Tom Banjo

stvn1974

Just made some pre-orders online. I am a sucker for reissues that are big box sets. I love the books that come with them. I can't imagine just having the digital files of all of the deluxe versions of the Bob Dylan Bootleg Series releases.

Koby

I haven't bought a music CD since around 2008 probably.
Now days, I just YouTube or Pandora everything for music.

cultshock

Oh yeah, I love box sets that come with nice hardcover books.

slop101

I had a ton of music on a hard drive that bit the dust, so I'm never doing that again.
Thankfully, I hadn't gotten rid of my CDs when that happened.

Right now, I listen to my ipod (which contains about 1,500 albums) in the car, and vinyl at home.
CDs are just used to transfer music to the ipod, then kept as archival, and occasional home listen to CDs I don't have on vinyl.
But since I have a really good vinyl setup, I listen to that at home, and I really do love the sound of a well-mastered all-analog vinyl record through my system.

I understand the draw of streaming - conveniences is pretty great - but it's just not for me. Music being one of my obsessions I still follow pretty closely (movies, comics and other things, I've mostly stopped following as closely as I used to), I like digging deep into a physical copy of an album. When you stream things (or just download them), they take on less value, and while it's psychological, it feels more devalued than if you buy/own an actual copy.

Having said that, here's a great article about cleaning up CD clutter...

Collection or clutter? Parting with your CDs can be daunting but liberating

kd5

I haven't bought a CD in probably 10 years but that doesn't rule out the possibility that I might.

Michael Corvin

I bought a half dozen CDs a few months ago. If the price is comparable to the digital then I go with the CD. Like slop, I rip them and stash the disc.

I started re-ripping my entire collection not to long ago. When I originally ripped them, (late 90's/early 00's) hard drive space was at a premium so like a lot of people I ripped at lower bit rates. I'm starting over, so it's good that I have the CDs to do that.

Meathead

Great article... I got rid of 2000+ earlier this year and looking back, definitely liberating.

Rex Fenestrarum

Well, I listen to Spotify every day on:

- My desktop with BT or wired headphones
- My laptop with BT or wired headphones
- My main TV, via Roku stick and\or Android TV box.
- My office TV via Roku TV
- My bedroom TV via Fire stick
- My phone, which means a) BT or wired headphones, b) in my car via BT AUX adapter, c) portable BT speaker at the beach or on my back deck, or my driveway while I wash the car; or d) my TV's sound bar if I don't wanna turn the set on.

I get it, I really do. I was a huge record collector in the 80s, even for records "just because". I had albums from all over the world, just because they said "Made in Japan" and "Made in West Germany", even though the music was the same. At one point I even had around 20 of the 36 different copies of The Police's Synchronicity album. When I first heard about Real's Rhapsody service, I thought it was the stupidest idea ever: what kind of moron would pay to rent music? However, the last time I moved it dawned on me that what I was interested in was music, not laminated aluminum discs. I'm not heartless - I've bought a CD or two just out of nostalgia or because it was a "super deluxe" version. Still, at the end of the day, I just want to hear my tunes. I don't care about the medium they come on, and I don't want to transport crate after crate of antiquated CDs when I move in a month or two. Once you use Spotify (or GPM or AM, whatever) music becomes so much easier. No more syncing music to multiple devices, no more lugging around CD binders. It's liberating!

Adam Tyner

I can pair my phone to my AVR via Bluetooth and stream whatever I want. (That even lets me play the phone-slash-board game Dropmix on my home theater.) You might have a similar feature on your receiver.

slop101

Audio through bluetooth has always sounded like absolute shit to me - so much so, that I'd prefer not to listen to anything at all than through bluetooth.

cultshock

I agree, Bluetooth sucks for listening to music, I avoid it if I can.

On the subject of Spotify, I LOVE it. Holy crap, I wish that existed in my younger days when I blind bought (deaf bought?) so many albums because I was listening to stuff not played on the radio or MTV. I would have happily spent $10 a month for all the music I now have access to at my fingertips. I spent way more than that on CDs, cassettes and vinyl per month back in the day. I use Spotify for the convenience and for finding new stuff to like, and if I discover an album I really, really like, I'll go out and buy a physical copy. I've discovered so many bands and albums since using Spotify that I probably never would have heard otherwise.

PhantomStranger

Agreed. I only use streaming for sampling new music and making purchase decisions.

I already foresee future problems arising with primarily new music that never saw physical media. Musicians are a wacky, wacky lot and many of them have made questionable decisions about their own catalogs - including keeping old music off the market.

Alan Smithee

I use the free ad-supported Spotify quite a bit, my TV even has an app that supports it. My receiver only supports the paid version. Songs still become "unavailable" often though, I've found some harder to find songs on it but I'll still buy the CD if I really care about it. If I were in charge of a record company's licensing I don't think I would want music accessible that easily without buying it.

davidlynchfan

These cars are known to catch on fire while driving.

rjh_54

I've slowed down significantly. Lately I've been buying CDs from my favorite artists for collection purposes, where in the past I'd buy just about anything that I even had a slight interest in. With Spotify Premium it just doesn't make sense for me too keep buying CDs that I'll only listen to a few times. I never thought I'd slow down as much as I have, but I guess the fact that all stores have cut back on physical media has had a big impact on the amount of impulse purchases I would make.

printerati

This is my mindset, although I don't know if it's been 10 years for me yet. That being said, it no longer even occurs to me to scour the Half Price Books clearance section for music deals, and I didn't bother hooking the CD/SACD player back up when we redid our home theater area a couple of years ago.

LiquidSky

Yes. I still purchase the CD and sometimes vinyl.

dsa_shea

Who doesn't like a good fire while on a road trip? I still buy CDs.

Decker

My car doesn't even have a CD player and I don't have one in my bedroom. So I don't really have any need for CDs any more. I did buy the annual Grammy Nominees CD (as I have done every year for at least 15 years now), as I like having that particular compilation as a snapshot representation of music of that year. I also bought that GnR Appetite for Destruction Box Set (and am STILL waiting for it to ship). That's it for 2019 so far and I don't think I will be getting anything else this year.
So not COMPLETELY out, but unless it's a really special collector's set (like Springsteen put out for The River, Born to Run and Darkness on the Edge of Town), I don't see myself buying anything any more. Spotify and my car's steaming app (Slacker) take care of all my music-listening needs these days.

milo bloom

I still find myself checking thrift stores and such for used stuff. And of course I still watch the giveaway table in my condo building. Yesterday someone put down a milk crate full of country and big band stuff, I looked them all over but all I kept was a Willie Nelson Christmas album.

The Infidel

Same here. I shop various Goodwills all the time, and occasionally hit the flea market. I have everything ripped onto my computer, but I still keep the physical discs. I don't have the slightest clue how many I actually have, but my music folder is 157 GB.

slop101

If you do still buy CDs (and vinyl), better make sure you buy them quick.
Seems like more an more new releases go OOP quicker and quicker every year.

milo bloom

You just reminded me I never picked up Gwen Stefani's Christmas album. According to eBay, prices are still reasonable so I'll be able to grab it before too long.

cultshock

I've noticed that too. I've tried to pick up titles released five or ten years ago just to find they are OOP and going for crazy prices on Amazon or Discogs. With CDs I usually manage to find reasonably priced ones on ebay, although they might be foreign releases (but are legit, I always check with Discogs first) but vinyl is a different animal. If the album only had a single vinyl pressing 5+ years ago, you might have to pay three figures for it, ouch! Lesson to me is that if I want a new release on vinyl, I grab it as soon as I can. I'm talking indie labels here, not major label stuff, although some of that vinyl can go OOP too.