It’s no secret that whenever Kanye gets active on Twitter, the world waits for whatever bit of knowledge/fuckery he decides to deliver next. From a Wiz Khalifa rant (later redacted) to his messy album rollout that took place in the social media landscape to “dead-mow-five,” Kanye has finally realized he can get his raw thoughts to the public immediately via Twitter.
I was thinking about not making CDs ever again… Only streaming
— KANYE WEST (@kanyewest) March 7, 2016
Today, Kanye decided he’s no longer going to sell CDs. He probably decided this a while back (he said the Yeezus packaging, which features no cover and nothing but a red stripe on the side, was an “open casket to CDs“), but he officially made it known today. The Life Of Pablo wasn’t sold with physical copies and was exclusively streamed on TiDAL, and this process, I assume, is just Kanye wanting to get ahead of the curve, because that’s what Kanye’s always done.
uuuuuuum, so there it is… No more CDs from me
— KANYE WEST (@kanyewest) March 7, 2016
The debate about streaming and it’s impact on the physical aspect of purchasing music has been around for years. As cassettes killed vinyl, CDs later came in to take the throne and now it’s just MP3s alongside streaming as one of the main sources of purchasing music. As to how quick the “death of CDs” comes is really up to the record labels — as long as they keep making money on CDs, the production won’t stop.
In 20 years, teenagers will probably look at CDs the way I did cassettes when growing up — a thing of the past. Eventually, CDs will permanently have a vintage and nostalgic feel to them, it’s just a matter of when that’ll happen. But when a largely influential person like Kanye advocates not selling — or rather the death of — CDs, then that process will start happening sooner rather than later.
