The Death of the CD.....

In  1877 Thomas Edison invented the recording industry, and the phonograph. He recited "Mary had a little lamb", and recorded it to a cylinder. It was an instant hit. Ever since then, there has been an effort to improve recording. Over the years, sometimes slowly, and sometimes quickly, the changes have been made to the way we listen to recordings, and particularly our favorite music.

Edison invents the recording industry.

Originally vinyl records were the king of the hill. Only the speed at which they revolved changed. In the early to mid 20th century 78 rpm recordings were popular. But the fidelity was poor, and they spun around so fast, the recordings weren't very long. In the 50's 45 rpm records became popular. The records were smaller, but had only one song per side. The "hit single" record was born. Eventually the standard became the 33 rpm recording. The sound was good, and you could get plenty of songs on each side. The album was born.

But vinyl records have a fatal flaw. They are fragile and scratch. But the biggest problem was that you couldn't take your favorite songs with you in your car. So audio tape was born. Teenagers of the early 60's would get 8-track tape machines installed in their cars. These were clunky systems that would commonly jump from song to song, and easily get tangled. Cool kids, like me, waited for to 70's cassette tapes to be invented. They were smaller than 8-tracks, sounded great, and rarely got tangled.  I would roll down my windows and crank up the music. There goes Rich with the latest from Creedence Clearwater, Bad Company, or Mott the Hoople.

Greatest selling album: Eagles Greatest Hits

It's hard to believe today exactly what the music and recording industry was like in the 70's. Record stores were all over. Record Theater, Record Revolution, and the giant Peaches store. Peaches was a store that was about as big as a Best Buy store today. It sold nothing but records and tapes. Music. Period. It was beautiful. Back then even the album covers were works of art. Peaches stores would be packed. That is where you go to find what you might have heard on WMMS radio. They would play up and coming trendy artists. Peaches was where hipsters like me would go to find rare import albums of Led Zeppelin live.

Over time, computers were invented, along with digitally recorded music. The Compact Disc was born. These were small, shiny silver discs, with perfectly recorded music on them. They sounded great. But they did still have a tendency to get damaged.  I've bought hundreds of CD's. Probably so I could show my kids what I was listening to on records and tapes.

But time goes on, and so do changes in the recording industry. High quality vinyl records have made a comeback. But mostly to audiophiles that want to sit and listen to music on expensive systems.

Goodbye CD's

Recently, I wanted to buy a CD as a gift. So I went to Best Buy. Back in the day they would have aisles and aisles of CD's. But when I went the other day - nothing. Zero. They have stopped selling CD's totally. I had to go to a store that basically sells only used CD's, games, and DVD's, (another dead technology).

This is disappointing to me. Everything is downloaded now. This has been coming for awhile, and it's not news to younger people. Yes, I have a playlist on my phone. Yes, I have an Alexa with Amazon Music that can play virtually any song you want.

But it comes at a price. Nothing to hold. No album art. No liner notes. Those are all from a bygone era. Like the early 21st century.

What's next? I have no idea. But someday I will hear somebody say, "Remember when we had to download music?"