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Topic: CD Single Memories

8th Jan 2013, 10:27 PM
	biffbampow Member since Jan 2013 65 Points	I was probably the first person in my school to get a CD player back in 1986 so was very tech savvy and aware! I witnessed how CD's took up small displays in record stores at the back with maybe around 20 CD's then gradually became ever more dominant eventually taking over from vinyl. The late 80's and early 90's were not a fun time to be a vinyl man. I found that most vinyl I bought - 7 or 12 inch - was pressed on cheap stock - I'd play it for the first time and already there'd be crackles and surface noise. It's long been mused this was a deliberate ploy by the record companies to force you over to CD if you wanted better quality. CD singles in 1987 were a real mess... not many of them I recall and worse, mostly in the ill fated 3 inch format necessitating the use of those adaptors. The CD single as we became to know it became more prominent during 1989. I remember EMI regularly released new ones by new artistes for 99 pence. For somebody on low pocket money, this was a boon enabling me to try out some new names. I never liked 12 inch singles, didn't like cassette singles either so as vinyl singles became ever shoddier in quality and lesser in supply, I did buy quite a few CD singles between then and the late 90's though the diabolical state music got into (in my view) between 1991 and 1994 made sure I didn't get many then. Another attraction of the CD single was bonus tracks. They regularly came with 4 tracks until Music Week or the BPI made some ruling that relegated 4 track singles in favour of three trackers. I was a Tori Amos fan and remembered "Cornflake Girl" coming out as 2 different CD singles... the digipak one was the "limited edition" and that became a prized possession since it sold out quickly and became much sought after thanks to it being the only place you could get her extraordinary cover of Jimi Hendrix's "If 6 Was 9"! Some odd thoughts and memories there. How about some of yours? Memories and thoughts on the format as a whole? Edited by biffbampow on 8th Jan 2013, 10:29 PM