CDs are finally going to go the way of cassettes, 8-tracks and vinyl before them. It was only a matter of time, but according to projections reported by Billboard, digital music sales will surpass CDs in 2013. That’s a mere four years away (or one presidential term, if you are currently in that mindset).
Record companies have weathered storms before, and I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before they figure out a way to turn a profit in this whole mess. However, a victim of the digital age might be the distributors–the middlemen between labels and stores. In the same way a label theoretically signs bands of a certain caliber, a distributor will generally have a certain standard when working with labels. But as the lines between artist and store tighten, who needs the additional middleman? A label can still claim it’s useful–paying for promotion, marketing, tour support and so on. But what can a distributor really offer when the world is all digital and ANYONE can upload music to Amazon.com through CreateSpace or onto iTunes via TuneCore?
Despite the ominous date of 2013, the end of CD’s days may not come so quick. Cassettes stuck around in stores long after CDs became the dominant force in the music biz. I also don’t expect any major label or distributor to go down quietly…no matter what the statistics say.
TOPICS: poingly