The Vinyl War Begins

Press Editor Mike Lloyd spotlighted me in his weekly column this past Sunday, and he mentioned I started this blog to track what's going on at independent music stores.

While that's clearly not the only thing I write about, the indie-music world has been a big part of it, and I'm grateful to have a mainstream platform to vent on behalf of a relatively esoteric subculture. Here's one of my quotes from his column I'm rather proud of:

• "There are music fans who appreciate the chance to shop at stores where the personnel did more than put on blue shirts."

That was a not-altogether-subtle dig at something I believe is killing the music industry. Just as downloads have devalued CDs to basically nothing, big-box retailers have put the squeeze on independents by selling music as a loss leader. The reason you can get a new release at Best Buy, Circuit City, etc., for eight bucks is that they're selling this stuff below cost in order to lure people in to buy appliances and higher-priced media.

The silver lining for indies in the past few years -- the survivors, anyway -- has been vinyl.
The reasons for the LP's most recent comeback are numerous and well-catalogued, and the benefits for retailers are obvious. The customer base is loyal, and the product can sell at a higher profit margin because not many stores carry it. (Disclosure: I hang out at Vertigo, like, all the time.)

It was with a bit of sadness, then, that I read this article the other day. The big dogs, apparently, have gotten a whiff of vinyl, whose skyrocketing sales couldn't have stayed under the radar for long.

So the indies gear up for yet another fight. But when it comes to the battle over vinyl, my money's on the record-store geeks, not the blue shirts...