USA Vinyl Sales 2013

Following on from an earlier thread on UK Vinyl sales for 2013 I have found similar stats for USA.

In 2013 Vinyl album sales in the USA reached 6 million units (not sure if that includes double albums). CD sales declined 14.5 percent and digital album sales stagnated, Vinyl sales grew by 32 percent from 4.55 million units in 2012.   

Between 2002 and 2012, Vinyl LP sales in the United States have increased by 250%, while total recorded music shipments have dropped nearly 50%. In 2013, Vinyl albums accounted for 2% of total album sales in the U.S., whilst CD's 57.2% and digital albums 40.6% accounted for the rest of the market.

Just saying ......

Interesting. It's still minutiae compared to digital, but it is interesting. I think it's a result of a lot of Hipsters. 

I think really you have two markets, the hard core audiophile who never gave up on vinyl, and the new young kids who are into something just because it's different. And retro. It's cheaper to get a LP rig than a decent tube amp! Not necessarily a decent LP rig, but an LP rig.

I think kids who do this notice two things. One is of course that LP sounds "different." Better or not is an individual judgment, but different. The other is that LP enforces a different kind of listening, a serially recorded album that doesn't support random access well, forces you to more or less sit and listen to at least 20 min of music at a go without getting ADD and skipping all over the place. Both I think are novel experiences for a lot of folks who weren't around in the glory days of HiFi.

So I wonder at what point B&O would invest in a niche area, ie would they be happy in selling 10,000 units world wide as a solid return or is this thought too simplistic ?

Jeff:

 The other is that LP enforces a different kind of listening, a serially recorded album that doesn't support random access well, forces you to more or less sit and listen to at least 20 min of music at a go without getting ADD and skipping all over the place. 

Listening to my 180g vinyl albums keeps me busy - no need for visiting the fitness center anymore

MM

Jeff:

I think kids who do this notice two things. One is of course that LP sounds "different." Better or not is an individual judgment, but different. The other is that LP enforces a different kind of listening, a serially recorded album that doesn't support random access well, forces you to more or less sit and listen to at least 20 min of music at a go without getting ADD and skipping all over the place.

...That, and also the fact that the people who were born in the nineties went directly into the digital and ipod era, where everything was accessible in an instant. I think that these people are now realizing how nice it is to possess a materialization of their passion, something they can touch, look at and take care of...

The contact with the music is also more physical in LP's: turning it at the end of one side is a pleasure in itself..

The same goes for books. I'm sure that we are far from the end of libraries...

Imagine if B&o would go back to that market with the reedition of the 4000 series or, why not, a totally new concept..

Guillaume

 

On another thread somone mentioned that B&O recently copyrighted B&O Classic, so how feasable would it be to "technically update" say a 4000 or similiar and reproduce it ?

Just because vinyl sales are going up a bit, it's still a tiny niche market, and I seriously doubt most of the new vinyl fans are up for paying the price something like a new Beogram would cost. Most are probably using used or 100-200 buck turntables, or cheaper. B&O should, IMO, stick to things with a larger and more profitable market. Their table would be too expensive for most, and the kind of people willing to drop large coin on a table are mostly audiophile nerds who would view any table from B&O as crappy just because it isn't a Linn or VPI.

Jeff:

B&O should, IMO, stick to things with a larger and more profitable market.

B&O is a niche market company rather than a mass market producer.

B&O is not a niche market company, at least not compared with truly niche market "high end" firms. In a way that makes B&O in a worse position, they can't get by on making just a few, hand tweaked items of dubious merit as that only takes a handful of lunatic audiophiles to keep a company like that in business. They have very few employees or infrastructure. And B&O is not a mega-corp like Sony or Samsung, who has such a large business model and make items in such a large variety of different areas (computers to fridges to TVs to stereos) that they can afford to have a presence in a market they will lose money on as their cash cows keep them afloat. They can afford to play that game for the publicity or street cred such halo products bring.

B&O is too big to play the small niche market game, and too small to play the large corp game. The penalty for guessing wrong on a product or such is much higher, they have to try and make every product successful, they can't handle large failures as that sucks up large amounts of limited R&D and product production budgets that they can't spare. They are already serving a small market, how many of their core type customers really give a fig about analog or vinyl?

Visitors are impressed when I play my vinyl, all clean or new, and the talk goes on about where to buy new vinyl and turntables, and everybody wants one.

I then explain that to get a similar sound, they will need a good turntable with a good cartridge, a quality amp, maybe a good preamp and of course, speakers to fit. I then explain the costs of before mentioned items, starting with the min. USD 200.00 cartridge. And thats where people stop talking about TTs and change the subject.

Mexicans are used to loud bad sounding "music", distortion all over, but a booming bass, if possible. Mostly they run a cheap amp with a pair of 10 W speakers at full volume, or if sophisticated, a cheap surround setup, with a sub woofer overloaded to give the STOMP.

They dont care of how it sounds, just that it sounds. An example is my garage door, double sliding type, a German made opener make for a totally silent operation, cost about USD 550.00. They prefer a USD 350.00 one that rattles and make boom and bang when opening and closing, and needing service and adjustment every 6 months.

I agree with Jeff, a new B&O TT will be only for a few enthusiast and the audiophiles will as always discard it as high price bad sound.

The vinyl sales rising is a fashion that pass and will go back to where is was 10 years ago.

Søren Mexico:

Mexicans are used to loud bad sounding "music", distortion all over, but a booming bass, if possible. Mostly they run a cheap amp with a pair of 10 W speakers at full volume, or if sophisticated, a cheap surround setup, with a sub woofer overloaded to give the STOMP

.

I agree with Jeff, a new B&O TT will be only for a few enthusiast and the audiophiles will as always discard it as high price bad sound.

The vinyl sales rising is a fashion that pass and will go back to where is was 10 years ago.

1: that seems familiar - not only rhe mexicans prefer noise to sound.

2: there are plenty of old B&O TT just waiting for been taken care of by those who go vinyl (still or again).

MM

Millemissen:

2: there are plenty of old B&O TT just waiting for been taken care of by those who go vinyl (still or again).

Starting with a USD 200.00 cartridge, most people back off, and buy a USB connectable TT for less.

Søren Mexico:

Millemissen:

2: there are plenty of old B&O TT just waiting for been taken care of by those who go vinyl (still or again).

Starting with a USD 200.00 cartridge, most people back off, and buy a USB connectable TT for less.

B&O tables are complicated by the price of cartridges, which makes any of them a pretty expensive proposition for a lot of people. If you have a decent standard table a 50 dollar Grado will get you some great sonics, but that's almost the price of a crappy USB table so most people go for as cheap as possible I think. Unfortunately, while a cheap CD player will sound almost or completely identical to an expensive one, analog devices like turntables are one place where money and quality does make a huge difference. I almost hate to admit it as it shows my age, but I've been playing with decent turntables for over 40 years. I have the protractors and gauges to set a traditional table up properly, and to do it right is a moderate to royal pain in the butt. Some tables and arms, like the old Transcriptor with the Vestigal tonearm are really incredibly hair pulling to set up right. Used to take me over two hours of tweaking and fiddling back when I set these up for a living.

All of which is one reason I really like and enjoy my Beogram...simple, easy, elegant, and sounds good.

yes the "boom"  box customer would never entertain such a set up or cost outlay but with no disrespect these are not B&O customer base.

Looking at UK's What Hi-Fi magazine as a baraometer they have a stack of tested turntables over the £600 mark and a number over £2,000 so there is a niche market and what is interesing a number of these manufactures are not classified as global or high street recognised brands. Now one could argue that this supports only the audiophiles buys Vinyl but I'm not sure.

Is Vinyl a fad ? this will always remain subjective, but I see the trend steadily growing over the next 10 years for a number of reasons. Yes it will never become main stream, the same as Bang & Olufsen, but there will be a percentage of the music audience who will want to stay connected with their music and this will grow in our throw away society (this could also be easily supported by the music industry by going back to 10 - 12 track albums, real artwork and better sleeve notes to strengthen the connection).

OK B&O are not Apple and do not have the ability to reinvent the wheel like Apple did with the tablet, but they should trade on their strengths of being nimble with quick decission making and maybe offering "low production runs" to capture such trends with cool products which not only bring excitement but also showlight attention to the brand. Take the H6 headphones; good cans and I enjoy mine but did they not come late to the market by at least two years and you can say over the ear headphones are a fashion fad outside ones house, but two years lost sales is alot of revenue as well getting your brand out there.

 

Ironically I believe 2% is roughly the same market share Apple had a little over 10 years ago.  Obviously different metrics and growth potential but I believe that vinyl hasn't yet peaked as it just now seems to be catching on where I live in suburban America.  If it doubles again this year ( which I think is very likely)  you're going to have a lot of people with a lot of money poured into an expensive collection of albums with an appetite  for "hipster" products like A8s, H6's.  Any new B&O clientele captured throughout their digital initiative will be just as susceptible to a B&O turntable just for integration and prestige.

 

I'm not saying it's a good idea necessarily as I have no info on how much market share could potentially represent but it certainly couldn't be any worse than doing a Beotime, etc.  and they already have some tooling for it I'm sure.

 

How hard would it be to manufacture a newer, smarter and cheaper Beogram7000?  Heck I could probably raise the funds myself on Kickstarter using Arduino and a inkjet printing parts.

 

 

Severian:

Some tables and arms, like the old Transcriptor with the Vestigal tonearm are really incredibly hair pulling to set up right. Used to take me over two hours of tweaking and fiddling back when I set these up for a living.

All of which is one reason I really like and enjoy my Beogram...simple, easy, elegant, and sounds good.

Jeff

I agree wholeheartedly, Jeff. Those uni-pivot arms were a pain to set up. I got fed up with it in the end and fitted an SME 3009.

Like you, the sheer simplicity of using a Beogram allied to the elegance of the design makes them irresistible. I do have a hankering for the Michel Gyrodec though!

Cleve

Cleviebaby:

I agree wholeheartedly, Jeff. Those uni-pivot arms were a pain to set up. I got fed up with it in the end and fitted an SME 3009.

Like you, the sheer simplicity of using a Beogram allied to the elegance of the design makes them irresistible. I do have a hankering for the Michel Gyrodec though!

Cleve

Good call, the SME is a great arm. We got to where unless the customer really really wanted the Vestigial arm for some reason, we put Mayware Formula 4 arms on. Viscous damped unipivot but dead easy to setup. As easy as a regular Japanese tables arm. Plus it looked good on the table, and for high end tables, like the Gyrodec, looks are a big part of it IMO. There's just something sexy about these works of art tables that, even if they don't sound any better than a high end Japanese deck, makes people willing to part with the money.

People often comment that my Beogram, which plays the oldest media, looks the most modern of my equipment. It's sexy, but of course the BS9000 is still the star of the show visually.

One wonders if B&O could serve the table market by restoring tables, you'd think they would still have a tech or two who knew the ropes on them. Just as Porsche offers certified used maybe they could restore tables. Still probably a losing proposition though. But you do see a lot of tables on Ebay and such that need some TLC, some look good but probably need a bit of tuning and some preventative maintenance.

 

 

Jeff,

Earlier in this thread you wrote that you thought there were basically two groups interested in vinyl - the hard core enthusiast who had maintained a vinyl collection and a younger group who have recently discovered it for the first time. I think there may be a third.

I had a reasonably large vinyl collection when CDs were first launched in the UK in 1983. Like many others, I was impressed by their ease of use and the virtually non-existent set- up procedure involved with the players. (I had a Linn LP12 at the time, which certainly didn't meet those criteria, and for which I had foolishly traded-in my Beogram 4000, but that's another story).

Over the course of a few years, I replaced most of my LP collection with the CD version until by the late 80s I no longer had any LPs. About this time, I had also, to paraphrase Stanley Kubrick, 'learned to stop worrying and love B&O'. I bought a Beosystem 2500 which allowed me to forget the HiFi and listen to the music. 20 years later I discovered Beoworld.

One effect of that discovery has been the purchase of 4 Beograms and the resurgence of interest in vinyl to the point where I am buying newly pressed analogue-mastered copies of LPs that I had replaced 30 years ago!

Am I alone in this madness? I had hoped getting older would have brought with it some wisdom, but apparently not.

Cleve

It was only Di

You make a good point Cleve, your experience closely resembles mine. I had gotten rid of most of my vinyl, and given my Beogram to my dad. Then after a hiatus of a few years, picked p a VPI table and started buying some vinyl again, along with a retro move into tube audio. Then I got the BS9000 and BL8000 combo, and when my dad passed away got my Beogram back and sold the VPI. 

Like you I really came to appreciate the B&O philosophy...easy to use, it just works, sounds wonderful, no hassle, and stopped worrying about equipment and just started enjoying the music. I still have the Beogram 3000 with an MMC2, but kind of stopped getting new vinyl, I guess I have about 2-3 linear feet of vinyl on a shelf. 

I go thru phases where I'll listen to a lot of vinyl, but mostly I stream from my PC or Spotify these days. but I'd like to keep the Beogram running as long as possible as I'd like to keep at least some vinyl around. 

I can fully understand the appeal of downloading or streaming music. As someone who finds the whole minimalist aesthetic hugely appealing (I went through the Catholic Jesuit education system!), the idea of not having any real physical manifestation of music sources I am surprised I haven't taken that course.

Maybe, like Roman Catholicism, there is something about ritual here. The sheer pleasure of preparing a record for play, the cueing of the arm, the enjoyment of using a well damped lift/lower device is all immensely satisfying and something I missed for 20 years. Add to that the LP sleeve art work and the liner notes you can actually read - it's all very attractive and somehow deeply human. We are analogue creatures, after all.

In a way my automatic Beograms only partially satisfy that need, hence the ongoing interest in a Gyrodec.

Of course, I could just go to Frede and order a Thorens 124 based Beogram 3000 but that is even more costly than the Gyrodec and I'm pretty sure my good lady would struggle with my 'need' for yet another turntable!

Cleve

You hit on a point that I've made before and have held this opinion since the start of the CD vs. Vinyl wars back in the 80's, mainly that what a lot of audiophiles missed with CD was the ritual of getting ready to listen to a record. You take it out lovingly, handle it carefully, look it over, clean it, put it on the turntable, and then start playing. In a way it's a ritual that kind of prepares your mind for listening, a Zen like attention to "washing your bowl" that clears your mind before you sit down to listen. I think this accounts as much as any sonic differences for the plethora of tweaks to CDs that were around then, stabilizers, green pens, etc. I think for a lot of audio guys this gave them a sense of involvement in the hobby that went beyond just slapping a CD in and hitting play. I think many really missed that.

That there were sonic differences is obviously true. Many early CDs were not mastered all that well in the rush to get the catalog fleshed out. And even the best CD sounds different than LP. To my ears, good CDs are clearly superior, but many people prefer and like the kind of euphonic distortions LPs have, their freq response has a dip in the upper midrange and an emphasis on the lower mids, and there is a significant amount of freq dependent crosstalk or reduction in channel separation and such that can give an exaggerated sense of depth. Bob Carver even made a little box called a Digital Time Lens that introduced some of this into a CD signal. I've heard it, and while it wasn't perfect (for example it wasn't adjustable for different amounts of "correction") it truly made digital sources sound a lot more LP like. Of course, since it was made by Bob Carver most audiophiles would never consider it as most of them loathed the man after his infamous Carver Amp Challenge that Stereophile so massively failed.

I do miss large album art and liner notes, that's something lacking in all modern media, CD or streaming. There was something about holding the cover in your hands and reading and looking at it. I don't miss getting up every 20 minutes or so to swap sides or albums though.

I think, while the Thorens/Beo table would be sweet, the Gyrodeck looks much sexier. If you're going to spend that kind of money might as well get as sexy a table as possible!

Speaking of short playing times of albums, I just relistened to "PDQ Bach On The Air" which purports to be the radio broadcast from WOOF, the radio station of the University of Southern North Dakota at Hoople.

The grand prize for the What's My Melodic Line challenge where you send in a music piece title and I Virtuosi De Hoople has to play it within 30 sec was the entire collection of the works of Vivaldi, recorded on convenient 45 rpm records, mailed out one a week, over the next 39 years.

As a lover of Baroque music, I have never subscribed to the view that Vivaldi wrote one concerto 450 times!

Over here in the UK, the BBC's classical radio station has a one hour daily programme on weekdays called 'Composer of the Week'. There is a rumour they are planning a PDQ Bach week!

Cleve

He really lampooned Baroque music, in the contest, he said by coincidence three people had sent in requests for music by Archangelo Spumoni. He was one of the most prolific and unknown of the many prolific and unknown Baroque composers. First piece, typical Baroque insipid chamber piece. Second piece, for harpsichord, was the identical melody. Third piece was the first of the 3 part inventions, guy starts playing the harpsichord with the same melody, he goes oh no, you fell into the trap, that's the first of the 2 part inventions. Then the guy plays the 3 part invention and it's the exact same melody only inverted. I rolled on the floor on that one.

I've seen him in concert numerous times, it's always a completely hysterical experience.

He made fun of our NPR stations over here in the 2nd radio station album. NPR over here has a pretty tightly restricted playlist of classical, the XM Radio satellite channel in my car has a much broader and more obscure at times selection. In his thing the playlist had to be nothing written after 1875, nothing in a minor key until after 10 pm, and even then you had to add up the minor chords and if they hit more than 70% of the chords, out it went. 

When I was much younger and lived in Orlando Florida the conductor came out and announced that after intermission the next piece was written after 1900 in case anyone wanted to leave, and by gods about a third of the audience didn't come back after intermission.

Wonderful stuff!

Cleve

Jeff:

When I was much younger and lived in Orlando Florida the conductor came out and announced that after intermission the next piece was written after 1900 in case anyone wanted to leave, and by gods about a third of the audience didn't come back after intermission.

Thanks for the stories Jeff

Interesting article from last year on the vinyl resurgence.   'Says Pro-Ject is selling 8,000 turntables per month.    Excerpt: 

“We never expected the vinyl resurgence to become as crazy as it is,” he said. “But it’s come full circle. We get kids calling us up and telling us why they listen to vinyl, and when we ask them why they don’t listen to CDs, they say, ‘CDs? My dad listens to CDs — why would I do that?’ ”

edit: above link may require log-in; hopefully this link will work.

Nowadays most vinyls are cut from a digital source.

Even the re-issues are from digital transfers.

Why bothering with vinyls and turntables then?

MM

Millemissen:

Nowadays most vinyls are cut from a digital source.

Even the re-issues are from digital transfers.

Why bothering with vinyls and turntables then?

MM

Outside the tactile and user experiences, they will sound different even if sourced from the same masters. LP will induce several things, bass summed to mono, more LR crosstalk (less channel separation) thru the midrange, and an alteration of the freq response curve from razor flat. To many these sonic alterations are pleasingly euphonic and they are willing to put up with the surface noise, pops, etc. to get them. Carver used to make a little box called a Digital Time Lens that basically degraded the sound of a digital source until it sounded more LP like, by doing a freq dependent alteration of phase and channel separation, and freq contouring. I've heard them, they worked pretty well. If you wanted your CD to sound like LP that is.

A small box could kill a whole turntable, preamp etc industrie!

Just add some (digital) filters and the vinyl feeling is there.

 

Turntables are for vintage vinyl LP's - and for a handfull of recordings that a couple of small devoted companies still make.

 

MM

As I rediscover LPs, I sure agree about the ritual surrounding using a turntable. But, to be honest, I think we tend to forget about the ritual that existed at the beginning of the CD era:

1- turn on the CD-player and wait for that hour-long drawer to open ...

2- open the ( then new) CD jewel box ( not to mention the real pleasure of getting a new one out of its cellophane envelope)

3- wait for the hour-long drawer to close, the various indicators to light up until finally the first song would play

Of course the ritual has faded away as we got used to the medium, with occasional revives when dvd and blu-Ray came out ...

It doesn't change the world, but just wanted to be fair to a format that was a true innovation, and probably the last universal standard (SACD/DVD-audio, blu-Ray/HDDVD,MP3/AAC and who knows about the next war)

Long live good music and good recordings!

Because I am getting on in years so have lost some of my top end hearing I have found records a little dull when compared to CD which has all that digital brightness inherent. 

I did a like for like comparison with the Beatles Abbey Road on 80 gram vinyl remix and the CD version and that was my conclusion.

I found that attaching a Graphic Equalizer in between the pre and power amps of my 80's Beomaster 6000 and leaving it all flat with a slight rise at the higher frequencies, I got the high end back again and still retained all the analogue warmth of the vinyl.

I know this will leave audiophiles aghast but it works great for me.

But you wouldn't want a 7000 with the cheap cable drive and cassette draw motor. You would want a 4000 with its beautiful design and precision engineering - and that costs serious money. More chance of you building one than B&O though!!

Dave:

Because I am getting on in years so have lost some of my top end hearing I have found records a little dull when compared to CD which has all that digital brightness inherent. 

I did a like for like comparison with the Beatles Abbey Road on 80 gram vinyl remix and the CD version and that was my conclusion.

I found that attaching a Graphic Equalizer in between the pre and power amps of my 80's Beomaster 6000 and leaving it all flat with a slight rise at the higher frequencies, I got the high end back again and still retained all the analogue warmth of the vinyl.

I know this will leave audiophiles aghast but it works great for me.

Just mentioning B&O will cause most "audiophiles' to gasp, but that's their problem not yours or mine! It sounds like you're using an EQ properly, that is minor adjustments to improve the sound, rather than the wholesale up and down slider approach most of the unwashed masses would pursue. And actually, it's their system so they can do what they like.

The system I had immediately before getting my BS9000/BL8000 setup was an all tube setup, including a preamp I'd built, a tube McIntosh power amp, and even a tube FM tuner (talk about hot running, thing had like 20 tubes in it). What that meant was that music sounded good if it was a good recording, and if I played it at a certain volume. Turn the volume down, with no loudness, wasn't great. Bad recording, well, you lived with it. One thing I quickly learned to love about the BS9000 was that I could change tone controls and loudness from the remote and the ease of my listening chair. Overbright CD? One notch or two down on the treble made it good. Thin sounding, ditto on a click or two up on the bass.

I've come to regard totally abandoning tone controls and EQ in the pursuit of an illusory sonic "purity" to be wearing a hair shirt for no reason.