[NewMusic] When the CD atrophies

[Robair, Gino]

The CD will die? Shit, it's already dead folks...for the people who really
make a proper living off of CD sales. (The serious money is in licensing and
synchronization, afaict). The article is really about the multinationals and
pop-music world. I can't see the fact that WalMart stops carrying CDs
affecting our level of releases (i.e., those of us who are pissing about
pressing <1000 units), many of which are sold primarily at gigs or via
boutique outlets like North Country or Forced Exposure. Most labels give
away 5,000 of a new release. Come by and visit our free bin at work, and
I'll show ya.

Vinyl didn't die as predicted. And the noise community is still making,
selling, and giving away cassettes. I'll bet there's a gal somewhere who's
selling wire recordings of her improvisations. She'll probably sell more of
those than I'll sell of Yellowcake product at gigs (which, btw, is a ltd
edition of 280 units for those of you who want to compete for the smallest
REAL run of CDs....) :-)

But my listeners still buy CDs at gigs, once I get out of my home town.
(YMMV)

For my money, I've discovered the most interesting music and music makers
online via MySpace. Sure, most people profess to hate that butt-ugly-looking
service now, but I'm constantly floored by what I run across by artists in
places I didn't know existed. That and YouTube.

BTW, Damon, have you ever worked in screen printing? Imagine setting up an
automated system to do 100 prints. Then try to do 10 jobs like that in a
day, seven days a week. Setup/teardown/cleanup/repeat is a bitch. THAT's why
they do runs of 500 units or more per setup, and charge $1K per job no
matter what. If you can do it cheaper consistently, you'll make a killing in
this biz (at least until this Christmas, when the CD dies).