Comments on: Teenagers Don’t Buy CDs Anymore

By: Lizzie

Lizzie — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 23:03:49 +0000

“These crazy teenagers today just don’t care about holding something tangible in their hands. They care only for the music. ”

That is because adults are show-off’s. Teens don’t care that much about collections.

I buy music for my personal use, not to show off.

By: Thomas

Thomas — Tue, 20 May 2008 20:32:18 +0000

I’d roughly 50% of my current music purchases are digital. It would probably be more but I can’t stand Itunes’ DRM protection so I only purchase online from places that do not use any form of DRM, most of whom have a vastly inferior selection to Itunes’ music store.

By: Ryan

Ryan — Wed, 14 May 2008 16:00:29 +0000

I also bought many tapes and cds in high school, but I rarely buy cds myself anymore. Before college I got into tape-trading to get concerts of my favorite bands, and these days I have thousands of concerts on cd and on my computer. I rarely use mp3s, 90% of my music is lossless (shn or FLAC). When I get a new cd (usually for christmas) the first thing I do is put it on my computer in FLAC format so that I have a backup in case my cd gets lost or scratched. The only cds I do buy myself are officially released live concerts and most of the time these are offered as a FLAC download as well.

By: Ben again

Ben again — Wed, 14 May 2008 15:24:19 +0000

The new digital age (mostly iTunes) has revolutionized music buying patterns. Bands and consumers are all digital now. CD won’t even have a pulse in a few years.

By: Jason

Jason — Tue, 13 May 2008 16:21:42 +0000

Great comment ‘someone’. Seriously, the last major label cd I bought was Wilco’s Sky Blue Sky, (Best Buy with the DVD, paid $20 I think) and before that I think it was a Jack Johnson cd (Target). I listen to Indie’s and have a ton of them as friends. These folks make their living off of cd/merch sales and there’s no better compliment then buying a few discs at a show. The money goes right to them. Indieheaven.com is my favorite site for new music (spiritual slant no doubt…great stuff though.)

Jason

By: someone again

someone again — Tue, 13 May 2008 15:47:46 +0000

..also not so much of the money goes to the artist… they get pennies per album… cd’s make money for the record label… so don’t think your so much supporting the artists by buying their albums… if you really want to support the artist go to their concert or buy their merchandise….

just an after-thought

By: someone

someone — Tue, 13 May 2008 15:44:45 +0000

something to think about… Most places the only place to buy cd’s is wal-mart and at wal-mart all you can get is edited music… most songs sound like crap when edited and some albums actually lose tracks to it…. so you can download the music for free or pay $20-25 for watered down music… I choose download…

By: Brian

Brian — Sun, 11 May 2008 03:39:39 +0000

Yeah, I can’t say that I down just pirate some music, but, like some other people said, it’s because those bands are already making plenty of money or that I may only listen to that CD once or twice. But if I’m going to actually listen to a CD, especially a new one, I’ll buy it, jewel case and all. I’m not much of a fan of iTunes because you can’t really do too much with the music since they’re all DRMs…

And, CDs do cost about 12 bucks on average.
Best Buy’s website lists:
<$6.99: 21180 CDs
$7.00-$9.99: 26851 CDs
$10.00-$14.99: 146480 CDs
$15.00-$24.99: 67222 CDs
$25.00-$49.99: 33897 CDs

So..um…yeeeahhhh…

By: Matt

Matt — Sun, 11 May 2008 02:35:08 +0000

What I find sad about the current movement in music is that the idea of an album has vanished. I think that predated, and may have even helped cause, the decline in interest in CD’s though. Everyone talks about only wanting one or two songs on a CD, and not wanting to pay for the entire CD to get them. Top 40 radio/Clear Channel/MTV/culture seems to have killed the album, let alone something as difficult as a “concept album”…

For me there may be one song, possibly even two, on an album I don’t like, if I’m willing to support the band. Sure, there are some one-hit wonders, but they are certainly a tiny percentage of what I want to hear.

Now, what I do like about this movement, is that it seems to be starting to crack the RIAA strangehold on bands. A couple of big bands have used digital means quite well (everyone knows about Radiohead and NIN). But Wilco, which is now plastered everywhere, probably owes their entire success to the internet. They were told Yankee Hotel Foxtrot was unmarketable, and were dropped by the label. They put it up on their site to download until they could get a new deal, and it sold like crazy…and now they’re quite successful.

If bands can get back to making money from performing, and stop being forced into contracts where they make virtually nothing per sale (all while being forced to pay “promotion” and all the other crap) it can only help the actual performers, rather than music labels.

By: Ben

Ben — Sat, 10 May 2008 21:07:23 +0000

Not to mention that Wal-Mart puts HUGE HUGE HUGE restrictions on what they sell. So much, in fact, that in most stores, they’re pulling their CDs. The only reason why they were up at the highest was because of the latest album by The Eagles (which sucked, by the way) was only sold there. There aren’t that many record stores that sell every kind of music anymore. Thankfully, if you live in the New England region, you’ll be semi-close to a Newbury Comics, which sells almost anything you can think of.