The Vinyl Countdown: Are Records Winning The War Against Technology?
“If you ain’t carried no crates – the fuck out of here,” DJ HouseShoes told Elevator Hip Hop in an interview last month about non-vinyl DJs. “I can’t respect a mother fucker that never DJed on records,” the Detroit-native proclaimed, “I’ll never respect that.”
For decades, technology has waged war against the tangible, analog formats of the past. What was once the pinnacle of the musical experience – the vinyl record – has now been relegated to a diminished, niche audience of core enthusiasts and DJs. While new advancements like Serato seem to be pushing people further from what was once the essence of hip hop culture, many labels, artists and DJs seem to be mounting their own insurgence, pushing for a return to a format that hip hop was built on. And, it seems to be working.
“Making the 12″ required printing jackets, labels, cover art, assembly, etc”
Vinyl sales have seen increasing bounds in growth in recent years – a rebellion, of sorts, against the digital age and the move away from physical formats. In 2009, over 2.5 million vinyl units were sold in outlets tracked by Nielsen Soundscan (a figure that’s decidedly conservative, given that it doesn’t account for many independent retailers, labels and artist sales). While it was admittedly a drop in the bucket compared to overall music sales – some 1.54 billion total units in the same year – the whopping increase of over 150% in EP and LP sales between 2007 and 2009 seems astounding, especially considering the increased demise of physical CD sales across the same time period.
Sales numbers like these beg the question: Is the vinyl market – one that has been declared dead or dying hundreds of times throughout the past 20 years – cheating death to win the war against an industry that’s been simultaneously driven, and stricken by leaps in technology?
Victory?
It would be foolish to declare victory for poly-vinyl without delving deeper into the mechanics behind the surface-level resurgence that’s been buzzing since 2006.
While it may seem that record sales are making a clear comeback, what it means for artists and labels, and where it may hit it’s high-point all remain shrouded in mystery. It’s a calculated risk, still, to put out vinyl for even those who have relied on the format for years.
“When Stones Throw first started, it was nearly impossible to lose money on an indie hip hop 12-inch,” said Jeff Jank from Stones Throw Records, “but, now, it’s very possible to lose money on them, even the popular ones.”
The California-based Stones Throw has built a foundation on catering not only to fans of their artists, but to vinyl enthusiasts specifically. For over ten years, the label has been guided by their founding mantra, “By a DJ, for DJs”, penned by their founder, Chris Manak (aka Peanut Butter Wolf), who worked behind the late MC, Charizma, and has since made a name for himself as a world-renowned turntablist and producer (outside of his role as label head).
Although they remain committed to pumping out vinyl releases, it’s still their lowest-selling format in almost all instances. Even so, Stones Throw doesn’t really consider halting their production of records.
“We have a single this year where we pressed 2,000 on vinyl but sold over 50,000 on iTunes,” Jank explained, “Making the 12″ required printing jackets, labels, cover art, assembly, etc, but there was never a discussion about whether or not to do it.”
It’s more a labor of love for their outfit than a bet on the future of music. Even Jank admits that despite the increase in sales, he sees the market as finding a comfortable niche rather than seeing any sort of insurgence.
Other labels have a marked interest in the vinyl market, but the circumstances just don’t seem right.
“I have a room full of vinyl,” said Paul Loverro, who is an MC and producer under the pseudonym Nasa and is the founder of Uncommon Records, an indie label based in New York. “I think vinyl is great. But, pressing up vinyl would be suicide [for Uncommon],” he explained.
Nasa continued by saying that for a small company like his label, the overhead costs are the main impediment to pushing physical records instead of digital releases. Producing a mandatory number of vinyl (manufacturers often have a minimum order size for physical formats) can cost labels a lot of money, and without a proven customer base of vinyl heads, it could easily serve a deadly blow to an entire outfit. Even so, there’s still a high level of interest in the format.
“Vinyl just connects better than CDs,” said Loverro, explaining his personal affinity for the bigger, heavier LP or EP instead of the plastic compact disc. “When I was coming up, CDs were wack,” the 31-year-old recalled, “You had to have it on vinyl. And, if it wasn’t on vinyl, it didn’t exist.”
And that connection – one created through physically removing a record from it’s sleeve, placing it on a turntable and putting the needle in place – may prove to be the best weapon against the march toward technology. Even though digital sales are nearly 100 times those of the older physical format, no number of MP3 files can duplicate the combination of sonic quality and physical connection.
The warmer, richer sound that many enthusiasts rave about runs counter to electronic files. Since MP3 technology was developed mainly as a way to compress music and make it more easily-transferable (remember the days of 50-plus megabyte WAV files?) from computer to computer, the technology has the side-effect of sacrificing many of the sonic ranges on the high and low end. While larger MP3s may sound almost identical to what’s heard on CD, there is still a huge margin between them and the sound created when a turntable’s needle glides over the grooves of a record.
So, the question remains – is vinyl in a state of resurgence, with younger generations flocking to a physical connection like they’ve never really experienced with CD and MP3, or are niche users simply rediscovering the nostalgia of their long-lost passion?
Standards
The key for hip hop’s adherence to the format may lie in DJs, like HouseShoes, quoted so eloquently above. Many DJs who have been in the scene for a long time have been huge proponents of the dated technology – and not just using vinyl track records to spin MP3s with Serato. This push by DJs has instilled a sense of cool in using vinyl, a form of peer pressure that makes the format a right of passage for new DJs looking to cut their teeth in the industry.
“I still buy vinyl if it’s worth copping,” said DeeJay Element of the New York-based Brown Bag Allstars, “But for the most part I use Serato, because digital is just a lot easier.” But, like HouseShoes (who also now uses primarily Serato), DJ Element sees using vinyl as a fundamental step in becoming a hip hop DJ. “Using Serato is fine,” he said, “if you paid your dues and spun on vinyl – if you earned your stripes.”
When asked what makes a piece of vinyl worth copping, Element said, “I like to buy vinyl to support artists, to put money in their pockets,” citing the newest Marco Polo record as an example. “I don’t know if Drake even put out a vinyl, but I wouldn’t go out and buy a Drake vinyl,” he said.
But, even DeeJay Element had a hard time communicating exactly what the connection is to vinyl that makes it so appealing. “It kind of brings me back,” he described about the feeling he gets from buying a new piece of wax, “When you go buy a piece of vinyl and you open it, it’s different. When you go online it’s no fun – [Buying vinyl] makes me feel like a ‘real DJ’.”
DJ and producer Chumzilla (the Skrilla Guerilla) offered some insight into that connection. It’s about paying homage to the past he said, “a lot of things that built what hip hop is about are getting forgotten – kids who get into DJing don’t know who Kool Herc or Grand Master Flash are, and that’s fucked up.”
“Buying vinyl makes me feel like a ‘real DJ’.”
Chumzilla is more accepting of a younger generation turning to digital alternatives though, because the standards have changed. “Now, the standard is Serato because that’s what [the younger generation's] resources are.” For him, forgoing vinyl is passable as long as there’s a respect for the craft as it originated, and being a DJ isn’t just a part of a “trendy fad.”
All of these factors, it seems, have carried on the legacy of vinyl into the year 2010. What was once marked for death long before the turn of the century has rode atop a bubble filled with lasting memories, tactile pleasure and urban-cool revival.
Whether vinyl will continue to enjoy the same success depends entirely on a series of unanswered questions:
Will vinyl records continue to make the same connection for years to come? Will records’ youth appeal carry them forward for another generation, or will the nostalgia of physical connection fade away like the long-lost memory of a former lover?
There’s no easy way to know the answer, and much of it depends on the ebb and flow of the music market. The historically volatile world of music production may prove kind to the bulky black discs, or it may wash away its legacy entirely. Time will be the true test for this hip hop hallmark.
All photographs by Anna Marie Rohzko, taken at Amoeba in San Francisco, CA
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