I have been thinking recently whether or not it is better to buy a CD, or just download it off iTunes/Rhapsody/Zune or whatever.

I bought my four latest albums off iTunes and they are:

Tomb of the Mutilated- Cannibal Corpse
The Negation- Decapitated
Antithesis of Light- Evoken
De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas- Mayhem

Now I really like these, but I would rather have them as a CD.
With a CD you get the album, album case, booklet and you can play it wherever a CD drive/player is. But it costs a lot more usually. And it is a lot harder to find a good selection of metal CD's and stuff when you live in a predominantly hardcore/metalcore region.

What do you guys prefer?

This isn't even an argument. Physical format beats mp3 in every way.

But mp3 is a lot cheaper. With a 25$ iTunes card I got three albums, something I probably couldn't do in real life.

You're not looking hard enough. You know, they do sell CDs on the internet.

Mp3 is bad quality. You can tell the difference on good headphones/speakers.
So depends what you want. Download lossless format or get CD or Vinyl.

I'd like never having to pay for digital songs if one day CD's would come to disappear. Paying for some files would be inconceivable to me. I have to hold what I bought in my hands.

I have a feeling that cd's will soon be replaced by something even more convenient, yet still physical. Vinyl will always exist, though.

That might be true for a new CD but used I find them to average about $6-8 total with shipping (going by prices from Amazon and sometimes ebay).

I prefer having a physical copy of the CD because I do enjoy looking at the artwork and I worry about my computer dying and music that I only have a digital copy of being lost. I suppose I could get a drive for it but what if I lose that or it's broken etc. I just figure it's easier to keep track of, and just plain keep actual CDs.

I love going to a record store and checking out all the metal cd's they have there and then deciding to buy a couple, that beats the shit out of downloading, and when I download, I do it for free instead.

This may just be the most retarded post I've read in a long time.

Sure, I download and all.. but if I have the money, I'm going to buy the CD. Which, if you have money and your going to spend it on music... get the CD. Not mp3 format. That's cheating.

Cassettes are dirt cheap, too. Vinyl is also cheap if it's second-hand and was mass produced.

+1

A friend of mine actually convinced me to try buying mp3 albums. I bought about 3, and really, it wasn't buying for 2 of them because I used pepsi points to buy them on amazon.com. But the point was still that I felt ripped off, because I don't have a CD to put on the shelf, I had no liner notes or artwork, the sound quality is not as good, and it's easy to forget you even have something when it's just files on your computer. I came back from this experience hating the idea of buying mp3s even more than I did to begin with. A couple of times I bought nonmetal songs, just one song I wanted to hear and didn't have/couldn't find, but that's a rarity and it would only be for things I didn't like enough to buy the whole album.


I feel your pain on this subject, but still, this is the reason I buy ALL my stuff online. Because nowhere around here has anything I want.

I think I'm about to have an aneurysm.

I tend to easily fuck up my cassettes, so I don't buy them... hence why I've never played my 1st pressing of Kill Em' All.

I want to so bad, but man.. thats such a scary thought of fucking it up.
I've yet to get any vinyl... I want some though!

I need every format if I'm going to have an up-and-coming collection.

What do you do? Grab it by the tape and slam it in upsidedown in the deck? How do you fuck up tapes without being a retard?

Honestly this is stupid. Why waste your money on stupid files when you can own something physical that you can cherish and hold in your hands? I mean really. Besides the possibility of having the MP3s deleted, they also come at a much lower sound quality than on a physical release.

Dumb dumb dumb.

CD or vinyl, no question about it. Having the internet voids the "I can't find the CD in my area" excuse.

Yes you can say that but this is metal. I can see a person buy a CD for like pop or rock, but with metal, there are a lot of different choices to choose from, which makes it hard to get it all. I still want some Nile, Necrophagist, Napalm Death, Daylight Dies, Swallow the Sun, Candlemass, Opeth, Death, Toxic Holocaust, and several other bands. But I don't have the money to buy all these guys stuff.

And the idea of buying just one song from a metal band on iTunes disgusts me. And if you buy the CD online and have it shipped, it may get damaged, lost and it could possibly be the wrong thing (although this usually isn't a problem)

I mean sure, I could ask my friend Dan for all of his Opeth CD's, and his Death and his other countless albums, but that's being a leech, and no one likes a leech.

I don't know how to put a tape in... yes, stupid as fuck.. but I've ruined several tapes because of that.

If you went to amazon, it would be roughly the same price, but you get everything from amazon. with mp3's, you dont get full quality and cdrs scratch a lot easier

CD - Always.

What are you talking about? Why would it make more sense to buy a CD for pop or rock but not metal? There are tons of bands in every genre and thousands more in every sub-genre.

You clearly are about 12 years old, because you have these weird perceptions about stuff being damaged in the mail. I've bought tons of shit through mail-order and only once did anything besides a CD case get damaged.. it was a vinyl record and it wasn't properly protected. If this is such a concern for you, then purchase insurance. It only costs a couple of bucks. I've also only had one thing lost, but I was quickly given a refund. Honestly, I think they just didn't bother to ship it out. Wrong item sent to you? Get in contact with the seller and it should be resolved quickly.

You see, all your little arguments about why you're so scared to buy things online are flawed... but hey, if you want to spend more money to buy lossy files instead of having the actual object (which you can then rip and create your own, higher-quality lossy files), that's your business. Personally, I'd much rather you buy the mp3s, as that leaves the real products to the collectors such as myself.

I'd either download a free mp3 illegally or (the preferred option) buy a real CD. Either in a shop or having it shipped via the web. I would, however, NEVER pay for mp3 files.

Neither do I, but I would rather wait until I can afford the CD.

I only just bought Nostradamus last week, for fuck sake.

I'd rather have a physical album than 15 (legally) downloaded albums.

Jesus Christ, what the hell is up your ass today? If you want to be a Smith (and by Smith I mean dumb ass) go do it somewhere else, not here. And when did I say I was scared to buy something online? I was just asking people's opinions whether they prefer to download something over purchasing an album. I never made an argument either, so I have one thing to say to you:

Lrn2En61sh

Seconded. MP3 kills the purpose of the oh so beautiful album artwork.

Aside from their usefulness in exploring new music, I can't see how anyone could listen to mp3s.

Go buy yourself a stereo system.

YOUR RIGHT! God forbid anyone walk, or go places where bringing a stereo system would be a stupid idea, like school or work or on a jog. Your right, I only listen to music in my home, no where else.

EDIT: Oh and God forbid ANYONE back-up there files on some shitty flash drive, your insane if you do that!

If there's an album I'm interested in hearing, I'll check out some songs online first using a combination of things. YouTube, Myspace, we7, torrent sites etc. If I like what I hear, I will buy the CD. I like to have an actual physical product in my hands and feel that I own something rather than a bunch of computer files that could be lost if my computer ever suffered from a major problem.

I buy cd's or vinals when I can. But I don't really have that much money so then I'll usually download it. Though I do plan on buying the physical copies of all the albums I've downloaded.

But I'm extra paranoid so I only download bands from non-RIAA labels.

"To me Metal is like that street everyone's town that everyone knows is bad. Only the toughest mother fuckers will go down there and not be afraid.
Well, softer metal isn't really like that, but technical death/black metal is."

There's no question for me, I will ALWAYS buy the CD. I'm against downloading as I find it quite dissapointing to the person buying it.

If you mean paid downloads, such as iTunes, then I'm totally with you. If you mean free stuff like torrents and whatnot, however, I do wonder...

Either you have alot of money, or a small collection. Since one of the reason people do download for free is that they don't fit in either of these categories... just wondering. (And trying to defend illegal downloaders).

Both. I usually download first, then buy it on CD or LP later on.

I frequently only buy metal directly from underground bands (seeing as how bands such as Mayhem, etc. don't need my money, what with their multitude of fans), but lately I've been buying material by well known and unknown acts alike.

Buying the CD that you can have to put on your shelf and show off to your friends is far superior. I have downloaded a few albums, although I find it stupid to pay for mp3 downloads.

Usually, I only download if it's a super rare kvlt release that's gonna cost me an arm and a leg to have a physical copy, I.E. Demilich's 'Nespithe'; there's no way I'm gonna pay $85 bucks for that, especially if the band is split up and are probably not gonna see a dime from that money anyway.

But yeah, otherwise I will buy the album. No exceptions. This means that my collection is expanding at a rather slow rate, but I don't really care.

I usually download albums (illegally) and if I enjoy them, I buy them. Of course, with my average economy being that of a homeless dimwit, + self-deceiving and procrastination, I own about five albums, but I have hundreds of songs.

I need to shape my fucking economy up... and find someplace that actually sells albums I want!

Well as of right now, the income that I (should) have coming-in is little-to-none, therefore, I'll usually sample music online and decided from those given samples if I want to purchase the record or not. However, whenever I do obtain money, I'll more than likely, end-up ordering a CD or two online and in most cases, the record(s) end-up in my mailbox in relatively good shape.

However, to answer the OP, I prefer buying the physical copies of an artists' music rather than purchasing their MP3 files, which I find obsolete as one can easily locate any given band's material online, without any cost either.

I think this applies to pretty much anyone on this thread.

I always prefer the physical medium, it's not even a question.

I'm not against downloading, however I will always prefer owning copies of the album, and I'm against buying mp3's. How useless.





Either you're 12-13 years old, or a complete moron. I can't even think of someone who can ruin a cassette tape. CD players, tape decks, turntables...they're all designed so that people with mental disabilities could even work them properly.