R.I.P Music CD's

Alright, so I didn’t really know what I was going to write about until yesterday when it hit me. I was hanging out doing work at school listening to my iPod when I heard an old song from the early 2000’s come on. The song was 50 cent’s “In Da Club” which I had not heard in awhile but I remember in 2003 when it came out it was like the hottest song of all time. Everyone that I know that listened to hip hop or rap loved it and it was being playing all over the radio, so even if you weren’t into hip hop or rap you probably still heard it. The reason I bring this up is because I started thinking about other music that was big in the late 90’s and early 2000’s when I was in middle school. I remember that the main stream media when it came to music for me was all about 50 cent, Eminem, Linkin Park, Creed, Nelly, Dr. Dre and more. For those who don’t really know who I am talking about and was more involved in the boy band and pop scene this was the same time as Backstreet Boys, N Sync, Britney Spears and early Christina Aguilera.



So I came home that day and I looked at my CD collection which I don’t ever use anymore and just took a look at what CD’s I had and I realized that I had all the best selling CD’s from 98-04 weather it was 50 cent’s “Get Rich or Die Trying” or Linkin Parks “Hybrid Theory” and Eminem’s “Marshall Mathers LP and “Eminem Show”. I also noticed that didn’t own a CD that was released after the 2006. It only took a few seconds for me to realize that around that time of 05-06 I got an IPod and after that I really didn’t need CD’s anymore. So after that I went online and did a little research and I keep seeing that the best selling albums from like 98-04 were selling like 7-9 million for the year and even more if you include a 2 to 3 year span. If you take a look at the best selling albums the past 3 to 4 years you see that the best selling albums are only selling like 3 to 4 million. That’s approximately 3 million less people going out and buying the album. To dig further into it, in the early 2000’s the most popular CD’s like the one’s I own were selling for $15-$20, now a days the #1 selling album you can probably go to Target or Wal-Mart and buy for 11 or 12 bucks. So it’s really weird to think how far we have come just over the past 10 years when you look into the music industry. It was only that long ago that all of us heard a song on the radio or borrowed a CD from a friend and then said I have to go out and buy this so I can listen to it in my room on my boom box or my portable CD player before a game and on the way to school on the bus.




So to me none of this really surprises me when you think about it because over the past 10 years the way the mass media has forecasted itself to the public is totally different. Early 2000’s you were being persuaded to go out and buy these CD’s because they were “must have” products. Now since the invention of the iPod and legal or illegal downloading becoming much more popular, the media no longer forecast music as physical CD’s that need to be bought but now that can be delivered to us electronically, digitally or through file sharing. In the past few years with the inventions of ITunes and YouTube and almost every electronic device we buy today coming equip with both of them, how much longer do you think album CD’s will serve a purpose in today’s society. I know for me they already don’t because if I am not listing to my IPod I am listing to a CD that I burned or someone burned for me. So at the end of the day I see no purpose to go out and buy an artist album when I can simply get it for free or download it off a program. So my question to you is does anyone really go to the store anymore to buy music albums/CD’s like they use to and also what does the future hold for them?

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