heartoflesh
Puritan Board Junior
A very interesting and informative article.
http://houstonpress.com/Issues/2007-01-04/news/feature_print.html
http://houstonpress.com/Issues/2007-01-04/news/feature_print.html
CDs will soon be dead
- Thread starter heartoflesh
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bradofshaw
Puritan Board Freshman
While I definitely disagree about some of those statements about CDs, that was a brilliant article.
I've been thinking along these lines for a while. The record company conglomerates, while holding the power to do great evil, also enabled the mythology of the larger-than-life rock band/rock star persona. Once upon a time they had to recruit the best and put out the best to get people to buy. There has basically, in the last ten years, been an artistic inflation of everybody who can (but not necessarily should) putting their music out there.
I would blame a disinterested public for the fact that record companies only put out the lowest common denominator type music. And I would blame an uncritical internet consumer base for the proliferation of unimportant music.
I am actually starting to think that, contrary to what Neil Young would have us believe, Rock & Roll as we know it may be a passing art form that may someday be seen as an oddity of the late 20th century.
I for one, am one of those CD collectors who inspects a CD store from A to Z. I also have a nice little display of all my CDs and various bits and pieces of CD related art in my living room. I think the CD can be as artistically satisfying as Vinyl, and I'm not buying that Vinyl is vastly superior to the CD in sound quality. It certainly doesn't touch it as far as playability and portability. And people who scratch CDs are morons. You have to do a lot of stuff to a CD to give it a serious scratch. Keep the case, avoid the booklet CD carriers, and you should be good for life.
I've been thinking along these lines for a while. The record company conglomerates, while holding the power to do great evil, also enabled the mythology of the larger-than-life rock band/rock star persona. Once upon a time they had to recruit the best and put out the best to get people to buy. There has basically, in the last ten years, been an artistic inflation of everybody who can (but not necessarily should) putting their music out there.
I would blame a disinterested public for the fact that record companies only put out the lowest common denominator type music. And I would blame an uncritical internet consumer base for the proliferation of unimportant music.
I am actually starting to think that, contrary to what Neil Young would have us believe, Rock & Roll as we know it may be a passing art form that may someday be seen as an oddity of the late 20th century.
I for one, am one of those CD collectors who inspects a CD store from A to Z. I also have a nice little display of all my CDs and various bits and pieces of CD related art in my living room. I think the CD can be as artistically satisfying as Vinyl, and I'm not buying that Vinyl is vastly superior to the CD in sound quality. It certainly doesn't touch it as far as playability and portability. And people who scratch CDs are morons. You have to do a lot of stuff to a CD to give it a serious scratch. Keep the case, avoid the booklet CD carriers, and you should be good for life.
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MrMerlin777
Puritan Board Post-Graduate
VINYL FOREVER!! 
I'm sorry, I just still love my records.
I'm sorry, I just still love my records.
heartoflesh
Puritan Board Junior
What I found especially interesting was the observation of how music has become so greatly devalued in our society.
heartoflesh
Puritan Board Junior
Maybe because music today has no value.
I'd call that a sweeping generalization, wouldn't you?
MrMerlin777
Puritan Board Post-Graduate
I agree it is a bit sweeping.
One must admit though, it's a musical waste land out there right now in just about every genre of "popular" music. That's why I gravitated toward blues and jazz along time ago. Still love alot of that late 60s and 70s "guitar rock" though.
heartoflesh
Puritan Board Junior
Yep, as far as what the media mediums want to shove down our throat, I agree-- a complete waste.
Myself, in recent years I've found solace in more traditional music-- folk, bluegrass, old time.
MrMerlin777
Puritan Board Post-Graduate
I love celtic. Ever heard of The Tannahill Weavers?
heartoflesh
Puritan Board Junior
Never heard of them-- I really like the Irish band "Altan" if you've ever heard them.
MrMerlin777
Puritan Board Post-Graduate
Never heard of them. How about The Chieftans?
5solasmom
Puritan Board Freshman
MrMerlin777
Puritan Board Post-Graduate
MrMerlin777
Puritan Board Post-Graduate
I first saw them years ago on PBS. I was in jr high at the time. I'm 38 now and I've been hooked ever since.
heartoflesh
Puritan Board Junior
Yep, I like the Chieftains. They're more traditional than Altan.
MrMerlin777
Puritan Board Post-Graduate
Sounds interesting. Ever heard of Tempest, or Seven Nations? (Celtic Rock)
Bondman
Puritan Board Freshman
You and me both brother.
Anybody listen to the old blues rock from Jethro Tull in it's early years?
MrMerlin777
Puritan Board Post-Graduate
used to have all their stuff... lost it in a flood.
bookslover
Puritan Board Doctor
Wrong! CDs will be around for many years to come. Why? Simple.
1. Their sound quality, as opposed to that of MP3s and their ilk. The main reason that MP3s are so popular is because young people (teenagers and under) find them so instantaneous and convenient. By and large, they are only interested in the hits (John Lennon once joked that, to a teenager, an "oldie" is a song that came out 3 weeks ago). They don't care about sound quality, either. They download a song, listen to it for 3 days, then dump it and download whatever's next. But people who are older and who are interested in "better" music - jazz, folk, classical, etc. - ARE usually interested in sound quality. And CDs, with their digitized sound (and lack of an MP3 players necessarily compressed sound) serve these types of music (especially classical) much better.
2. Most people are not interested in changing formats yet again - which is why the Superaudio format fizzled so quickly. Again, most people who are not teenagers have been through vinyl, cassettes, 8-tracks, quad (remember?) and now CDs - and are just not interested in yet another format. I'm certainly not about to chuck my several hundred CDs just because MP3 players are so popular. Besides, those of us who are into more serious forms of music are interested in the booklet notes and recording information that comes with the CD. Especially in jazz and classical music, where there are nearly a century's worth of recordings now, this is very important. You don't get that stuff with downloaded music.
The audio equipment guy who has a column in Gramophone magazine (a young guy, by the way) agrees with me that MP3s, etc. are not the answer. He doesn't have one, and has no plans to get one. And he works with this stuff for a living.
Besides, as the article itself said, people like to have something physical they can hold in their hands, with information to read. That's why people love to haunt record stores.
I read, just a couple of years ago, that some firm in England is developing a CD that will hold 500 hours of music, along with movies and other stuff.
So, the CD is not dead yet - and won't be for a long, long time.
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