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Is this really where we are going?

P

plan9

Active Member
I work in a music store and also have an analog recording studio(modest)
Today a young guy comes in and says his band had just done a recording
downstate and would I listen to his CD and tell him what I think. I ask him why he wants me to critique his CD, he tells me that no one in his family or his band mates families, or his friends families own a stereo system. All they have are mp3 players, and that they have not gotten this CD basterdized
into mp3's yet. What the ****. Tell me this is an isolated case, Yikes

Jeff
 
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plan9 said:
I work in a music store and also have an analog recording studio(modest)
Today a young guy comes in and says his band had just done a recording
downstate and would I listen to his CD and tell him what I think. I ask him why he wants me to critique his CD, he tells me that no one in his family or his band mates families, or his friends families own a stereo system. All they have are mp3 players, and that they have not gotten this CD basterdized
into mp3's yet. What the ****. Tell me this is an isolated case, Yikes

Jeff
Click to expand...

I dont think its an isolated incident. Most folks dont care about hifi anymore. People just want to be able to hook their iPod into their soccer mom home theater in a box and not fuss with changing CDs.
 
Tributaries are where the pure waters flow, as they get washed into the mainstream it is inevitable that they will be diluted.

I am glad drink from the tributary. I don't wish for a flood, only that the source doesn't run dry.:music:


If we are headed where you suggest, there will be a lot of thirsty people around here.
 
I guess it's up to us to try and keep it alive. we have been going backwards for a while Vinyl...CD....Mp3...??? Maybe people will be happy when they can have 35 million songs in thier pocket, barely legible but 35 million never the less.
 
CD is rapidly becoming a dead format, but there is hope that MP3 will die, too, as computer memory increases and higher res digital files come into the mainstream. Even people I know who are really into their iPods admit that Mp3s sound terrible. When I go into the independent record stores here in Chicago, over the past couple of years I've noticed that fewer people look at the CD section, but the vinyl section is always really busy. Of course, that's a really small sample and chicago is a good music town with a reputation for snobby indie-rock record collectors....but it at least gives me hope. All things seem to happen in cycles.
 
Troubleshoot said:
Thats not only where we are headed, thats where the mainstream seems to already be.
Click to expand...

FWIW, I've toyed myself with the thought of an all digital conversion.

I have a 16GB iPod Touch and it's very convenient. I've got 754 songs on it burnt at 320 to 1140 kps and they sound pretty darn good. And that fills 14 Gig with artwork and a couple videos and some of my pictures..

With the price of storage and hard drives plummetting I probably could easily sell my LPs and CDs after burning them in a lossless format and have money left over after buying a couple terabyte drives and whatever software I would need to burn and manage them. And a respectable pile at that.
I can only see this format getting better as the big guns are hopping on board with music servers. McIntosh had one at AKFest and if they feel comfortable enough to use it in a show setting, that would seem to lend a bit of credence to the possibilities this technology can bring. :yes:
 
Personally I love my iPod. Radio shows and music in my pocket. Perfect for getting around. But at home, it's big JBLs, Phase Linear and CDs or LPs. :thmbsp:
 
I hear what your saying plan9. But IMO, I think the most important thing is that people are listening to music.
 
Yes.
<duckingforcover>
iPod is hifi enough for me. Love vintage, love new systems.
Love mp3. Convenient good sound, and fun.
Love music.
</duckingforcover>
 
BadassBob said:
I dont think its an isolated incident. Most folks dont care about hifi anymore. People just want to be able to hook their iPod into their soccer mom home theater in a box and not fuss with changing CDs.
Click to expand...

Agreed that it's not an isolated incident but I'd like to point out that hifi never did matter to the masses, it's always been for a rather small group of enthusiasts. I suppose it became a bit more mainstream during the 70's but faded back away along with the flower children.
 
I've never seen anyone else in the gym that I go to with a portable cd player except myself. If I'm really feeling like vintage I bring along my cassette walkman. Are mp3 or ipods or whatever they are really that good or am I stuck in the stone age?
 
Im in the digital age myself, but I dont mess with mp3s. I buy CDs like a mad man, but they only see a CD player once...to rip them to WAV and encode to FLAC. After that, theyre stored away...most likely never to see a CDP again...unless I had a catastrophic hard drive failure.
 
people drift that way and do not even realize it. Is sort of what I did. Like an idiot got rid of all my real good gear at one time. Then picked up all I could afford at the time, a mid level mass market piece of crud. After a while, you start getting used to it, do not even realize just how bad it is.
Then CD's came out, who needs vinyl - no cleaning records, no flipping them over, no need to record cassettes....so much easier with cd.
Then after a bit, again, u get used to it as that what everyone around you is doing.
Ahhh, the mp3's come out. What "bliss" - listening to it now on a mass market stereo, so sounds just as good as a cd, maybe not quite as good, but so convenient. Download and go.
Now is so easy to fill up your library with all of the songs you want. Get a 500 gig hard drive and you think you have it all.
Times goes by, you just get used to listening to it, even the mass market stereo starts to dwindle as you only listen to mp3's now - just so proud you have 8,000 songs you like, using Itunes is so easy to get any song you want, instantly.
Then of course you want a surround sound for your tv. used to listening to mp3's for the last decade, why do I need to spend so much, end up picking up a Yamaha Surround for under $400.00.
Ahhh, movies sound so good now. Got my big old Pioneer HPM-100's as the mains, pleasing the wife, plus no ear left, put in those in ceiling speakers so I can hear the jets whoosing by...

Stereo now basically consists of a surround sound receiver and speakers, use your laptop of course for the source.
Isn't technology great.

Then one day you are talking to your son about music. Trying to explain to him why just because they say it is 1000000 watts per channel, that does not make good music.
Foggy memories start coming back to you. All that time you used to spend with your friends, debating for hours over beer why you thought TDK sounded better then Maxell tape.
Dawns on you suddenly just how far you have drifted.
Surely though the memory is not as good as it really was, just like all my old girlfriends were gorgeous.
Still thinking about the talk you had with your son, you decide to get a few pieces of vintage gear, mainly for memory's sake.
On a whim, you buy a Marantz 2216 receiver, just like the very first piece of component gear you ever had, you had your dad buy it for you for your 16th birthday. You think back how your dad thought you were crazy, why get that when for the same amount of money you could get a all in one unit.

Day comes when the Marantz gets to your house. Anxiously, to relive old memories, you hook it up to the computer, to play those mp3's of course.
Fortunately you do still have a pair of HPM-100 speakers.
The VERY moment the sound comes thru your speakers, everything comes flooding back. The sound out of this under $100 receiver just blows away what you have been listening to for decades.
Then, it all comes back, just how far you have fallen.

Next thing you know, the same guy and ear you had re-emerges and you find yourself once again addicted to finding that perfect sound for you.

So, for me, I totally understand how it happens. If you do not have anyone around with a decent system, as time goes by, it is very, very easy to forget what music is supposed to sound like.

Sorry so long
 
CDs aren't dead yet, but they're in real trouble.

Mass market consumers are by most accounts lazy, unsophisticated and cheap. You have to go to the store to buy a CD. You have to store and handle a CD. If you don't take care of a CD it will get scratched and become worthless. CDs cost 1.5 times as much as down loads from iTunes or Amazon. The music biz in the states has been "singles" driven for over 50 years. Traditional labels have hammered and coerced artists for singles to the point that maybe they have finally killed the golden goose. Mainstream consumers that think buying the Eagles latest exclusively at Walmart is actually good for them are never going to appreciate the story or nuances a complete, cohesive, thematically linked album can provide in any format anyway.

Then there's us. The not so FDH. The few that know and appreciate the difference. We have a vinyl resurgence going on. New music, reissues (albeit with some unevenness) and tons and tons of vintage vinyl coming out of the dust and into circulation. I suggest we enjoy it before the bubble bursts and gobble-up everything in site like we're at the Rio buffet in Vegas.
 
BadassBob said:
...unless I had a catastrophic hard drive failure.
Click to expand...

Just had one of those 35,000 files lost mp3, ogg, flac and wav. I guess now I'll find out if Carbonite is worth fifty whatever bucks a year.:thumbsdn:

I had a 500Gb Western Digital I bought used about 2 years ago. I'm replacing it with a new 1 terrabyte WD green. I hope I can recover my music...I really don't want to go through all of the ripping again let alone the downloads.:no:
 
donberry said:
Then one day you are talking to your son about music. Trying to explain to him why just because they say it is 1000000 watts per channel, that does not make good music.
Foggy memories start coming back to you. All that time you used to spend with your friends, debating for hours over beer why you thought TDK sounded better then Maxell tape.
Dawns on you suddenly just how far you have drifted.
Surely though the memory is not as good as it really was, just like all my old girlfriends were gorgeous.
Still thinking about the talk you had with your son, you decide to get a few pieces of vintage gear, mainly for memory's sake.
On a whim, you buy a Marantz 2216 receiver, just like the very first piece of component gear you ever had, you had your dad buy it for you for your 16th birthday. You think back how your dad thought you were crazy, why get that when for the same amount of money you could get a all in one unit.

Day comes when the Marantz gets to your house. Anxiously, to relive old memories, you hook it up to the computer, to play those mp3's of course.
Fortunately you do still have a pair of HPM-100 speakers.
The VERY moment the sound comes thru your speakers, everything comes flooding back. The sound out of this under $100 receiver just blows away what you have been listening to for decades.
Then, it all comes back, just how far you have fallen.

Sorry so long
Click to expand...

For Proust, it was a Petite Madeleine (a small crunchy cookie), for you it was a Marantz 2216. :tresbon:
 
I live on a very pedestrian-active street and have had a digital camera stolen out of my car. Meanwhile, I'll often leave 4+ cd binders in my car, a minimum of 1, almost always in plain sight. Never had reason to worry. Nobody wants them!
 
Catswold said:
Just had one of those 35,000 files lost mp3, ogg, flac and wav. I guess now I'll find out if Carbonite is worth fifty whatever bucks a year.:thumbsdn:

I had a 500Gb Western Digital I bought used about 2 years ago. I'm replacing it with a new 1 terrabyte WD green. I hope I can recover my music...I really don't want to go through all of the ripping again let alone the downloads.:no:
Click to expand...

I keep 2 backups of my music, just incase of a hard drive failure. Id be pretty upset if I had to rerip and retag all of that.
 
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