Why is vinyl so popular among indie artists?

In the last decade, we noticed a rise in the number of musicians who released music in vinyl records from Lady Gaga to U2 to Metallica to BTS. More and more people are dusting off their old turntables again or buying the fancy ones sold today. There’s so many of us loving vinyl again that in the first quarter of 2020, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) reported that vinyl is enjoying constant increase in sales while the CD dropped three times as fast. Vinyl records are sought after during Record Store Day because now it’s not just the music they’re after, people are going crazy with the limited edition releases. There are labels like Third Man Records (owned by Jack White) and The Vinyl Factory that release custom colored vinyl records and totally unique vinyl records like vinyl with ink and water inside or vinyl crazy toys and goodies.

You might think, given that vinyl records are quite expensive, that only big artists like Fleetwood Mac (who have the most number of records sold today), Beyonce, and Harry Styles are releasing music on vinyl records. Wrong! Even the new indie acts are releasing vinyl records too.

One example is Ty Segall, an American multi-instrumentalist, singer-songwriter and record producer. They keep pressing vinyl records for their releases. In an interview with Fast Company, they said they sell more from vinyl than from CDs.

“We sell significantly less CDs than records at shows,” says Emily Epstein, who drums in the band. “Sometimes we’ll only sell one or two CDs a night. Records are still always king in terms of what people want at our merch table.”

When asked why they think this is so, they agreed that it’s because of the user experience.

“We all love getting a record, putting it on, spending time with it, looking at the gatefolds, reading all the liner notes–so it’s been fun to create a complete experience.”

Many indie artists have now included vinyl records in their album release because it’s selling like hot cakes again. There are so many legit reasons people are buying custom vinyl records nowadays. Here are some of our theories:

Vinyl makes music more enjoyable. As Emily Epstein said, it’s all about user experience. We will add that it’s also because now that music streaming is the way most of us consume music on a daily basis, playing music on vinyl becomes something special—something sacred even. It’s reserved for those special albums where you have good wine and stare at a painting until you’re transported in a different dimension while in your living room. Plus, even though others argue that it’s total BS, music does indeed sound better when played on a vinyl record. Unlike its digital counterparts, data is not compressed in vinyl records because they’re etched on it. The added crackle and pop also adds warmth to the music listening experience.

Vinyl has more value. Vinyl is more expensive than CDs but it’s also because of this that it has more value. It is a much better gift than CDs or download cards, for sure. If you buy limited edition records, you can sell them at a higher price in 10-20 years, something you can’t do with CDs and especially not download cards!

Vinyl is cool. It’s the thing! It’s what separates music lovers from true blue audiophiles, from the pseudo fans to the superfans. It’s much cooler to share a video of your latest vinyl purchase on Instagram feed, right? And that’s because it’s cool. Want to impress your date? Invite them over and share your vinyl record collection. You’ll definitely get plus points.

If you’re an indie artist and you’re wondering if you should do custom vinyl record pressing, the answer is DEFINITELY! So little to lose, so much to gain. Now you can order as few as 100 units and thanks to the internet, you can let your fans pre-order them. It’s not as risky as you think. It’s a good way to legitimize you as a band, too.

Releasing an album on vinyl records is simply a must for indie musicians today.

New to Record Collecting or Vinyl LP Records ? Visit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LP_record