Clipse, and other highly disposable pop/rap music suffers the most because they are not albums you actually want to waste money on.

I'd like to see the sales numbers for Used CD's somewhere. Why doesn't the RIAA crackdown on the hordes of shops who are illegally selling promo copies despite the warning stamped on every promo explicitely stating it cannot be sold. If i can buy a promo copy of the Clipse for 6 dollars, neither Clipse nor his label, Star Trak, get paid, yet they don't complain about that. They're a bunch of fucking RICH and GREEDY money whores. I sleep just fine at night, thanks.

And, yeah, no one should be losing sleep over Star Trak, maybe that one is a bad example.

From an ethical standpoint, buying a used CD is only a good if you're into supporting Used CD stores and the people who sell to them. Maybe you are. I'm not.

I think it'll be interesting to see how the LCD scenario plays out. I simply love the record, I'm a fan of what Murphy does with the label, and I'll gladly pick up the vinyl when it comes out to show some love. Maybe if people start thinking about music in terms of patronage rather than consumption, we'll see some mitigation of these trends.

finaly, good music does not need to be validated by massive sales and huge paychecks, that's what I was trying to say @2. there have always been folk traditions of music existing outside of the marketplace, new technology just changes the way it gets around.

With that considered and the decrease in sales, I would be curious if down the road we see (have we already seen?) a shift of artists away from "major" labels and to "mid-sized" labels like Merge, Matador, Sub-Pop, etc. that can better serve the artist?

Also, how much of that $.99 itunes download or $20 emusic subscription does the artist actually see anyway?

Not too surprisingly, it seems like many of the stumbling blocks to a viable download business are being placed there the major labels themselves, whose desire to protect their own soon-to-be-obsolete asses from the inevitable collapse of their bloated business model is prompting them to lobby extensively to hamstring any technology that facilitates downloading. Witness platforms like Zune, which by the time the RIAA and Microsoft got through loading it down with all their own DRM and licensing demands became a lot less user friendly. (Maybe that's why to date they've sold a total of approximately four of the damn things.) Even artists licensing their music on a Creative Commons basis (listen all you want, share all you want, do not resell) were unable to get around the "3 listens or 3 days" rules dictated by the big labels. And the strategy of trying to outlaw any technology that doesn't support this sort of DRM is still in full swing. Depending how far they go with this strategy of breaking everybody's radios, it spells bad news for independents.

I think the "patronage versus purchase" is probably the key to a truly independent music marketplace. Musicians don't have to be millionaires, but making money is certainly helpful. And the fact is under the current models, artists keep pennies on the dollar for music sales. If musicians were paid more reasonable royalty rates, sales could be much lower and still pay a respectable sum.

So maybe the kids stole a band's record off the internets, but at least they heard the music. That'll get them to come to the show, and if there's something worth buying, hopefully buy it straight from the source. Assuming the band does their own merch (which is easier to do these days), that'll be money in their pocket.

LCD is going to be gigantic in the southern litigating circles now. And they don't download or buy used cd's, they buy new cd's, but usually they're like Hootie & the Blowfish or Norah Jones or Brooks & Dunn.

http://www.discogs.com/release/580668

So, where then do you buy your records? At last count, every store in this city sells used goods.

According to Downhill Battle's iTunes iSbogus page, Apple gets 35% and the record label gets 65%, of which about 8 to 14 cents goes to the artist.

"From an ethical standpoint, buying a used CD is only a good if you're into supporting Used CD stores and the people who sell to them. Maybe you are. I'm not."

From what I gather from this statement, Mr. Grandy isn't into supporting stores that sell used CDs, but every store in town does. So where does he buy his music locally? Amazon?

The Garth Brooks statement is of course in reference to when he said Garth Brooks cds would not be sold in stores that also sold used goods. Thanks for continuing your support of Wall Mart Mr. Brooks!

Stores started selling used goods as another means of income because the profit margin on a new cd is at the most $3 - less if they have to discount deeply to compete with big box stores that sell CDs under cost and use them as a loss leader.

So, Mr. Grandy, try not to be so judgemental about what an indie store needs to do to survive, eh?