From RollingStone.com:
In Rolling Stone’s new Special Collectors Edition issue, we count down the 100 greatest songs from the greatest band of all time: The Beatles. Check out the top 10 songs now, before the issue hits stands.
August 30, 2010
August 27, 2010
Company presses your ashes into vinyl when you die
Music lovers can now be immortalised when they die by having their ashes baked into vinyl records to leave behind for loved ones.
A UK company called And Vinyly is offering people the chance to press their ashes in a vinyl recording of their own voice, their favourite tunes or their last will and testament. Minimalist audiophiles might want to go for the simple option of having no tunes or voiceover, and simply pressing the ashes into the vinyl to result in pops and crackles.
Continued at WIRED.CO.UK
August 26, 2010
COLUMBIA RECORDS TO RELEASE BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN’S “THE PROMISE: THE DARKNESS ON THE EDGE OF TOWN STORY” NOV 16
Columbia Records will release Bruce Springsteen’s ‘The Promise: The Darkness on the Edge of Town Story’ on Nov 16. The Deluxe Package comprises over six hours of film and more than two hours of audio across 3 CDs and 3 DVDs. The media contents are packaged within an 80-page notebook containing facsimiles from Springsteen’s original notebooks from the recording sessions, which include alternate lyrics, song ideas, recording details, and personal notes in addition to a new essay by Springsteen and never-before-seen photographs. Containing a wealth of previously unreleased material, ‘The Promise: The Darkness on the Edge of Town Story’ offers an unprecedented look into Springsteen’s creative process during a defining moment in his career. ‘The Promise: The Darkness on the Edge of Town Story’ will additionally be released as a 3CD/3 Blu-Ray disc set.
August 18, 2010
NME’s 50 BEST NEW BANDS OF 2010
From NME:
Now we’re over halfway through the year, we thought it was high time we looked back and rounded up the most exciting new acts to surface in 2010.
Here, then, are the 50 bands who’ve blown our minds over the past few months. Do you agree with our choices? Let us know who we’ve overlooked over on the Radar blog. You can also listen to every band on the list via our Soundcloud player.
Oh, and if you’re in a new band yourself, make sure you sign up to NME Breakthrough – it’s a great way of sharing your music with others and, just maybe, earning a write-up in the pages of NME.
August 11, 2010
Who’s still listening to vinyl?
By Carly Costello, CNN
(CNN) — Chuck Thieroff of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, couldn’t escape the Beatles in the early 1960s. He would hear singles such as “I Want to Hold Your Hand” and “She Loves You” what seemed like a thousand times a day on the radio and the sound just knocked him out.
Not long after being introduced to the British sensation, Thieroff bought two Beatles albums. Before long, he was hooked on vinyl.
Since he started collecting more than 45 years ago, Thieroff has traveled the country looking for the perfect LP. He currently owns around 4,000 albums, but at one time his collection exceeded more than 25,000 records.
Vinyl records are still a big part of Thieroff’s life today, as he currently sells and trades albums. He recently started writing a blog about his collecting adventures called “In Search of the Sound”.
CNN asked iReporters to tell us why they love vinyl in an era of digital music. Dozens of responses came in from people of all ages. Some had been listening for decades, while others fell in love with LPs after discovering their parents’ or friends’ collections.
August 6, 2010
What If Vinyl Records Saved The Record Industry?
That joke, relayed by Streetside Records manager Nick Soha, has been going around the retail music industry for a few years now. As with any good joke, there lies a kernel of truth — a truth that might help an industry considered on its way to extinction.
With the rise in popularity of compact discs, vinyl records became an antiquated format. Then came the Internet music-sharing craze and online music sales, which further marginalized the old LP format at the beginning of the millennium. Through services such as Apple’s iTunes and Napster, customers could purchase music instantly from the comfort of their own homes. As a result, retail music stores saw a decline in both sales and profits.
By Jeremy Essig
Continued at Columbia Business Times
August 4, 2010
Would Record Stores Love It If Labels Started Hawking Posters and T-Shirts Tied to Downloads? Not Necessarily
Sub Pop’s considering selling merch with free album downloads, and general manager Megan Jasper told us last week that, “We used to give many of these tchotchke items away for free in an effort to entice people to pay for the music, but we’re considering flipping our strategy so that people pay for the toy and receive the music for free.”
It’s possible the new physical incentive might be enough to drive more people into brick and mortar record stores, which would be good for business. Sonic Boom co-owner Jason Hughes is not so sure.
More at Seattle Weekly
July 30, 2010
Cassette Tapes Are Back In The Mix
By August Brown
When the vinyl LP began its modest but highly publicized commercial comeback a few years ago, the format felt easy to love again. With sprawling artwork, pristine sound quality and the adoring ritual of flipping album sides, its return united young bohemia and their boomer parents alike.
Not so for the lowly cassette tape. To mainstream music fans who spent the ’80s detangling spools with a paper clip, listening to heat-damaged sounds warble out of the speakers and blindly fast-forwarding and reversing to get to a favorite song, cassettes might be the most despised, instantly discarded and fidelity-challenged medium to ever vie for mass popularity.
Continued at The Los Angeles Times
July 14, 2010
Vinyl and Record Stores Making a Comeback
BY DYLAN BOYLE
In the last two years, Daniel Bosman says he hasn’t purchased one CD, and his collection of CDs takes up only a small span of shelf space in his house.
Now, almost every album he buys is pressed on vinyl.
Bosman’s love for vinyl is apparent in his house in the Drake neighborhood. The third floor is reserved almost entirely for vinyl storage, and framed albums from artists such as William Elliot Whitmore and Daniel Johnston decorate the walls.
More at Business Record
July 12, 2010
Doing Business at 33 1/3 R.P.M.
By Karin Lipson
July 7, 2010
ANDREW GRABOWSKI, 20, and his brother, Nick, 18, both of Centerport, have iPods. But when they get bored, they do what generations of music fans did before them: “It’s like, ‘Let’s go to the record store!’ ” Andrew said last month at the Long Island Vinyl Exchange here. Behind him was an eight-foot-high wall of shelves running the length of the store and filled with thousands of albums — not CDs, but vinyl LPs arranged with their jacket spines showing, like books in a library.
More at The New York Times
