CD sales are alive and well in Japan

Interesting read, a different culture that has more of a collecting fetish, less respect for pirating music illegally, and a flagging streaming and vinyl sector. The younger generations in the West seemed to have embraced vinyl as a retro fad, but rejected CDs as something of the dreaded 90s and 2000s to them, something their parents listened to.
Then we have genres like vaporwave and hauntology that have helped rebirth cassette releases, and in vaporwave's case, even CDs and CDRs, I'm guessing because of the genre's association with early 90s computer culture, and it's association with CD-ROMS? Good to hear that Tower Records is still doing so well in the Far East, we miss you Tower.

http://noisey.vice.com/en_uk/blog/why-does-japan-still-love-cds-so-much

The decline of the CD has been dramatically overstated in the media. Last year in the UK, CD albums outsold download albums two-to-one.

I've moved about eight times in the last ten years, which has definitely contributed to my selling off around 1,500 CDs. I'm also very slowly replacing my collection with Japanese mini-LP sleeves, digifile editions etc., as they're aesthetically more pleasing, but also so much more space efficient. You can often get three in the space it takes to store one jewel case.

i'd very much like distribution for some CDs and vinyl i made over the last 10 years. i'd give it all away if someone in japan would sell it for me. 

  On 8/15/2016 at 8:57 PM, xxx said:

I can remember fetishizing my collection but now it's like a millstone around my neck. All you have to do is move it once and you'll fall out of love with that thousand pounds of plastic and paper in a hurry. At the same time, I can't sell/donate/trash it either.

Those VHS cassettes near those floor speakers... bad idea.

As for "can't" - well, you "can", it's more like "you don't want to".

Personally, I am done with collecting physical stuff - sure, it's nice, but after awhile, it only takes up space and you lose interest and there's potentially no resale value.

I have two storage units on either side of the US now due to some shenanigans, it does feel like an albatross at times. On the other hand, my records have their own little house I can visit, lol.

In Tokyo my whole apartment is made from CDs.  I eat CDs and drink CDs.  CDs all day err'day.

compact discs aren't compact enough

  On 8/16/2016 at 9:54 AM, Ragnar said:

compact discs aren't compact enough

I hope you didn't miss the most IDM music format of all time:

MD4EVA

yeah minidiscs are fucking wicked

  On 8/16/2016 at 9:54 AM, Ragnar said:

compact discs aren't compact enough

In Japan they had the 3" CD for a while (Japanese-8?)

even less compact compact disc

Love my old school cd set up, its two heavy high quality black steel boxes (amp and player) held together by top notch finger-thick cables. The sound is as good as I can get without spending silly stupid ridiculous money, so I still buy cds (last one was Bottomless Pit) but am gradually moving away.

My main issue years ago was losing or misplacing files (cause I can't be arsed with techy stuff like that), since with Bleep cloud and other cloud options tbh I'm happy without the physical side of things.

I'd never sell my cd collection, which lives lives in a huge six drawer chest (one drawer is a two man job to lift!). It's almost like looking at a photographic album of my life. A music timeline. Some covers are melting by hot rock burns, some still have cocaine ingrained on them, some are smashed to peices and look like beer mats lol, and some are pristine (Quaristice!) I know people like to sniff (no pun intended) at cds but I like 'em.

Also I think there's perhaps something to do with what genre of music you listen to. Maybe there is still something to do with reading lyric sheets, reading about the bands thoughts on putting together the music and seeing photos of the band. So the physical side still counts. Perhaps with electronic music (apart from perhaps BOC) thats not really the case.

I just smashed these thoughts off the bat in a few minutes, its not supposed to be The Law.

I have plenty of electronic releases with lovely worthy artwork though - the 192 page book with Dead Cities, some lovely long fold-outs on Underworld albums etc.

Part of me likes that they're physical and digital while the other part thinks they're a waste of materials and space.

I guess I still like CDs but my consumption of them has gone waaay down to the point where I might buy 1 or 2 a year.  I still like the idea of owning playback rights to  musical works (as opposed to renting them) so mainly keep a digital library and buy flacs via blerp or blandcamp, or in the case of absurdly priced out of print shit (like Herbie Hancock's Flood before it was reissued), slsk records.

  On 8/16/2016 at 5:39 PM, Ragnar said:

 

even less compact compact disc

Children Bodom (bottom) with a conspicuous starfish hole in the center?

i fucking hate jewel cases, i'm clumsy and end up breaking them.

  On 8/17/2016 at 5:28 AM, Glunk said:

i fucking hate jewel cases, i'm clumsy and end up breaking them.

You could tell a lot about people back in the day, by looking at how they treated their CDs.  What I realized from that era was that most people are sloppy fucks who have no respect for their belongings.  Cases broken, CDs scratched to fuck and for some reason covered in something sticky, etc.  This is why we can't have nice things.  It's not that nice things aren't readily available to us-- it's that nice things take care and respect to fully appreciate, so even if greatness is in the hands of someone who cannot respect, they cannot perceive the greatness.  ...This is why we can't have nice things.

  On 8/17/2016 at 5:52 AM, peace 7 said:

 

  On 8/17/2016 at 5:28 AM, Glunk said:

i fucking hate jewel cases, i'm clumsy and end up breaking them.

You could tell a lot about people back in the day, by looking at how they treated their CDs. What I realized from that era was that most people are sloppy fucks who have no respect for their belongings. Cases broken, CDs scratched to fuck and for some reason covered in something sticky, etc. This is why we can't have nice things. It's not that nice things aren't readily available to us-- it's that nice things take care and respect to fully appreciate, so even if greatness is in the hands of someone who cannot respect, they cannot perceive the greatness. ...This is why we can't have nice things.

How bout people that put discs back in the wrong case, that made me bristle.

Hah! Yeah years ago for some stupid reason I lent some Irish scroat I worked with U2's Zooropa. When I (finally) got it back the cd and case looked like something that was dug out of a slag heap. I knew it was going to be in a slight worse way but not that bad. I actually just dropped it straight into the bin the second he gave it to me. Of which we both laughed, for some reason we both found it funny, there was something almost comical about it. Chuckle chuckle.

  On 8/16/2016 at 6:04 PM, beerwolf said:

Love my old school cd set up, its two heavy high quality black steel boxes (amp and player) held together by top notch finger-thick cables. The sound is as good as I can get without spending silly stupid ridiculous money, so I still buy cds (last one was Bottomless Pit) but am gradually moving away.

 

My main issue years ago was losing or misplacing files (cause I can't be arsed with techy stuff like that), since with Bleep cloud and other cloud options tbh I'm happy without the physical side of things.

 

I'd never sell my cd collection, which lives lives in a huge six drawer chest (one drawer is a two man job to lift!). It's almost like looking at a photographic album of my life. A music timeline. Some covers are melting by hot rock burns, some still have cocaine ingrained on them, some are smashed to peices and look like beer mats lol, and some are pristine (Quaristice!) I know people like to sniff (no pun intended) at cds but I like 'em.

 

Also I think there's perhaps something to do with what genre of music you listen to. Maybe there is still something to do with reading lyric sheets, reading about the bands thoughts on putting together the music and seeing photos of the band. So the physical side still counts. Perhaps with electronic music (apart from perhaps BOC) thats not really the case.

 

I just smashed these thoughts off the bat in a few minutes, its not supposed to be The Law.

Dude I love your posts.

But yeah +1. Also, the biggest problem in my case has been that for years if there wasn't a plastic version of a release, it was more or less a headphone experience only (yeah I come from a stone age and am still living in a cave). So in some cases it was somewhat frustrating since there are releases that just beg to be played out loud. Now that I have a good Audio Pro speaker pair to which to link my portable, it isn't such a problem anymore. Yet, my physical collection is a part of me. Will sell a kidney before my precious discs.

  On 8/17/2016 at 5:52 AM, peace 7 said:

 

  On 8/17/2016 at 5:28 AM, Glunk said:

i fucking hate jewel cases, i'm clumsy and end up breaking them.

 

You could tell a lot about people back in the day, by looking at how they treated their CDs.  What I realized from that era was that most people are sloppy fucks who have no respect for their belongings.  Cases broken, CDs scratched to fuck and for some reason covered in something sticky, etc.  This is why we can't have nice things.  It's not that nice things aren't readily available to us-- it's that nice things take care and respect to fully appreciate, so even if greatness is in the hands of someone who cannot respect, they cannot perceive the greatness.  ...This is why we can't have nice things.

 

The nicest thing was to borrow your favorite albums to a friend which came back scuffed as fucked...that is if you could get them back at all. It usually took at least 6 months. Oh the nostalgia.

Yes, beer-bosses posts are =)

Really? Sometimes I think I waffle on a bit. Very much appreciated

I love waffles, for the record. 

lol

People putting CDs in wrong cases or fucking up CDs/DVDs they borrowed...  We gotta bring this level of disrespect into the digital era.  I'm gonna track down these assholes from the 90's, ask them to put some music or movies on a USB thumb drive for me, and then I'm later gonna go on their computer and replace the files they gave me with low-bitrate encoded versions.

"Hey, bro- why the fuck are all the shit I gave to you been replaced with low quality versions?"

"You still think scratching my Fugees CD in 9th grade was funny?  I had to listen to Ready Or Not with the hook skipping, you fucking asshole."

Then you choke him out and cover his face in taco sauce, so he's not really sure what happened.