The Poopy Diaper Vinyl Thread

[Jon]

It's definitely the case that some people are dicky about their preferred format, but it's pretty easy to shut them down, since almost all of us fall into the category of "listen however the fuck you want."

But the bigger conversation here is about whether artists (specifically NIN & TR/AR) should be obligated to put their music out on CD. This of course inevitably turns into arguments about which format is better, more popular, etc., which is unfortunate, but it's definitely a more interesting debate than "my format can beat up your format."

I've always been on the side of just getting whatever format a thing comes out in and being totally fine with it. I haven't seen any great arguments from other people about why artists should be obligated to put things out on CD, but it's been interesting to hear everyone's thoughts. Most of the arguments tend to be, "they should put things out on CD, because I listen to CDs," which is ridiculous, but the more nuanced arguments on both sides have been pretty cool to read.

In my opinion, the artist has no obligation to anything, outside of making music. That is what makes you a musician/artist. They are not even obligated to release said music; any more of an expectation is unreasonable. That sounds like common sense, but sometimes it takes seeing an idea written out before we can begin to understand the psychology behind why we may prefer "x" format.

Along those lines, I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone that could effectively argue for the superiority of any format. Digital seems superior in every sense, save for dopamine hits. The heart (feelings/beliefs) often wins out over the mind (logic/reason).

[katara]

Most of the arguments tend to be, "they should put things out on CD, because I listen to CDs," which is ridiculous

No, it's not.

[Jon]

No, it's not.

Then what is it when you reduce it down?

[Toadflax]

No, it's not.

Excellent rebuttal.

Looking back through your previous posts, you have one of the strongest CD arguments on here. Essentially, "I want to own a physical version of this without having to pay vinyl prices."

I tend to not understand why people can't just buy the vinyl to have something physical and then burn a CD from the digital release if that's their preferred medium. That was kind of the idea of the physical components: "we're not planning on putting this out on CD, so here's a thing you can hold and put on a shelf if you don't want the vinyl." But yeah, when the vinyl option is three records totaling close to $100, I get the frustration.

[BenAkenobi]

You guys seem to have it set in stone that CD is bound to be this despicable little shitty thing, while it's not necessary so.
The "downside" and the most common argument against CDs - small artwork - is not mandatory by the format.
Sure, 12 x 14 cm is how 99% is manufactured. But who forbids making bigger packaging? Nobody!
Make them book-sized, make them 10-inch - why it's almost never done is NOT fans' fault.
So many musicians and record labels are simply lazy to think outside the box.
NIN made a badass book Ghosts, it's gorgeous. It doesn't always have to be as badass, but it doesn't have to be in the minimalist polar opposite either.

[cdm]

You guys seem to have it set in stone that CD is bound to be this despicable little shitty thing, while it's not necessary so.

This is a very dramatic interpretation of what is being said here (generally).

[BRoswell]

Yeah, I don't think anyone was saying that. It's just that, from a dollars and cents perspective, it doesn't make much sense for them to make CDs if the vinyl versions are going to make them more money overall. Obviously that doesn't satisfy people who have a gut reaction to this sort of thing, but I'm practical about it. If you like CDs, cool, but you're not entitled to a CD just because you like them. If you don't want the vinyl, steal the album online (there's plenty of places to do so), buy some cheap jewel cases, print out some artwork and DIY yourself a CD like we used to do back in Ye Olde Days.

[Jon]

You guys seem to have it set in stone that CD is bound to be this despicable little shitty thing, while it's not necessary so.
The "downside" and the most common argument against CDs - small artwork - is not mandatory by the format.
Sure, 12 x 14 cm is how 99% is manufactured. But who forbids making bigger packaging? Nobody!
Make them book-sized, make them 10-inch - why it's almost never done is NOT fans' fault.
So many musicians and record labels are simply lazy to think outside the box.
NIN made a badass book Ghosts, it's gorgeous. It doesn't always have to be as badass, but it doesn't have to be in the minimalist polar opposite either.

Completely agree with these.

As far as bigger packaging, it had a stigma as being an inferior/more fragile way to present music. No clue if this is still the case, but here are some personal examples:

[BenAkenobi]

Yeah, I don't think anyone was saying that...

Somebody quoted T-Rez. I have no horse in this race. I don't own a single vinyl record (i have no right to say anything). Peace!

But the we got pure bliss -- digital high resolution download. Should be answer to all.
Do we have access to entire artists catalog on their own site? No. Sites get redesigned, shops change, download codes expire...
Do we have a definitive third party digital shop where we can get anything? No. Some albums missing, some tracks only available in bundles, some material region locked.

And then the Artist from capital A finds it okay to troll his listeners. Okaaaaaay.

[Toadflax]

Yeah, the "make CDs better" argument is interesting. 13/14 years later, and I still reference the releases of With Teeth and 10,000 Days. Trent said, "no one's buying CDs, so here's a shitty CD," while Tool said, "here's a CD with a packaging you can only experience in an analog space. You can rip the music and scan the liner notes, but you can't download stereoscopic glasses." Tool stepped up and gave us a reason to buy their thing.

Appropriately, years later, we're looking at the same thing with those same artists. Trent is trying non-CD angles - vinyl and digital-only releases - while Tool released a next-level CD package that sold a bunch of units right away.

[imail724]

while Tool released a next-level CD package that sold a bunch of units right away.

To be fair, Fear Inoculum wasn't released on any other physical medium, so I wonder if the CD version would have sold as well if they also released a standard CD and a vinyl version.

[botley]

To be fair, Fear Inoculum wasn't released on any other medium

Streaming and download releases were simultaneous with the CD.

[jmtd]

With Teeth still had a little effort put into the packaging. With the exception of one slightly odd edition, it was a digipak.

[SM Rollinger]

With Teeth still had a little effort put into the packaging. With the exception of one slightly odd edition, it was a digipak.

Remember it had the PDF file though? That was pretty ahead of it's time.

[imail724]

Streaming and download releases were simultaneous with the CD.

I meant to say physical medium. Fixed.

[chuckrh]

i have a few good reasons not to dive into the vinyl thing. i had vinyl in the past like when i was a kid but i'm on a fixed income & given the price nowadays, its a habit that i just can't afford. the other reason is i have a really terrible version of RA (with an osteo chaser) & my hands don't work so well a lot of the time & i tend to drop stuff. cds are way more difficult to mess up. a minor drop isn't going to do damage where a minor drop of a record could be a catastrophe. i'm all for the artists making money & continue to support cd & download music. i wish nin.com did high quality downloads for stuff like the watchmen. i checked amazon & the only option is mp3 for watchmen. i'll most likely be buying the download from them but am going to shop around a bit to see if i can find lossless versions.

[Merriweather]

i have a few good reasons not to dive into the vinyl thing. i had vinyl in the past like when i was a kid but i'm on a fixed income & given the price nowadays, its a habit that i just can't afford. the other reason is i have a really terrible version of RA (with an osteo chaser) & my hands don't work so well a lot of the time & i tend to drop stuff. cds are way more difficult to mess up. a minor drop isn't going to do damage where a minor drop of a record could be a catastrophe. i'm all for the artists making money & continue to support cd & download music. i wish nin.com did high quality downloads for stuff like the watchmen. i checked amazon & the only option is mp3 for watchmen. i'll most likely be buying the download from them but am going to shop around a bit to see if i can find lossless versions.

Someone posted in the Watchmen thread, I think, that FLAC files are available for purchase on Tidal. Kind of pricey compared to say, Bandcamp, but that’s an option.

[chuckrh]

Someone posted in the Watchmen thread, I think, that FLAC files are available for purchase on Tidal. Kind of pricey compared to say, Bandcamp, but that’s an option.

thanks!

[allegate]

With Teeth still had a little effort put into the packaging. With the exception of one slightly odd edition, it was a digipak.

the surround sound dualdisc is 'slightly odd'? :P

[Halo Infinity]

Point is everyone has a choice to listen to their music on vinyl or CD or streaming or even cassettes. There's no right or wrong way to listen to music. I just don't get into the whole "I like vinyl and people who listen to CDs suck" or "I have CDs and vinyl people suck" arguments.

Absolutely. I've also seen this happen in real life a few times. I actually know somebody that looks as CDs with so much disdain, while acting like vinyl always makes people cooler/better.

On the other hand it's still nothing compared to people basically telling me. "Ha! Ha! You still care about physical media! Ha! Ha! Get with the times dude! Why are you wasting money on such pointless bullshit? Everything's for free on the Internet anyway. Hey everybody! Look at this dumb fuck still buying music. What an ass!"

Even though that's not exactly what they said verbatim, they might as well have worded it that way. And not that it's happened in a while, but this was even way before the late 2000s.

And even now, I still sometimes notice people taking the piss on people that enjoy collecting physical media.

As for me, I feel the same way, and the more formats available, the better. I'm also always for letting people enjoy whatever they format they like in peace.

i'm all about letting people enjoy what they enjoy. as long as it's not hurting anyone, who gives a shit?
people in chicago flip out if you wanna put ketchup on your hot dog (i never put anything but cheese on a dog so it's a non-issue for me) and it's just like...who fucking cares? how does it affect you when someone puts a certain thing on their food? are they making you eat it? no? then shut up about it.
the same thing applies to format preference. "you like vinyl? cool! hope you enjoy listening to your records. do you catalog them?" "you like CDs? cool! do you have any cool box sets?"
it's so much easier to be nice and excited for someone but so many people choose to be dicks and i just don't get it. /rant

Thank you. This is exactly what I also had in mind. I know I also shouldn't care, but being dissed and even nagged at for preferences that don't even hurt anybody and myself always bothered me.

With that being said, as far as hot dogs go, I've always been a ketchup and mustard person myself.

[jmtd]

the surround sound dualdisc is 'slightly odd'? :P

I kinda think so, because it was a "tour edition", but I never saw it on sale during those tours, nor ever in a UK or EU record store. It's a jewel case which is pretty unusual for NIN releases (not unheard of, sure, but not that common). It wasn't really pushed as a deluxe product despite having hi-res and surround sound. The artwork is also only subtly different to the normal album, you have to be in the know to realise it's something different (until you crack it open and see two discs, of course.) So yeah, for all of those reasons I think it's slightly odd :-)

Since I've posted again here, I'll write the following, which I didn't feel needed a post all on its own, so it can sidecar the above.

I'm sorry if anything I wrote has come across as elitists or looking down on a particular format or those who like it. I personally collect music in all formats, I don't look down on any format. Ultimately what matters is the music, and even if the fidelity of great music is not perfect, it doesn't matter so much to me. So much of my life was spent listening to stuff on cassette or low bitrate MP3 or transcoded back and forth to ATRAC on Minidisc anyways. Specifically about vinyl: I've been collecting vinyl for over 20 years. Before it was cool, kids! I am under no illusions as to its pros and cons. And cons it does have, especially in the fidelity dept. That's not why I buy vinyl. (I tend to only buy second hand vinyl, but not exclusively. It's not my preferred way to experience new music). CDs have pros and cons. The packaging sure is a con. The fidelity sure is a pro: 16/44.1 is more than enough for anything, for anyone, forever. My top complaint about CDs is more of a niche technical thing, and it's limitations around the way that the error correction works, that drives have random and unpredictable sample offsets so it's very hard to actually prove you ripped the data off a CD perfectly, which in the modern digital era is a pest. I hate ripping CDs. Also jewel cases are awful, awful things. Put all these things aside, and what remains is the music we all love. Peace!

[cdm]

There's been a lot of talk about how the Tool album is proof that cds are alive and well. There are flaws with that argument:

1. We don't know how many units actually sold. All we know is, for a time, there was a shortage. The only sales figure we've seen combine digital and physical.
2. We don't know how many sales were driven purely due to the screen / physical package opposed to the media. I suspect a lot. Anecdotally, everyone I know bought for the screen and it's collectability.
3. Related to that, as others have said, for a time it was the only way to get a physical package.

Innovative and elaborate packaging is awesome when done well. For a lot of people, me included, it adds to the experience and makes it memorable. It is not, however, a good indicator of the health of a media.

[BRoswell]

Also, Tool has a pretty rabid fanbase, and they hadn't released a new album in thirteen years, so it's no surprise people snatched it up any way they could.

[eversonpoe]

I kinda think so, because it was a "tour edition", but I never saw it on sale during those tours, nor ever in a UK or EU record store. It's a jewel case which is pretty unusual for NIN releases (not unheard of, sure, but not that common). It wasn't really pushed as a deluxe product despite having hi-res and surround sound. The artwork is also only subtly different to the normal album, you have to be in the know to realise it's something different (until you crack it open and see two discs, of course.) So yeah, for all of those reasons I think it's slightly odd :-)

man, i didn't even realize that existed. i was over here thinking like "uh...what the heck is this malarkey?" the US dualdisc is in a digipack much like the standard CD release so i had no idea there was an EU edition with a dualdisc AND a CD in a jewel case. i would definitely agree with you that that's "slightly odd."

[allegate]

I kinda think so, because it was a "tour edition", but I never saw it on sale during those tours, nor ever in a UK or EU record store. It's a jewel case which is pretty unusual for NIN releases (not unheard of, sure, but not that common). It wasn't really pushed as a deluxe product despite having hi-res and surround sound. The artwork is also only subtly different to the normal album, you have to be in the know to realise it's something different (until you crack it open and see two discs, of course.) So yeah, for all of those reasons I think it's slightly odd :-)

Since I've posted again here, I'll write the following, which I didn't feel needed a post all on its own, so it can sidecar the above.

I'm sorry if anything I wrote has come across as elitists or looking down on a particular format or those who like it. I personally collect music in all formats, I don't look down on any format. Ultimately what matters is the music, and even if the fidelity of great music is not perfect, it doesn't matter so much to me. So much of my life was spent listening to stuff on cassette or low bitrate MP3 or transcoded back and forth to ATRAC on Minidisc anyways. Specifically about vinyl: I've been collecting vinyl for over 20 years. Before it was cool, kids! I am under no illusions as to its pros and cons. And cons it does have, especially in the fidelity dept. That's not why I buy vinyl. (I tend to only buy second hand vinyl, but not exclusively. It's not my preferred way to experience new music). CDs have pros and cons. The packaging sure is a con. The fidelity sure is a pro: 16/44.1 is more than enough for anything, for anyone, forever. My top complaint about CDs is more of a niche technical thing, and it's limitations around the way that the error correction works, that drives have random and unpredictable sample offsets so it's very hard to actually prove you ripped the data off a CD perfectly, which in the modern digital era is a pest. I hate ripping CDs. Also jewel cases are awful, awful things. Put all these things aside, and what remains is the music we all love. Peace!

Huh. I've only ever seen the US version of WT so that's new to me. Weird.

Also kind of against the grain of what makes a DualDisc a...well...DualDisc.

[eversonpoe]

Huh. I've only ever seen the US version of WT so that's new to me. Weird.

Also kind of against the grain of what makes a DualDisc a...well...DualDisc.

yeah the album also being on CD in there seems a bit* redundant...

*100%

[jmtd]

the second disc in the tour edition wasn’t dual disc iirc, it was just DVD-A.

[allegate]

the second disc in the tour edition wasn’t dual disc iirc, it was just DVD-A.

ah...so it was a literal dual disc instead of a DualDisc. I see.

[Prettybrokenspiral]

I have that WT tour edition. It's a CD of the album with Home as a bonus track, and a DVD-A with stereo and surround sound audio, THTF music video and an interactive discography sampler of all his stuff up to that point, excluding PHM and its singles. Pretty cool release if you can manage to track one down..

[chuckrh]

I have that WT tour edition. It's a CD of the album with Home as a bonus track, and a DVD-A with stereo and surround sound audio, THTF music video and an interactive discography sampler of all his stuff up to that point, excluding PHM and its singles. Pretty cool release if you can manage to track one down..

i found a used copy recently for a reasonable price. i like surround sound stuff & it sounds great!