Why I Still Buy CDs

I posted a picture of a CD I received in the mail this morning on my social media accounts and one of my friends asked me why I still buy CDs. It got me thinking (and listing). Here’s a list of a few reasons why I still buy CDs and don’t want to see them die out. Much of this can also be used to argue why vinyl records and cassettes should still be made as well.

CDs were the record of my generation.

I was born in the late 80’s. When I was a kid, my dad was a radio DJ on a local (to Tucson) station and I remember seeing walls of CDs and cassette tapes. I remember the first CD I bought - a classical music album with wolves howling in the fore-ground (I was in a wolf phase). Just like people sift through old, musty records at antique stores, I love looking through stacks of CDs, hoping for a gem from my childhood. There’s also something to waiting for things. With digital media, you just pull out your phone and buy just the song you want and you can play it instantly. With Cd’s, you have to wait until you’ve accumulated enough dog-walking money, jump on your skateboard, skate to the closest place that has the CD you want, sort through all of the other albums to find the one you want, skate back home, figure out how to get through the clear plastic wrap and barcode stickers that are holding your jewel case together, pull out your old favorite CD from the player, put it carefully back into its jewel case, put the new CD in, skip to the single (because that’s what you want to hear first), sit back and listen, a job well done. That all may sound like a win for digital media, but the feeling you have during each of those steps is anticipation… and you just don’t feel that when you click to purchase.

CD booklets are a sub genre of printed art.

Not only is CD cover art a statement, curated by the record company and the artist/s, but the booklet that cover art is on is called a chapbook. Chapbooks are a form of printed media that dates back to the 1500’s as a way to get information to the people cheaply (“chap” comes from “cheap”). Chapbooks have been used ever since for sending bits of information, short stories, poetry, and individual chapters from books to the general public. Chapbooks called “serial novels” are how some classic books became famous: Uncle Tom’s Cabin, A Tale of Two Cities, Crime and Punishment, Anna Karenina, and my favorite book, The Count of Monte Cristo (https://booksonthewall.com/blog/serial-novel-a-brief-history/). If these weren’t available to the public as serial novels, they may have been victims of time and faded with their authors

The thing is, chapbooks are super rad, but not well known. In this consumer age, paper media of all kids is dying (newspapers are going out of business). I like tactile things, I like real books, I like the smell of newspaper ink. I don’t want to see it die.

Physical often works better than digital.

I grew up with computers and the ability to learn new tech as it came out, but I’m an old soul. I chose, at some point, to stop caring about learning new technology and instead to begin learning old technology. I took up knitting! I like to work on my old motorcycle and try to keep my old Jeep going.

What got me, was that computers fail. Just like CDs scratch, digital files can corrupt. The computer can get a virus, or just slow down and become obsolete. Having the physical copy of music allows for it to play, without any lag, whenever I want it to. If I get a call, the music just keeps going because it’s not playing through my phone, it’s on the boombox (which is a totally rad name btw!). I understand the tech that plays music from a CD. It works. In my experience, it works better than the digital version.

Nostalgia is important.

Not to nerd out more than I already have, but new things (like the inundation of digital media online now days) creates and fuels FOMO. FOMO is, in most forms, negative. Nostalgia, on the other hand, is positive. It’s especially positive when you can pull out an old CD that you haven’t listened to in 15 years, throw it in the player, sit back and sink into memories of your emo years (I mean, that’s what I do at least). Yes you can do this from your computer or phone, but I think it’s a better experience doing it the old-fashioned way. It gives me a chance to look through that booklet.

Fun fact: The first popular album recorded on CD was The Visitors by ABBA in 1982.