This was an interesting thing I came across mainly because I can remember some saying that the huge surge last year would become the opposite this year, some said it was driven by Taylor Swift's RED re-do and the new Adele. Vinyl soared 22% more over last year, again realize that streaming is still over 80% of how people get music, I forget the actual % is for "paid" subrscirptions and unpaid, to me honestly there should be a seperated streaming chart but thats another topic. The vinyl surge again was attributed to the RSD that have happened, but also a lot of ROCK artists and older artists have been selling a ton of vinyl. Some thought the new ADELE was going to be the big vinyl seller, but it was not, some stores have tons of copies with dust on them, the Taylor vinyl did better but also didn't do what they expected on vinyl, the enormous price ticket now is half off, a lot of amazon warehouse cut vinyl prices have helped this surge, but also indie places are doing well, I know also people say ROCK is dead well the new Ozzy is number one seller, Alice Cooper had a top 5 album, bands like Halestorm, Dorothy and the Pretty Reckless are causing some mainstream rock radio damage and its leading to physical sales, considering the Grammys retired the ROCK female category maybe its time that comes back and some of that gets handed out on the show. Again not saying CD's and Vinyl are ruling, NO people stream its convienance BUT some are realizing, shit if I really like something, or something classic, streaming services are rentals, I own nothing and some on the fence are starting to buy.

https://variety.com/2022/...235379361/

I do a little bit of everything.I stream music on Spotify,but I still buy vinyl and CDs.There are so many ways to listen to music nowadays.

I enjoy Spotify tremendously it's so much fun to make my own playlists and to listen to playlists that others come up with.

It just goes to show that when someone says 'physical media is dead', someone else will come out and say, 'you're wrong'!!!!!!!

JabarR74 said:

It just goes to show that when someone says 'physical media is dead', someone else will come out and say, 'you're wrong'!!!!!!!

Well numbers don't lie, fact is fact that sales of physical media in both CD (Though small) and Vinyl (very large) are increasing. Also all the talk of it being a "phase" or because people were home so long in 2020 is BS because the pandemic and closures are non existent and have been in a lot of states for awhile. The "wholesale" cost raise on vinyl that happened earlier this year was said "to be the end of this rise in sales" it hasnt even effected a thing, in fact sales have risen more since the cost went up on catalog vinyl. So its a sexy headline to say "Rock is dead" and "Physical media is dead" well that would mean that neither would be existing anywhere, and the facts show when broken down its the opposite.

SoulAlive said:

I do a little bit of everything.I stream music on Spotify,but I still buy vinyl and CDs.There are so many ways to listen to music nowadays.

I enjoy Spotify tremendously it's so much fun to make my own playlists and to listen to playlists that others come up with.

I have gotten very into indie artists and tried to support them everyway possible, some can release physical media some just do digital and are working towards that. I think people still forget that for these indie artists, they make more on someone buying their t-shirt directly from their web site, than if they had 5,000 streams of a song. It sounds crazy but its true. A lot of indie artists are looking to change the payout system, but its tough when you don't have the bigger artists behind you in this, very similar to what PRINCE dealt with in the 90's when he was talking "rights" and everyone in music ran from him like he had COVID or something, its the same now.