Vinyl continues to die
John
Allthough the use and popularity of vinyl is holding, the underlying infrastructure for pressing and distributing it is dying. Vinyl pressing quality varies greatly these days and the know how of running vinyl production machines is diminishing, not to mention good mastering services for vinyl aren’t always easy to find. Bottom line, more vinyl distributors are filing for bankruptcy. This is a deadly blow to vinyl, especially dance music vinyl.
This is a great post by Wired, http://blog.wired.com/music/2007/11/vinyl-dance-mus.html
I still buy vinyl and have released some of my own vinyl, but I’m slowly moving away from it. I love the tactility of dj’n with it, but since I’m spinning more of my own productions, I’m moving twords digital timecoded vinyl, like Ms. Pinky, Serato, FinalScratch, etc. I still don’t like mixing with CDs…maybee I just haven’t spent the time learning, but they annoy me. Not to mention, there are so many options that clubs and lounges don’t have a standard. It’s only at the big clubs you can count on serious Technics and Pioneer CDJs. Many of my dj friends bring their own CDJs because of this.
For the lighter side of the vinyl debate, check this other wired post. As much as has been written about vinyl in the past few years noone knows what will happen to it. Certain aspects of it are actually flurishing. I think however that as a DJ tool it will be around for many more years, even though it’s on its way out in popularity