There is exactly one thing that vinyl records have in common with John Stamos: they are just as hot today as they were in the 80s.
I think a lot of older folks are bewildered at the resurgence of vinyl sales. They look at the entire lineage of recording platforms they lived through — vinyl to 8-tracks to cassettes to CDs to digital downloads to streaming — and wonder why after finally arriving at the promised land of Spotify are we reverting back to perhaps the most flawed medium of the bunch?
And they have a point. From a pros and cons standpoint, vinyl makes absolutely no sense. It's not portable. Records scratch and warp and don't always play properly. The sound quality is worse than streaming unless you're willing to drop the money on a pretty expensive system. New records are pricey. The equipment can be a pain maintain. When compared to streaming, vinyl is little but a laundry list of downsides.
But I think the people who are confused at its resurgence are confused because they're viewing vinyl as only a step in the long and winding road of music formats that began with Edison's tinfoil phonograph and ended with Spotify. In many ways though vinyl wasn't just a checkpoint in this progression but instead the last stop on the route through analog music, which led us from that tinfoil phonograph through wax cylinder recordings through 78s and ultimately through 45s and LPs.
In other words, vinyl LPs are a fully formed technology. They aren't just a stepping stone we passed on the way to Spotify. The are the ultimate expression of analog music.
A similar progression happened in digital music. First we had 8-tracks, which got replaced by cassettes, which got replaced by CDs, which got replaced by pirating, which thankfully got replaced by paid digital downloads, which got replaced by streaming. And streaming is to digital what vinyl is to analog: a fully formed technology, which is why it makes sense that the two are able to endure in tandem. Streaming is the ultimate expression of digital music. At every step of the road through digital formats, you could generally visualize what conveniences the next format would bring, but what could possibly be next for digital music besides even better streaming? It's hard to fathom.
That's one of the reasons I think vinyl is seeing a comeback even when other formats of old are not. Those weren't fully formed technologies. Cassettes were only a digital stepping stone to CDs. CDs were only a digital stepping stone to downloads. In retrospect, it's obvious now that vinyl was an end, not a means.
And as much as I adore streaming, I'm happy we still have one analog technology that appears to be enduring. Because there's something about the ceremony of analog music that never ages even when the technology long has. Sifting through your record collection. Pulling the disc out of its sleeve. Twirling it in your hands to the side you want. Placing it onto the platter. Dropping the needle. Hearing the first few seconds of static. It's beautiful. Normally to find ceremonies this gratifying and sacred I need to go to Catholic mass. Now I just need to go to my turntable.
Comments