Vinyl record on turntable
Vinyl records have completed their comeback
Vinyl outsold CDs for the first time since 1987 last year
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Scott LaMar
Vinyl record on turntable
Airdate: March 27th, 2023
Vinyl albums outsold CDs last year for the first time since 1987, according to the Recording Industry Association of America. It marked the 16th consecutive year of growth in vinyl, with 41 million albums sold — compared to 33 million CDs.
Streaming is still the biggest driver of the music industry’s growth, making up 84% of recorded-music revenue, but physical music formats saw a remarkable resurgence in the past couple of years. Even when CDs were the preferred choice for listening to music, there were record collectors who never abandoned vinyl.
With us on The Spark Monday were Derek Shaw and Phil Schwartz with Keystone Record Collectors.
Schwartz talked about why he prefers vinyl to digital,”Everybody talks about warmth. The warmth seems to be a keyword. I call it depth and texture. And vinyl is a far more high quality sound. No audio that is lost when pressing a record. It sounds just as great as a producer in the band intended.”
Shaw added,”I’ve been collecting since the Beatles came to America. I was eight at the time, and She Loves You is my first 45 and Ricky Nelson 45 as well. I Wonder. I want to hold it. I mean, yeah, you can stream and that’s okay. But I’d rather hold something physical product. I never abandoned it and it came back. We thought our show might fade away about ten years ago, and all of a sudden we started seeing young people have interest in vinyl. I can’t explain it necessarily. Maybe still has a thought, but we’re excited. I didn’t abandon something that that came back around again.”
Shaw said he started noticing younger people coming to their shows,”Probably about five or six years ago. And I’m not sure what precipitated this interest. But again, they’re collecting certain things. This 11 year old was thrilled to get a Bruce Springsteen album that joined our club. Maybe it came from her parents. Maybe they had interest in and it translated into her. But we’re finding young people coming out and you feel maybe you can better explain it. I can’t put my finger on exactly why, but I’m not complaining. I’m happy they’re coming because we want to see a resurgence. We want to see people keep the music alive. And I think it goes back to something we discussed a little bit earlier in the show. Ownership. When you have a record, when you get vinyl, you can bring it home and actually hold something in your hands. And that’s something invisible in a computer that you hit a button in your audio file with to feel.”
Album cover artwork has also become a hobby. Both Schwartz and Shaw admitted they have purchased records based strictly on an album cover they liked.
