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7910079100Victrola's Stream Carbon turntable works seamlessly with Sonos, at a price
Victrola's Stream Carbon turntable is a well-built, expensive device that can stream your records wirelessly to any Sonos speaker. It's easy to set up and sounds great, but the $800 price point makes it a tough sell.
Audio-Technica resurrects its Sound Burger portable turntable from the '80s
After nearly 40 years and countless clones, the updated model features a few new features to make it more appealing to modern listeners.
Teenage Engineering's PO-80 Record Factory both cuts and plays vinyl
Teenage Engineering has unveiled a stylish record cutter that lets you produce vinyl at home.
IKEA teamed up with Swedish House Mafia on a turntable
IKEA has teamed up with Swedish House Mafia on a series of products, including a record player and a desk for music producers.
Akai finally brings vinyl simulation to MPC samplers
Probability and ratcheting rhythm features are also on the way.
Technics' iconic turntable gets a seven-color makeover for its 50th anniversary
Technics plans to only sell 12,000 units of the SL-1200M7L.
CD sales rose for the first time in 17 years
The music industry made almost as much from CDs as digital downloads in 2021.
Technics made a black version of its SL-1200 turntable you can actually buy
After dipping its toes in the world of Bluetooth earbuds last year, Technics is back to releasing new turntables and audiophile equipment.
How I inadvertently became a vinyl nerd
I became a vinyl nerd this year and purchased the U-Turn Audio Orbit Plus turntable and the Kanto YU4 powered speakers.
Amazon cashes in on the vinyl resurgence with record of the month club
For $25/month, you'll get a classic album from the '60s and '70s every 30 days or so.
Rane packs high-end tech into its first single-unit DJ controller
Rane, a well-known name in DJ hardware, has finally announced its first one-piece DJ controller: the Rane One. It is available starting today for $1,499.
Vinyl outsold CDs for the first time since the '80s
Streaming now accounts for 85 percent of revenue from recorded music, according to the RIAA.
Streaming represented nearly 80 percent of US music revenue in 2019
Streaming is even more vital to the music industry than it was a year ago. The RIAA has reported that streaming represented 79 percent ($8.8 billion) of American music revenue in 2019, compared to 75 percent the year before. And crucially, more of those were paid subscribers. There were 60.4 million paying customers for services like Apple Music and Spotify, representing 61 percent ($6.8 billion) of the entire industry's revenue -- a big step up from 46.9 million subscribers and 55 percent in 2018.
Phonocut will let you make your own vinyl records
As CD sales continue to fall, vinyl is becoming more and more popular of a music format. Some fans enjoy the bigger packaging and artwork while others claim vinyl playback produces a "warmer" tone compared to CDs and digital files. But vinyl doesn't have the flexibility of those formats. Phonocut hopes to change that with its home vinyl recorder, which launches on Kickstarter this week. The device's diamond stylus cuts the waveforms from an external source into a blank 7- or 10-inch vinyl disc so you can create records of compilations or your own music.
Streaming dominates the music industry's revenue
The music industry is on the upswing, and the RIAA has services like Spotify and Apple Music to thank. Adoption has steadily increased, and they accounted for 80 percent of the revenue from the first half of 2019. Despite these record-breaking numbers, the artists who actually create and perform the music aren't reaping much benefit.
Bloodborne's atmospheric score is getting a vinyl release
Bloodborne is one of the most lauded titles of the current console generation, and a key ingredient in making FromSoftware's game so memorable for so many is its delectably dark soundtrack. The atmospheric score by Ryan Amon, Tsukasa Saitoh, Michael Wandamacher, Yuka Kitamura and Nobuyoshi Suzuki includes nightmarish, etherial tracks and faster-paced pieces that ramp up the tension during boss battles. Bloodborne's soundtrack was already available to stream, but fans might be glad to learn there's a vinyl edition on the way, four years after the game arrived.
Bandcamp's new service is like Kickstarter for vinyl
Bandcamp is launching a Kickstarter-style vinyl crowdfunding service for artists. Once a musician's campaign hits its funding goal, Bandcamp will press the records, print the packaging, and handle shipping to boot. Artists will be able to set the price of their release and have full control of its design.
Digital music may not have saved the environment after all
Logic would suggest that music downloads and streaming are good for the environment. You're not buying physical copies, right? Not so fast -- there's a chance things could be worse. Researchers have published a study suggesting that greenhouse gas emissions are higher now than they were when physical media was all the rage. While going digital has reduced the amount of plastic, the combination of extra power demands and the sheer popularity of music (you can listen to virtually anything for $10 per month, after all) may have offset other gains. Where vinyl produced 346 million pounds of greenhouse gasses at its height in 1977, downloads and streaming are estimated to pump out 441 million to 772 million pounds.
Music streaming is fueling vinyl's resurgence
Streaming has been blamed for killing off the CD, but industry experts agree it's helping bolster the growth and quality of another physical music format: vinyl. Since 2015, streaming income has eclipsed CD sales, and the likes of Apple Music and Spotify have become major players in the music industry. This year the Recording Industry Association of America reported that 75 percent of music revenue in the United States came from streaming services. In the past three years, vinyl sales in the US have steadily risen about $2 million annually.
How to buy a turntable
So you want to start collecting vinyl. Great! Record sales have been steadily climbing, and in March, physical music outsold downloads for the first time in six years. You might've even started buying vinyl already to get in on the action. But given how long the format has been around, picking out a turntable can be as daunting as building a home HiFi system to connect it to. It doesn't have to be. You can spend anywhere from $60 on a Crosley all-in-one at Target to more than $3,000 for an audiophile-grade deck, with plenty of options in between. But what's the difference between a budget turntable and something that costs more than a few months' rent? And do you really need to spend that much? What are the features you shouldn't go without? Let us give you a hand.
