Twenty-Eight year old Alexandra Rice remembers waking up early on Tuesday mornings and forcing her parents to take her to the nearest Best Buy to buy her favorite artists’ newest CDs.
“I would bug my parents to hurry up and get dressed,” Rice said. “Then when we would go to the store. I would damn near run to the music section to grab up the albums. I remember tripping a few times.”
However, gone are those day’s of anticipation and excitement to go out, and buy physical copies of your favorite artists’ latest album. Now are the days of streaming those songs and albums from streaming services.
“There was a time you could walk into Wal-Mart and the electronic section was covered in CDs,” Rice said. “ Now it is one aisle and then you have tons of iTunes gift cards and Google Play cards.”
The world of streaming music has taken over and changed the music industry.
According to Nielsen’s Music 360’s 2014 study, Americans streamed 164 billion on-demand tracks across multiple audio platforms that year, up from 106 billion in 2013.
“The music industry has fully embraced streaming, and I think music will continue to live on the cloud,” music industry professor Ben Yonas said. “There is really no compelling reason for people to download mp3’s anymore."
Yonas has also noticed a shift in how some artists release their music.
“I know of some artists and managers that put records out digital only,” Yonas said. “However, most artists are still manufacturing cds. I myself have not put a cd in a cd player in a long time, yet I do make sure my artists don't run out of their cd inventory to sell on tour."
There are many advantages to streaming music, such as being able to personalize playlists and take the music with you everywhere. However, there are some down sides to streaming.
“You may have limited data usage on your cell phone, and you could be spending a bunch of money streaming music,” Yonas said. “Yet this money doesn't really flow back to the artist. There are not really that many disadvantages that is why it is so popular, it is very convenient ”
However, some music lovers do not feel the same way about the shift to streaming services. One of those people is self-titled, audiophile and University of Memphis student, Stephen Williams.
“I prefer to own music,” Williams said. “I am someone who loves sound, and with streaming services you will not get the same sound quality as you would normally. Most streaming services play music at 128-320kb/s, and for me that’s really bad.”
Although, the shift in how people are listening to music is changing, there will seemingly always be a market for buying and purchasing physical copies of albums.
“The avid, serious listener will want more,” Williams said. “They want an experience. There is nothing like pulling the vinyl record off the shelf, pulling the record out, placing it on the turntable, dropping the needle on it, and while it is playing, read the liner notes that come with most vinyl releases and admiring the large artwork.”
