Audio content delivery

[amirm]

A good number of used CDs purchased online will indeed come in somewhat beat-up condition. But as you well know, CDs with even a lot of surface scratches usually play and rip just fine; cracked jewel cases can be replaced easily; and dirty CDs and dirty jewel cases can be cleaned very easily with some rubbing alcohol or just lukewarm water.

The ones that are rated as "near new" or whatever term they use on Amazon, are excellent. But sometimes I could not find them in that condition and resorted to buying them from Goodwill. Man, those discs are filthy at times. You know, like the ones that lived under the seat of the car for years before the guy decided to donate them to goodwill.

Fortunately almost all of them will rip fine. Did have a few that either glitched or didn't rip at all but in the grand scheme of things, it didn't matter.

The thing is though that even used CDs cost $4 to buy including shipping. With streaming I don't have to keep paying that and spend the time ripping. I see an interesting track/album posted by a member here, and I instantly can pull it up with Tidal and listen to it. And go and get all the rest of the albums by the same talent if I like it. There is no decision of "is it worth buying this album or not."

 

[graz_lag]

We‘re getting less and less of good things ...
There is the basic rule of demand-offer : the market demands convenience over audio quality.
The day Apple introduced the iPod was the beginning of the declining process for the audio quality in music ...

 

[andreasmaaan]

We‘re getting less and less of good things ...
There is the basic rule of demand-offer : the market demands convenience over audio quality.
The day Apple introduced the iPod was the beginning of the declining process for the audio quality in music ...

I'm not so sure. If you look at use of limiting compression ("loudness wars"), it seems that maybe the trend is starting to reverse now that streamers normalise playback levels: https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/end-loudness-war

 

[RayDunzl]

I see an interesting track/album posted by a member here, and I instantly can pull it up with Tidal and listen to it.

My Audio Buddy brought over Prophetic Attitude CD last weekend. He didn't pay that much for his used CD .

Tidal:

Search on Title - https://listen.tidal.com/search?q=prophetic attitude - nope

Search on Group - https://listen.tidal.com/search?q=Le Concert Impromptu - nope

YouTube has a track

They're playing (with some arrangement, no doubt) from the scores.

 

[Thomas savage]

My Audio Buddy brought over Prophetic Attitude CD last weekend. He didn't pay that much for his used CD .

Tidal:

Search on Title - https://listen.tidal.com/search?q=prophetic attitude - nope

Search on Group - https://listen.tidal.com/search?q=Le Concert Impromptu - nope

YouTube has a track

They're playing (with some arrangement, no doubt) from the scores.

Umm $42 ..$50 new

 

[Hugo9000]

My outlook of wanting only physical media is colored by my already owning 3000 or so CDs, comprising nearly everything I could even imagine wanting, as well as my own status of approaching EOL (I'm "only" 49, but I'm clearly on the other side of the hill haha!).

If, at the age of 20, when I first seriously started buying my music, I had a list of my current collection that I consider "must haves," I think it would have been extremely daunting and depressing. "Oh, I now have 302 CDs from this list, only 2698 to go!" Ugh. So if that were the case, I would definitely view streaming as a more valuable prospect than I do. As it stands, I use Spotify only for music discovery.

 

[RayDunzl]

Umm $42 ..$50 new

They want nearly as much as a seat at one of those pubilistic pugilistic exhibitions you're fond of. (oops)

 

[amirm]

My Audio Buddy brought over Prophetic Attitude CD last weekend. He didn't pay that much for his used CD .

Search on Tidal is horrible. Often times I have to search different ways to find things. This one is an import CD though so likely is not there. What is there is another 827 albums:

I am going to guess that you don't have most of these.

 

[RayDunzl]

I am going to guess that you don't have most of these.

I'm going to guess that I do, with 89 (or so) discs in the rack...

I read the above as 827 compositions, not albums, by the way.

 

[Frank Dernie]

And that physical copy is bound to not exist at some point. Without mass market, there will be little production of CDs as compared to today. And the mass market has already voted where they want to go.

How about all the very many countries in the world with poor internet service?
Presumably CDs will continued to be manufactured for them?

 

[amirm]

How about all the very many countries in the world with poor internet service?
Presumably CDs will continued to be manufactured for them?

You don't need much bandwidth for compressed audio. And at any rate, in many of those countries piracy is huge so labels make no money as to want to keep producing CDs for them.

 

[amirm]

I read the above as 827 compositions, not albums, by the way.

They are albums. Just many not be from Frank Zappa performing which I think is the case with the CD you listed.

 

[RayDunzl]

They are albums. Just many not be from Frank Zappa performing which I think is the case with the CD you listed.

Humor me, and show some of one of the ranges... the 1-50, 51-100, etc

I can't duplicate your screen, probably due to no longer being a member.

 

[sergeauckland]

How about all the very many countries in the world with poor internet service?
Presumably CDs will continued to be manufactured for them?

I also feel that whilst 'pop' music might eventually go totally on-line as instant disposable music, anything more serious will still be made available as a CD, or at most, a download. Given how little a record company gets per play on streaming, music genres that don't get many plays are far more attractive them them as downloads which cost little to distribute, yet get £10-£15 per sale as opposed to a cent or less per play. CD releases may well decline hugely, but as long as the alternative of a download exists, at least those of use who want control of our media can still have that.

S.

 

[amirm]

This is Roon by the way, not TIDAL app.

 

[Thomas savage]

If you look at places like bandcamp you will see there's many many examples where music is available to download and stream while NOT being available on physical media. So that cuts both ways.

I have found things amir and others have posted on tidal etc though our music threads that are available on cd but are bonkers expensive to buy.

The danger is in ten years we will be looking back on CD as the pinnacle of sound quality long since replaced with lossy codecs for streaming.

Right now I think we have the best of all world's but maybe some of us should be actively supporting hi-res downloads and streaming so we don't fall foul of our own disdain for streaming and the like and end up with crappy quality content.

I guess in the end we do it to ourselves.

 

[RayDunzl]

This is Roon by the way, not TIDAL app.

Oh, well, duh.

What you showed are "songs" or "tracks", not entire albums, going by the names at the right of the album cover.

Example, 9/8 Objects, from the CD Everything is Healing Nicely, a compilation put together by Dweezil and the Vaultmeister from previously unreleased recordings.

The Vault:

 

[amirm]

What you showed are "songs" or "tracks", not entire albums, going by the names at the right of the album cover.

No, it is not a track list but rather, everything that is released. They could be singles, EPs, or full albums. Those smaller releases could of course be part of other larger releases.

The point is that there is an exhaustive library of 800+ items related to Frank Zappa. That one thing is not there will not deter from enjoying Frank Zappa for months non-stop if that is your thing.

 

[Sal1950]

I bought a bunch of them from Amazon. Some came in conditions though where I had to wear gloves to handle.

I believe those were the porn DVD's he were thinking of.

 

[Sal1950]

If a demand exists for something then usually someone will exploit that demand, it's a question of how much money is necessary to make it worth the effort. With high speed Internet I really see no reason not to stream at lossless CD quality, or higher if people want hi-res. AV companies already stream 4k movie and TV content.

Ah but this is area I see the problem as more serious than CD. For those of us interested in the best quality video, all the streamers are leaving something on the plate compared to the discs. Video data is compressed and the audio side is even worse. The soundtrack is being heavily compressed in various manners compared to the disc's, Atmos DTS-X or whatever immersive codec used may not be available, the end product being delivered to the consumer varies all over the map. So the only way to ensure the best is to get the expensive discs, rentals of which is dying fast. In most parts of the US we have Redbox but I believe them to be in trouble vs the streamers, plus currently they're not doing 4k expect in a very limited market test. Nothing around me.