Here's My Tribute To Compact Discs

CDs are not dead yet - or even on life support - but they are definitely in intensive care. Over the last fifteen years its dominance as a musical format has declined to almost the point of no return, so it’s time for a tribute to those shiny, little discs.

I was one person who immediately fell in love with the CD when it arrived on the scene in 1982. I thought I had died and gone to stereo heaven because I always obsessed over the annoying scratches, clicks, and pops that most records accumulated over time even though I took extremely good care of them. I used Discwasher regularly, and I still use it today on any records I play.

As soon as I put my first CD in the player's little sliding drawer I appreciated its extra playing time - most double LPs could fit on a single disc - and the expanded sonic field. The increased clarity was apparent to me immediately on most percussion and acoustic instruments. Female vocals sounded far superior then they ever did before.

For the first time I started a classical music collection, in part because the quiet passages many of the pieces contained could be heard without those extraneous noises, turntable hum, or damage done by the tone arm's stylus even when using top notch equipment.

Another impressive thing about the then new technology was the massive reissue campaign it spawned. Tons of out-of-print LPs were re-released as the record companies' archives opened wide. The extensive liner notes that accompanied many of them and the multitude of box sets that became quite popular at the same time were very welcome and informative.

You could easily play CDs in your car. All you needed to do was simply slide them into the slot on your dashboard. There was no need to worry about cassette tapes getting tangled in your player. As a bonus you could leave them in a hot car because they wouldn't warp and melt like vinyl did.

Another reason to buy CDs is the cost. I'm not trying to appear cheap, but I can't justify paying double and sometimes even triple the price for new vinyl for its "warmth" - whatever that is - when I can buy the exact same thing on CD at a far more reasonable price.

I became a fan of multi-disc players, and in 1994 my wife bought me a Philips five-disc carousel player for Christmas to replace my original Onkyo single disc player that has now been replaced by an Integra six-disc carousel. I still use my player on a regular basis, especially in December when during our annual Christmas Eve party I carefully program an eclectic mix of holiday music that plays the entire evening instead of having to jump up every fifteen minutes to change the record.

Admittedly, early CDs weren't perfect, but it wasn't the fault of the technology. The record companies saw to that. The frequent hidden songs were always annoying, especially when they weren't given their own separate tracks. Too often the last song would end but the track wouldn't. Then, after perhaps as much as three minutes of stone-cold silence the extra tune - whose title was rarely provided - would suddenly and, without warning, start playing.

Just as stupid were the blank tracks separating the last song from the rest of the disc. One example is the debut release from The Dave Matthews Band, Under the Table and Dreaming. After the eleventh song ended there were twenty-two blank tracks - each just a few seconds long - before the whole CD closed with the last tune, an instrumental named after its track number, "#34."

Another negative side effect of the CD was that artists often fell too much in love with its additional playing time. They frequently stopped editing themselves. There usually was a reason that the songs they left off of their old LPs didn't make the cut. Instead of choosing the best ten or twelve performances from the sessions for their new album your favorite band could now release fifteen or sixteen songs or more. Too often these extras diluted the album, deceiving the consumer into thinking there was less good stuff on it than there really was. Listeners often believed they were laying out too much cash for mediocre music, but the longer discs were almost always sold at the same price as the shorter ones. However, I think the majority of listeners thought otherwise and this could explain the popularity of buying individual songs today. Music lovers no longer have to pay full price to get the three or four songs they enjoy.

The trend of adding unnecessary garbage and hidden tracks to CDs seems to have ended. Unless you're buying a compilation, box set, or special edition most regular CD releases today have only the same ten to twelve tracks the LP version offers.

Like many music lovers I wholeheartedly embraced iTunes, and I currently have over 21,000 songs on my 160 G ipod classic that holds 40,000 tracks. It's another beloved relic that proves I'm not young anymore. Most of the music from my CD collection has been transferred to iTunes and a growing percentage of my purchases are mp3s. I love my ipod, and the convenience it provides, but I don’t feel like I own the album if I can't hold a physical copy in my hands, and that is why I always burn my new purchases to CD.