I still buy CDs

In April, I purchased about sixty songs via iTunes, Amazon, and eMusic. That's an average month for me.

My iTunes library is currently at 16,559 items. While I have ripped a significant portion of my CD collection to my iTunes library, I haven't gotten around to all of it.

Currently, my iPod Nano has about 2400 songs on it.

In summation, I am a music addict. I have a particular fondness for the convenience of digital music. I love making playlists, putting my iPod on shuffle, and burning CDs for long car rides.

The music industry is concerned that music afficianados are only buying one or two songs off an album. CD sales are declining faster than digital revenues are rising.

While I am buying more digital music than ever, my CD purchases have not been eliminated all together. I still buy one or two CDs every month (on top of those sixty digital song purchases). Why do I still buy CDs? If I really love a band's music I like the comfort of having the physical CD. I like being able to control the bit rate at which I copy the music to my computer. I also like supporting bands I really care about.

Prime example how important band support is to me: I had initally pre-ordered the new Dave Matthews Band album, Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King from Amazon. The price was right, $9.99. However, DMB's online store was offering a great fan package that included a t-shirt and a Live Trax CD from one of last year's concerts. The package cost me $29.99, plus shipping (which I would have been spared from on Amazon since I have Amazon Prime). So, I canceled my Amazon order and grabbed the package from the DMB store. Factoring out the costs of the t-shirt and the live CD, Big Whiskey cost me $14.99 plus shipping. That's at least $5 more than it would have cost me over at Amazon. However, I liked the package and I like supporting DMB.

Some other bands whose CDs I have purchased recently: Green Day, The Fray, U2 and Crystal Method.

I hope the music industry stays profitable and is able to continue to produce CDs for those who want them. Note: At last count, I have over 2000 CDs. I'm thinking I could be a DJ ... hee hee