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Music

No, Vinyl Sales Aren't Down 33% in 2024. They're up 6.2% 60

Posted by msmash from the math-is-hard dept.
An anonymous reader shares a report: Starting on October 14, 2024, news outlets including Yahoo and NME reported that year-over-year, the U.S. vinyl market was down 33 percent. The data for these articles came from a weekly report from Billboard called "Market Watch," which automatically updates with data provided by the company Luminate. Amid the vinyl revolution, this news signified a shift in buyer habits: a sales decline among vinyl for the first time in 17 years.

On October 15, Discogs contacted Chris Muratore, director of partnerships at Luminate, who confirmed that the reported data is incorrect. Vinyl sales are actually up 6.2 percent. Billboard has since added language to their "Market Watch" report, clearing up the error. Luminate has been the gold standard for physical music sales numbers for decades. However, at the beginning of this year, the company changed its reporting process, frustrating many record store owners and industry personnel.

No, Vinyl Sales Aren't Down 33% in 2024. They're up 6.2% More | Reply

No, Vinyl Sales Aren't Down 33% in 2024. They're up 6.2%

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  • At this point in history, and absent a retro fad, I would imagine that sales of audio recordings on vinyl are pretty stable year-on-year. And I think the retro fad happened about a decade ago, so.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by KMnO4 ( 684253 )
      If they are stable year over year, that's a sign they are still a fad. https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

    • They have been on the rise for 25 or 30 years. When CD hit their peak. 30 years is not a fad. And CD continues to fall off.

    • At this point in history, and absent a retro fad, I would imagine that sales of audio recordings on vinyl are pretty stable year-on-year. And I think the retro fad happened about a decade ago, so.

      Actually, cassettes have started to be popular again. There are even newer bands releasing albums on them. No idea why. Worst format ever, and I grew up listening to the damned things so I should be the target market for such shenanigans.

      • Actually, cassettes have started to be popular again. There are even newer bands releasing albums on them. No idea why. Worst format ever, and I grew up listening to the damned things so I should be the target market for such shenanigans.

        That's driven by the younger generations buying them as collectables. They usually are not actually listening to them. Modern production cassette players are atrociously bad, since no company that knew how to make them well still builds the mechanisms. I do agree it's rather hilarious that anyone would want cassette tapes in the modern age, since that's basically just a worse quality version of having a resurgence of interest in CD-Rs; tapes were how we pirated music in the old days!

        As for vinyl records,

        • TT's aren't too bad at the high end. It's the tonearms and carts. SME's can top several grand and if you have the micro-seiki DDX-1000 you can spring for three arms and of course three cart's. Something like say a grado epoch3 for 12K and maybe a Koetsu platinum for 10k and then a inexpensive AT ART1000 (5K) for disks that are not pristine. And of course you'll want a few phono preamps to mate with those carts. Personally I own an ancient Denon DP-30L that still works great (arm came with the unit) and ver

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Megane ( 129182 )

        cassettes
        Worst format ever

        Said by someone too young to know about 8-track. The only good thing about 8-track was that it worked in an automotive vibration environment. I remember as a kid regularly finding piles of 8-track tape guts on the side of the road, from when someone would rip a busted tape out of the player, then throw it out the window in disgust.

        • cassettes Worst format ever

          Said by someone too young to know about 8-track. The only good thing about 8-track was that it worked in an automotive vibration environment. I remember as a kid regularly finding piles of 8-track tape guts on the side of the road, from when someone would rip a busted tape out of the player, then throw it out the window in disgust.

          Oh, I remember 8 tracks. Dad had them everywhere, including the cars. You're right. I should have said worst format of my generation.

          Granted, I do still have grandpa's old school platter-level hand-crank record player out in the storage unit. Bust it out every few years and it still plays just fine. That was a format worth keeping around.

          • You young whippersnappers never heard of wax cylinders?! The sound is SO much more [whatever-people-claim-vinyl-to-be].

            • You young whippersnappers never heard of wax cylinders?! The sound is SO much more [whatever-people-claim-vinyl-to-be].

              Noisy. I mean, they claim warm, but they mean noisy. And having heard a few wax cylinder recorders in person, you'd be right. They're far more noisy than vinyl.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by taustin ( 171655 )

          Wax cylinders weren't anything to write home about, either.

        • Not only that, but most 8-tracks had no fast-forward or rewind feature.

          Want to listen to "Take the Long Way Home" again? Sorry Charlie, you just need to wait for it to come around again on Program 4.

      • Worst format ever

        So I'm curious - What better format did you use to listen to music compilations in your car in 1987?

        • Worst format ever

          So I'm curious - What better format did you use to listen to music compilations in your car in 1987?

          It's not currently 1987. I welcomed CDs with open arms as all around better. As much as I enjoy the digital availability, I still like my CDs. I never really thought they'd be the last mass-market media format to be physical, but it's cool. I'm too old to matter to the media giants anyway.

          • The other thing I like about CD's is longevity. With minimal care (some were in the car over the years) I've yet to have one fail and I started collecting in 83. I have an original Sony CDP-100, built like a tank bought in 83. Sound was not good though, which is not surprising. in 83, state of the art DA's were not very good. Today a cellphone integrated DAC is probably better. The greatest disappointment was that SACD did not take off. CD is almost there but needs just a bit more performance. Of course the

        • FM radio after midnight.

  • File this under.... (Score:3)

    by Kelxin ( 3417093 ) on Thursday October 17, 2024 @11:52AM (#64872083)
    Who cares?!
    • Exactly. The really cool kids all listen to Tefifon [wikipedia.org].

    • No, file this under Fake News.

    • Who cares?!

      All of the vinyl fetishists care. There's a decent overlap in the Venn diagram between vinyl-lovers and people with a bondage kink but it's a different thing. With this story we now learn that the number of people dressing up in skin-tight plastic is on the risk. PVC pants fans don't need to feel like they're a dying breed of niche turn-ons.

      All of which is a way of pointing out that the summary doesn't say this is about music.

  • More msmash space filler as usual (Score:3)

    by couchslug ( 175151 ) on Thursday October 17, 2024 @11:56AM (#64872089)

    Why would this trifle be newsworthy? What's next, linking to antique cylindrical recording sales?

    • You can still buy those? Where? Are they players that can pair with Bluetooth speakers?

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by beerale ( 520271 )
      I hear that Sumerian/Akkadian clay tablets will be making a BIG comeback in 2025. Big big.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Gaglia ( 4311287 )

      Why would this trifle be newsworthy?

      I tell you why: because nowadays it's one of the very few ways you can actually OWN your music.

      I used to consider vinyl some hipster madness fad. I don't buy the "sounds warmer" BS, and it's definitely worse than digital in every possible aspects. Except: you OWN it. No DRM. No need of some license-encumbered codec to play it. No need of careful backup, and shielding your backup from solar flares. No need to setup an account, or to play a premium to skip annoying ads. Also, it's undoubtedly more elegant

      • "it's definitely worse than digital in every possible aspects. Except: you OWN it. No DRM."

        So, how's it better than a CD? CDs may be all digital, but they have no DRM and their LPCM encoding is public domain.

      • You nailed it. Vinyl is a Free medium

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

        It's one of the reasons I was sad about the shutdown of the Pono store. Sure, it was run by a hack musician touting some crap music player, but it was a store that sold DRM-free FLAC of music.

        You could buy the music and you had it.

        These days the music is still DRM free, but there's no lossless version around, for whatever reason. You can xtream lossless music, but you certainly can't buy it.

        (Pono closed because Apple bought out the company behind it which supplied music to music stores - they handled the li

  • Inaccurate (Score:4, Funny)

    by cstacy ( 534252 ) on Thursday October 17, 2024 @12:30PM (#64872175)

    It's not 33%.

    It's 33-1/3 % of course.

    And singles are down 45% I heard.

  • Vinyl is different (Score:3)

    by RossCWilliams ( 5513152 ) on Thursday October 17, 2024 @12:56PM (#64872281)

    Vinyl sounds different than digital, whether you care is another story.

    Albums are played as a side at a time with multiple songs, think of it as two playlists by the artist. That is one of the reasons musicians use it. You can do that with digital and with CD's but most people don't. They play their favorites or mix multiple artists.

    Listening to vinyl is an activity. You need to change sides regularly, Lots of people don't want to do that and just want background music played for them. But it makes it a different experience.

    Unlike digital services, you own the music.

    Album covers and "liner notes" - Have you ever read Bob Dylan's poetry?

    • "Vinyl sounds different than digital, whether you care is another story."

      Very true. It's worse.

    • I'm about to play devil's advocate here, just for fun. Here goes:

      Vinyl sounds different than digital, whether you care is another story.

      And generally speaking, there's more difference in sound between two different turntables than between two different digital music sources. Colorations are fine, but if you're looking for consistency and fidelity, digital is better.

      Albums are played as a side at a time with multiple songs, think of it as two playlists by the artist... You can do that with digital and with CD's but most people don't. They play their favorites or mix multiple artists.

      And when cassette decks came along, so did mixtapes, and they were pretty popular, even though they were a pain to make using vinyl as the original source. CDs then made the process easier. Then came music on hard d

      • say that as somebody who has both read and written a fair amount of poetry.

        Have you read Dylan's poetry on Bringing it All Back Home. I don't think it is particularly musical. Apparently Dylan didn't think so either so he printed it on the cover instead of singing it.

        so you can't blame digital for making folks desire that.

        Well I don't think the desire is new, its the reason cd players allow random play and why music services create playlists. There are lots of people who have no interest in music listening as an activity, in fact most of us at some point.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Jerrry ( 43027 )

        As for Dylan, I'd much rather listen to his poetry. His work is fundamentally musical, and I don't find merely reading his lyrics to be at all engaging.

        As for Dylan, I'd much rather listen to other singers cover his songs. His voice is cringeworthy.

  • ...the age of vinyl when it was the only option.
    I had good equipment and treated my records with care, but I remember getting a new record, carefully placing it on a nice turntable, and on the first play, clicks and pops. I find it extremely hard to understand why anybody still likes vinyl. In my judgement, it sucked mightily

    The music, however, was better back then

    • The music, however, was better back then

      Meh, I had plenty of LPs in the Good Ol' Days with one good track and the rest shite.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Phact ( 4649149 )

      Remember every audiophile of the day bought CDs when they came out, added them to their systems, and did side by side comparisons, They ditched their vinyl and never looked back.

  • If sales are and were exactly zero, then they could simultaneously be up by 6.2% and down by 33%. :-D

  • Back when weed had seeds (Score:3)

    by zawarski ( 1381571 ) on Thursday October 17, 2024 @04:24PM (#64872867)
    Album covers were useful for breaking up your weed on.

  • Never ever had I such multitude of options to get vinyl records, as it is now. Do buy some new at my bookstore, but for the same budget of about 50 Eur, I will bring home many of them from the local flea market, held every other weekend. It is heaven for the music lover.

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