that one

i would be comforted to know that still crazy is going to get bought by a paul simon die-hard thrilled that at last all the detail of the electric piano on "i do it for your love" will be coming through clear as a bell.

yeah my uncle is totally one of these dudes and it's quite silly because he really can't afford to be.

but it really is mostly rich people who only want new things. used? gross!

edit: but it the expensive random vinyl thing is mostly rich people who only want new things. used? gross!

$15 is the PERFECT price for a new record.

but then I always thought that $10 would be the perfect price for a CD. and that never happened. I think there would still be CD stores if that had happened though.

I would buy 10 dollar CDs all the time. instead of the two CDs I buy a year.

it's like when thrift stores sell used CDs for $1.99. I end up buying 2 or 3. if they were a dollar I would buy 20 of them.

but then I always thought that $10 would be the perfect price for a CD.

Really? That's about what they are over here..

Yeah, I was gonna say. "Catalog items" - stuff like Dylan, Clash, even GZA and Weezer and shit - regularly sell new on CD from between $5.99 and $8.99. At least they do at my local brick and mortar (and also on Amazon)

As a result I buy CDs all the time. For one thing, it's satisfying buying something for $6 that you once might have actually had to pay upwards of $21.99 for, and for another, digitally sourced new vinyl for $28.99 vs same thing without the pops and hisses and clicks and the need to flip the side over for $6.99 = no contest.

And yes, I fully expect to become the equivalent of the weird uncle in the family who still keeps Betamax tapes. Perhaps I already am!

>> but then I always thought that $10 would be the perfect price for a CD.

> Really? That's about what they are over here..

£10 maybe, not $10

ha, so this was all starting to sound familiar and it turns out we covered a lot of this same ground on recent revive of Continuing with CDs? - down to me going on about Kill Rock Stars prices! apparently i really have a soft spot for Kill Rock Stars.

xpost well, they were for a while..

i started buying LPs because they were cheaper and i would copy them onto cassettes for the car. even the new ones were cheaper! i stocked up on so much weird early '90s indie too...god knows how much that Lake of Dracula LP was. five dollars maybe? CDs were 16 bucks, new LPs were ten or less, used LPs were five or less (i got so much classic rock during this time, all my essential Neil Young, Stones, Zeppelin, Hendrix, etc was all in that range and they were all EX or NM.

I love weird early 90s indie