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Made in Shoreditch

I also contribute a weekly column to Made in Shoreditch magazine called 'Old East End/New East End', where I look at the relationship between the East End of old and new, looking at the changes and the stalwarts in landscape, residents and culture, focussing on one street or district each week. You can find it here.

Vinyl Sales Up - But, is this a Good Thing?

Friday 21 October 2011

According to Music Week, vinyl album sales are "up 40% year-on-year". So, people care about buying records again. Good, hey? Arguably not. Vynil is a crap material, to put it bluntly. It is not of any use to us in terms of keeping the planet going and the production methods used to create vinyl are extremely harmful. See here for a great explanation on just how ridiculous our need for stuff is and how harmful all of our PVC possessions are. There is a big consensus in the music industry towards keeping independent record stores alive and while I can see the merits in terms of keeping businesses localised and what not, I really think we can forsake records and have independent stores totally online. Let's face it the rent's cheaper. If we are to move on from piles of plastic Western waste in the Caribbean and Africa, these are the types of steps we have to take. Just an observation.

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