By Solé Scott
Editor-in-Chief
The loss in popularity of physical music has made a detrimental impact on music today.
I remember the time when I went to Best Buy, Target, Walmart, Barnes & Noble and FYE to buy CDs of my favorite artists. The excitement I felt as I shopped through the music section of these stores was out of this world. Sure, I watched YouTube sparingly with the permission of my mother on the family computer.
Now when an artist releases an album, I am not in a rush to listen. When I do finally listen, I keep that album on rotation for max a week then throw it into the abyss.
The positives for streaming is convenience, because we all carry a cellphone and can access music with a click of a button. No need to carry a Walkman and a fanny pack for cassette tapes and CDs.
The negative is that as consumers, we do not own the music but rather have access through subscriptions. Oh and do not even get me started on subscriptions.
Spotify is currently $11.99 or an individual plan and Apple Music costs $10.99 and up. What I have noticed about both of these platforms is that they do not have the full discography of an artist or band. I find myself having to still go on SoundCloud and YouTube for songs and albums that are missing from Spotify and Apple Music.
Perhaps I am biased on my stance in this opinion due to me being a vinyl collector since 2016 and owning two record players and over 90 records in my personal collection.
There is just nothing compared physically going to a store and buying your favorite artist’s album and opening up that CD after ripping the plastic off and sliding the disk in the CD player.
Another angle of streaming vs. physical is the decline in first week sales or general sales.
For example, pre streaming artists had to sell more than 100,000 units order to be deemed successful. Now you have Pusha T’s “It’s Almost Dry” went number one on the billboard 200 chart by selling 55,000 album equivalent units in 2022 or Gracie Abrams’ 2024 album “The Secret of Us” reaching number two on the Billboard 200 chart with 89,000 copies sold.
These people are flops and would have never lasted in the music industry by pushing these numbers.
I mean for crying out loud these artists no longer put effort into album covers and always slap a generic picture with a parental advisory sticker at the bottom.
No one takes the time to perfect anything, yet artists today are recording albums that are 30 minutes long with 10 songs over the span of two years.
As much as this pains me, I do have to give credit to Taylor Swift for being the only artist now that is able to sell 1,000,000+ in the first week.
What I also feel that pains me is records from older artists, such as Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, The Beatles, etc.are being broken today due to streaming. I do not think that is fair at all because there is a huge difference in streaming numbers versus physical numbers and Billboard needs to rectify the situation as soon as possible.
