Nov232009
Audiobooks on … vinyl?
Filed under General by david brooks at 9:23 am
I was in Boston this weekend, and on Sunday morning attended the Gospel Brunch at the House of Blues. I wasn’t expecting much, but it was fabulous, with a Boston-area trio of women called “Test-a-Mony” who are everything an R&B/gospel trio should be - lots of personality, lots of energy, and all three can sing like nobody’s business. The backing band was incredibly tight and reasonably young, too, which is nice, because the blues/R&B business is fading away into a sea of old folks.
As long as we’re talking about traditional audio stuff, take note that the ever-quirky David Sedaris has released his latest audiobook on vinyl. (NY Times item here.) This is so weird a move that I figure it’s done for publicity alone - and hey, it worked!
I have recorded virtually all of my few-hundred LPs into digital, complete with pops and hisses because it’s too much of a pain to clean them up. As a result, I have listened to that music more than I have since early post-college days, when having a record playing at virtually all times was a requirement for daily life.
November 23rd, 2009 at 9:18 am
Not too many people realize this but vinyl has made a bit of a comeback in the last few years. Well, maybe “comeback” is too optimistic a term, but at least a small push back against extinction.
I've also been converting all my LP's to digital (more reliable, takes up less space!) I kind of like the imperfections though, it's a slightly “warmer” sound than pristine digital recordings.
November 23rd, 2009 at 9:52 am
The NY Times pieces claimed vinyl has grown from the early 1990s nadir to a $50 million or so business. I find that hard to believe (the pain-in-the-neck factor of vinyl far outweighs the cool factor) but you never know.