Albums are dead.

I've had more sales than a chart topper. Everything's coming up Milhouse.

 

There are lots of options.

I still buy CDs but if it's a few bucks cheaper for downloaded FLAC files I'm fine with that. I just rip the CDs and they go on the shelf anyway, I don't even have a standalone CD player. I've got all of my music in lossless files on a 4 terabyte hard in my desktop PC, shared on the home network. My desktop PC has an external USB Dac/Amp that drives a pair of powered studio monitors (inexpensive ones but fine for what I use them for), and I've got the media server for Foobar installed so I can use the Android version on my phone to access anything in my music library when at home. I've considered setting up a Plex server so I can access it from anywhere, but I've been working from home for four months now and doubt I'll be back in the office this year, and leisure travel isn't going to happen in the near term, so other than a daily hike I'm just not out and about enough to bother - but I may revisit that at some point.

My main headphone rig at home uses an old Microsoft Surface Pro, also running Foobar, accessing the library over wifi from my desktop share and controlled using the MonkeyMote app on my android phone. USB from the Surface to a DAC, to a headphone amp, to my HD 6XX headphones.

I'm old too, but I work in product management for a software company and one benefit is I'm comfortable mucking around with computers and software, and actually kind of enjoy it.

 

Dang that sounds complicated and exprensive! I like to turn on the receiver, put the album on the turntable and push the start lever. Life is complicated enough already.

 

There is plenty of fantastic sub 100$ DAC's, it doesn't need to be a super expensive addition. If you already have a PC that can be integrated into your system. It can be done with little hassle and expense.

So do I! But I also really like the advantages a digital route allows in addition to my turntable.

Your tellin' me brother

 

Nice track . That one got past my Yes radar. I can see how you and other Yes fans are overloaded by Tales From Topographic - I saw that tour, my first Yesshow of several , and Topographic was a Saga - just stunning. Having experienced it first hand, the album is a gateway to a Yes Realm, much like their other overlong, overproduced, and chaotic Epic, Relayer. Not so much about songs as a journey.
Tales may well be a "you had to be there" record, limited to its time and audience.

We align with Close To The Edge, however. In some ways my favorite Yes.

Have you heard the Steve Hoffman DCC remaster of Close To The Edge? It is phenomenal. Alchemy.

 

That Tales tour was something else. That was my third Yes show and it was soooo much better than the previous two. The quad sound was unbelievable. The band was super tight and expressive.

 

Wow, yeah man - I am happy to have the album to revisit, as honestly I was too young to really get it. The show made quite an impression, I recall it like a vivid dream or a visit to another world.

Just listened carefully to "Awaken" - Same Yes Realm, a later more civilized epoch. Tales and Relayer were more difficult listening for the Pioneers of Yes Realm, they were the Abstract Wilderness Struggles and the Chaos Wars Fought to settle the New Lands so gloriously civilized in Wagnerian symmetry by the time of Awaken.

 

speaking of Yes and they're more civilized epochs/epics, has anyone climbed "The Ladder" to their glorious yet rather unheralded 1999 release "The Ladder" recently?

Has aged well, methinks.

 

What's an "anime tart"?

 

I think you're being coy. But since you asked, at least some of these pics qualify
anime girl at DuckDuckGo

 

Lol. Yeah, you got me, was just pushing back a little on the Taylor-bashing.

I wonder how these types would react to a gal singing "Whole Lotta Love" complete with moans and groans?

 

The big question is, where is @schnitzerphilip? He doesn’t seem to have been around for ages. Threads like this don’t mean nothing without Modern Dad.

Stay safe sweet prince.

 

I don't think albums are dead at all. A few years ago a local band would offer a CD on their website or at their merch table. Now it seems that those same bands offer CDs and LPs. I just got an LP from Jonathan Parker, an excellent country singer from his website. This is the first time any of his work has been available as LP, with all the others just CD and download. It's a totally DIY operation so I don't think he would be doing it if their wasn't the potential to make, not lose money from doing it. I think this is a trend we will see going forward.

 

hmmmm.... i seem to keep buying them.

 

AC/DC say no.

 

Hell yeah!

 

No one buys albums anymore? Good to know, as I look at four recent vinyl purchases that will be played this week

 

I haven’t noticed the death of the album. When browsing Qobuz new releases each Friday, there seems to be dozens of new albums to choose from. I buy new album downloads all the time. It seems alive and well. @PhantomStranger succinctly summed up the relevance of Billboard on the first page of this thread.

I have noticed the death of the B-side though. It seemed B-sides were added to 7” singles because the side was there to be filled. CD singles were often EPs to add value to the format. But in the streaming age, an artist can put energy into a track, whip up a cover, then post it on Bandcamp or on a streaming service. There seems to no longer be incentive for a B-side.

 

Its one heck of a headline, one sure to grab people's attention, but its only true to a certain extent.

But actually, they aren't dead, they're merely slumbering.