Are Jazz CDs making a comeback?

[Stonewall15]

Similar to the comeback of LPs several years ago. The convenience of CDs may have overcome the nostalgia of owning LPs.  

[Daniel A]

I think a CD comeback could only come out of nostalgia - because streaming is even more convenient. A couple of years ago there was even a short-lived comeback for VHS tapes (not for jazz, though), but historically, it seems that the most convenient option always wins out.

[ghost of miles]

I don't know about jazz CDs specifically, but the owner of my fave local record store recently told me that he's selling CDs as much if not more than ever. He says he's getting more young customers buying them, partly because they can't afford vinyl if they're looking for physical media. And Numero, which dumped its CD stock years ago, just announced that they are launching a new CD reissue series in response to ongoing customer base demand. I don't think CDs will come back necessarily to the extent that vinyl did, and will remain a niche part of the market, but there do seem to be signs that a small revival is underway. 

[sonnymax]

"Comeback", or a "dead cat bounce"?

[Holy Ghost]

Thinking ahead, which is now behind (you know, behind sight is always 50-50, lols), if we would've just started making CD's mini-lp's back in the '80's, to save space (and money, haha) we should've started this like a half a century ago, then that way, we would've saved a third of space on earth; no, keep sending on those plastic jewel cases wherever they go....

[JSngry]

34 minutes ago, Holy Ghost said:

Thinking ahead, which is now behind (you know, behind sight is always 50-50, lols), if we would've just started making CD's mini-lp's back in the '80's, to save space (and money, haha) we should've started this like a half a century ago, then that way, we would've saved a third of space on earth; no, keep sending on those plastic jewel cases wherever they go....

Downloads need no packaging. Storage, yes. But not packaging.

[Holy Ghost]

1 minute ago, JSngry said:

Downloads need no packaging. Storage, yes. But not packaging.

I get it, but I like having the product, and I'm a library man; wish the program started out more...economical. is all. 

[Holy Ghost]

19 minutes ago, JSngry said:

Downloads need no packaging. Storage, yes. But not packaging.

Right. Point taken, I just don't like downloads. I feel like I am buying virtually air. Just not for me. Takes the excitement out of having the actual product in your hand, I mean did you not freak finding a rare album in the cut-out bin in 1970? I can't tell you how many times I've said, "no fucking way" out loud in a store when I found the actual record/CD.   

Downloads for me, the thrill is gone.

 

 

[Eric]

A bit of a different game, but Dusty Groove seems to always have a pretty good used selection, generally cheap.

[JSngry]

2 hours ago, Holy Ghost said:

Right. Point taken, I just don't like downloads. I feel like I am buying virtually air. Just not for me. Takes the excitement out of having the actual product in your hand, I mean did you not freak finding a rare album in the cut-out bin in 1970? I can't tell you how many times I've said, "no fucking way" out loud in a store when I found the actual record/CD.   

Downloads for me, the thrill is gone.

 

 

I concur. Totally. But I'm old, and I'm not expecting the future to grandfather me in (although I am a grandfather...).

I tell you what I'm NOT gonna do, and that's to go back to vinyl. Been there, done that.

[Stompin at the Savoy]

Originally I didn't like downloads much and was particularly puzzled by the habit younger people have of downloading single songs. Having grown up on 78s, 45s, and albums the single download seemed like a step backward.  Not to mention the loss of album front and back cover.  I was also turned off after a while by mp3s.   It's probably all in my head but I fancy I can tell the difference between cd quality (and better) and mp3s.

But then a number of things changed my mind about downloads.  First of all, I have a lot of cds and box sets and I'm having trouble storing it all. I live in a tiny cabin at the moment. They end up residing in a storage unit and I play the files ripped from them.  Another thing that happened is the advent of widely available cd qual or better downloads and the simultaneous proliferation of music database sites such as Discogs, MusicBrainz, AllMusic, Internet Archive, etc.  The discography and often photos of album covers is now available electronically and for free for most releases. 

So I was already listening to lossless files I ripped from my cds and keeping photos of their covers and booklets.  It occurred to me that commercially available cd quality (and above) downloads combined with digital photos of the covers and booklets available online were exactly the same formats I was using at home!  Why not just buy the cheaper downloads and quit storing hard copies in a storage unit?

Edited 19 hours ago by Stompin at the Savoy

[felser]

I don't like downloads, but am certainly not going back to vinyl, so have started buying them for items where CD's are either not available or priced in the stratosphere.  But I'm so physical product-collector oriented that I actually burn the downloads to CD-R, print off copies of the front and back covers, stick them in a thinline jewel case, and store them on my shelves along with my CD's.

[Stompin at the Savoy]

11 minutes ago, felser said:

I don't like downloads, but am certainly not going back to vinyl, so have started buying them for items where CD's are either not available or priced in the stratosphere.  But I'm so physical product-collector oriented that I actually burn the downloads to CD-R, print off copies of the front and back covers, stick them in a thinline jewel case, and store them on my shelves along with my CD's.

I also burned disks of downloads at first, thinking of them as the long term backup for the files I was playing.  But as my collection of ripped and downloaded files grew I moved toward a fully digital way of thinking and began backing up all my music to portable hard drives and lately multiple copies at more than one location of 1 TB micro sd cards.  One advantage of this arrangement is I can instantly dial up any record I own on multiple devices and also instantly bring up photos of the album covers and booklets.  This is particularly helpful in my case because visual disabilities make it near impossible for me to read most cd covers and booklets but I can read the photos when I blow them up on a good sized monitor.

Edited 19 hours ago by Stompin at the Savoy

[mikeweil]

Every type of medium has its advantages.

[Dub Modal]

It will be interesting to see what happens to physical media in the next decade or so. Nothing is fixed. What we have today for streaming could look very different in terms of content and pricing in future. If these large platforms ever introduce tiered pricing mixed with AI-artist development and promotion, some of their customer base could leave and go seeking physical media or other options.

I just don't see it happening for CDs overall though. One needs a CD player, receiver and speakers to listen to them and younger millennials and gen z don't seem like the demographic that's going to go out of their way to get all of that going. Happy to be wrong on that. 

[Holy Ghost]

11 hours ago, Dub Modal said:

It will be interesting to see what happens to physical media in the next decade or so. Nothing is fixed. What we have today for streaming could look very different in terms of content and pricing in future. If these large platforms ever introduce tiered pricing mixed with AI-artist development and promotion, some of their customer base could leave and go seeking physical media or other options.

I just don't see it happening for CDs overall though. One needs a CD player, receiver and speakers to listen to them and younger millennials and gen z don't seem like the demographic that's going to go out of their way to get all of that going. Happy to be wrong on that. 

Word. But I'll ride it out and see what happens....

[Kevin Bresnahan]

I just don't see this in my area. CDs are dirt cheap and plentiful in every store I go into. If they were gaining any traction, I doubt I would see so many rare CDs sitting in these bins with $5 price tags on them. I guess you could say that Jazz CDs are rising as a way for someone to acquire a large collection cheaply, but that doesn't seem to be the way it's going.

FWIW, the argument that today's younger music fans aren't willing to buy equipment and have an actual stereo setup doesn't hold water when you consider that they are also the generation that has supposedly caused a resurgence in LPs.

[John L]

Yea, I don't see that a CD comeback is in the cards.  They will be collected by some only as artifacts, and the huge supply of many of them will keep prices low.  With LPs, you have analog sound that some people still value, as well as attractive packaging.   With the capacity of hard drives and computers so high, CDs no longer have much value as a storage of sound.   People can talk all they want about their perceptions of "real product," but the bottom line is that real product is sound in this case, plus information that can also be digitalized.  

[Stompin at the Savoy]

1 hour ago, Kevin Bresnahan said:

I just don't see this in my area. CDs are dirt cheap and plentiful in every store I go into. If they were gaining any traction, I doubt I would see so many rare CDs sitting in these bins with $5 price tags on them. I guess you could say that Jazz CDs are rising as a way for someone to acquire a large collection cheaply, but that doesn't seem to be the way it's going.

FWIW, the argument that today's younger music fans aren't willing to buy equipment and have an actual stereo setup doesn't hold water when you consider that they are also the generation that has supposedly caused a resurgence in LPs.

An older friend of mine has a collection of LPs and a pretty decent turntable, amp and speakers.  He was interested in playing some cds he had been given so I found a Sony DVD player which also plays cds and got it for him.  The player cost $33 in 2021 and now goes for $44.  https://www.amazon.com/dp/B007F9XHBI .  It's not a top quality device but it worked pretty well; this indicates that the cost of entry for working with cds is pretty low.  Most PCs will play CDs no problem...

Edited 2 hours ago by Stompin at the Savoy

[ejp626]

55 minutes ago, Stompin at the Savoy said:

Most PCs will play CDs no problem...

That was true 10 and maybe even 5 years ago, but no longer.  I had to pay extra to get a computer with a CD/DVD bay in it, as this is definitely no longer standard.

[GA Russell]

I don't think it's a surprise that teens and recent teens prefer the new way of doing things.

What surprises me is that adults have abandoned the CD.

A very important aspect of owning physical media (books, CDs and DVDs) to me is that they go out of print.  The fact that an album is available for streaming today does not ensure that it will be available tomorrow.  Owning the physical media allows you to know that it will be there when you want to enjoy it.

[mikeweil]

External CD drives are inexpensive. I had to get one when I had to buy a new computer five years ago. I had an external CD/DVD burner long before that.

CD prices vary: If you are searching for rare items the price tags are astronomical. Add to that the high shipping fees and customs fees and some items I would like to have are out of my budget. I recently found a Venzuelean CD from my wish list that is only 20 bucks, but the shipping costs would be four times as high, not including import taxes. Crazy.

5 minutes ago, GA Russell said:

What surprises me is that adults have abandoned the CD.

A friend of mine with an expensive high end system including high resolution streaming simply does not want to plaster his walls with shelves. Looking at my living room walls I can see his point.

And I was surprised at the enormous catalogue of his streaming service. Many rare jazz items that never saw a CD reissue. We did our evening on Cal Tjader completely by streaming. And the sound quality was better than any of my LPs or CDs. All high resolution. Only disadvantage is that often the liner notes etc. are missing. 

[Stompin at the Savoy]

32 minutes ago, GA Russell said:

I don't think it's a surprise that teens and recent teens prefer the new way of doing things.

What surprises me is that adults have abandoned the CD.

A very important aspect of owning physical media (books, CDs and DVDs) to me is that they go out of print.  The fact that an album is available for streaming today does not ensure that it will be available tomorrow.  Owning the physical media allows you to know that it will be there when you want to enjoy it.

Not sure I follow your logic here.  Yes, the fact that an album is available for streaming today does not ensure it will be available tomorrow.  But if it is streaming, it's almost certainly also available for download too.  Which makes it exactly the same as a cd: get it while you can because it may go out of print at any time.