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When I got back into radio in 1997, compact discs were pretty much the standard format. We still played commercials on carts (photo on the left), but most (if not all) music was on CDs.Â
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Around 1998/99, the radio station I worked for started loading all their audio elements (music, commercials, and even pre-recorded announcer voices) on a hard drive. CDs became the “back up†format in case the hard drive died, and carts…Well, they went the way of LPs, Reel-to-reel, cassette, and 8 track tape.
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Well, now that the majority of the music consuming public saves their music on hard drives, why do we need CDs? Why not phase them out and focus all distribution on an iTunes-like system? Well, duh! That’s exactly what’s predicted to happen this year. Many online retailers (who sell CDs) are rumored to be venturing into the world of digital downloading soon, and Apple may have to change their “Songs downloaded from the iTunes store will only play on an iPod or computer that is “authorized†to play the music†if a class-action lawsuit doesn’t go their way.
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The hard drive wars will begin soon enough, and we’ll all get screwed in the end, but in the meantime, I’m wondering how many of you still buy CDs? Are you aware that the Mp3 format really blows in terms of audio quality? Sure, it’s a small enough file that it downloads quickly, but you sacrifice quite a lot when it comes to hearing the music the way it was meant to be played back. People, like me, who are pretty much obsessed with good audio quality cringe when all that audio separation goes away when WAV or AIFF (Audio Interchange File Format) file gets converted to mp3. But, this is the world we live in and it might get better when the download time for chunky files like WAVs or AIFF
are faster.
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But back to my original question…Are you still buying CDs?
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–PK
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13 thoughts on “So Long CDs…”
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I still buy and listen to CDs. Audio quality must run in the family. I want good sound separation, etc. I am finding that my CD player doesn’t have the settings for bass and trebble and that these features are becoming less and less available. Why is this?
Yes, I still buy CDs. I like them, and like you, I find the quality of music better. All this fighting over downloading rights bla bla is such a waste of time. Why do people like to fight so much? 🙂
I don’t think I’ve ever had bass and treble on a home CD player. Usually, I EQ the sound with my receiver. But I have noticed that the factory settings on the CD players in new cars are very much on the “low end.”
Yep, I still buy CD’s. Not as much as I used to, but I still do.
I don’t buy CD’s all that much any more for myself, unless it’s a band or singer I love and have most of their other CD’s. I like to download and make my own CD’s. I guess I’ve been burned too many times with paying too much for a CD where I only liked one or two songs.
Dot: I think you’re right about being burned by CDs, and that’s why people started trading files. Who wants to spend 20 bucks on a CD that has maybe 2 good songs on it.
I still buy CD’s, but not that many.
The sound quality of the MP3’s all depends on where you’re getting them from.
I agree with Dot, am tired of spending all that money for a CD with only a few that are any good.
Dot nailed the issue for me as well. I want the better sound, but I feel ripped off when I pay so much for an album, and I don’t like most of it.
One thing I like about CDs, though, is taking the time to really get to know an album. When it’s inside of you, and you hear a song, and know what song is coming next, and there’s a theme or a mood there…you don’t get that much these days. Is that just an old stoner thing to enjoy? I was never a stoner, but somehow listening to Dark Side of the Moon with just the black light on…seems kinda stonerish to me. 😉
Yes I still buy CDs. I do not have a Ipod or a MP3 player. I am pretty much in the dark ages. Sometimes I play cassette tapes too.
I’ve found that at the right bitrates (192 kbps and above), the loss in quality isn’t pronounced enough to bother me. I’m much more concerned about the overwhelming tendency to compress and brighten the shit out of the sound on pretty much every album that’s come out in the last 5-10 years. CDs and mp3s are capable of handling separation and even approximating warmth, but when the source material has already been ‘sweetened’ to death, any loss in quality hurts even more.
There’s a burgeoning back-to-tapes movement going on out there. I think those people, and the vinyl afficionados, should take up pitchforks and march on the major recording studios and mastering houses of America.
I still buy CDs and love the sound of them. MP3s are easy to handle, but ain’t the same as CDs.
Jefito: I was listening to some early Elton John at my bro’s house a few months back and we were commenting on how much separation and warmth there was in the recording (and it was on CD).
Mastering is something I didn’t know much about until I started mastering projects at work. Now, I hear a great deal of variation in the sound of a certain recording. For example, a number of the REM albums from the IRS years had such a thin sound that the songs sound very dull (in a sonic sense). On the other end of the spectrum, Rush’s “Vapor Trails” (2002) was mastered so “hot” that there was clipping and the overall sound was very muddy.
Can you think of a recent album that was mastered with what you consider the right amount of separation and warmth?
I rip Mp3s at 320kbps. I don’t notice any sound quality difference between my CDs and those Mp3s, though I do notice it at lower bitrates…
I still buy CDs, though. When I buy music online I get a lower bitrate than I can rip myself, and I have to put up with odious restrictions on what I can do with that music. I suppose I could strip the DRM off the apple files, but that seems like too much work…
You’ve got an iPod, you listen to music on it; what do you set your “import” settings to? Do you stick with Mp3s, or do you use something newer like an AAC? What bitrates do you rip at? Can you hear the difference?