The MP3 Tragedy

Sound quality matters.  Ever so much.

The movement from the sweet, tasty sounds of vinyl

ffd-vinyl

…to not-anywhere-near-as-amazing, but still okay sounding CD’s

Fat Freddys Drop - Blackbird CD - www.beaveronthebeats.com

…to unbearable MP3 versions & their loss of sounds…

MP3 Symbol - Beaver on the Beats

01 Blackbird – MP3 – Blackbird (2013) – Fat Freddys Drop

…is a tragedy of epic proportions.

Don’t you think so?

Or am I going on about nothing? 

Don’t know what I’m talking about?

Or I’m right, but just need to shut up about it, accept that it’s happening/happened and get on with things in our new world of musical dissemination and listening?

Tell me, please. I need to know.

What’s the future trajectory for the sound quality of our music?

Is it hopeless for me to have hope? To try and resist the ‘inevitable’? Are we doomed for a future where we have to buy our music from and store it on a computer? In shitty MP3 format? Once upon a time I heard that technology was supposed to give us better things than we had before.  Well tragically for all of us, it hasn’t turned out that way for music.

5 Awesome Reasons to Buy Your Music on Vinyl or CD

1. Hearing all the sounds in the music that the artist created for you to hear.

FFD recording

Fat Freddys Drop recording

2. Enjoying the album’s visual and written arts – and supporting the visual artists & authors creating it. Front Cover. Back Cover. Booklet. Inserts. & any other extra bits the artist might include for you.

3. Supporting the music artists trying to make a living from the valuable contributions they are making to the goodness in the world.

4. If buying it from your local independent music store, supporting both those music store owners and music in general.

5. Enjoying the sensory delights of having the vinyl or cd in your hot little hands, smelling it, touching it, seeing it, putting it into your record or CD player and waiting in anticipation for the sounds of music.

Any reasons I missed?  Number 1 (sound) is enough to give MP3 a complete miss anyway. Isn’t it?

Increase your listening pleasure. Don’t miss out on hearing every single sound the artist who created the music wanted you to hear.  Choose vinyl or CD where you can, over shitty MP3 versions.  I will, for as long as I still can anyway (in hope that it’s forever).