Posted on waaytv.com, By Jamey Tucker, 25 Feb 2016
It’s an odd thing when people reject new technology for the old. The technology behind making
vinyl records hasn’t changed in 50 years, and millennials are flocking to it.
The way we listen to music has gone through a lot of changes over the past 25 years. From records to cassettes, CDs, MP3s to streaming. But the music industry is going through another change.
United Record Pressing in Nashville is just one of a handful of companies still making vinyl records.
The vinyl is compressed and the labels are compressed on the top and bottom of the vinyl, then it runs through a press that imprints the music and trims the edges before the record drops.
You may remember vinyl — the sound, the artwork, the songs you only heard if you bought the album. Now the MP3 generation thinks they’re pretty groovy.
“These consumers are kind of ages 15 to 25, 30 years old that never had a turntable before, never experienced a record, and they got their hands on it and they saw this beautiful artwork and the liner notes,” United Record Pressing CEO Mark Michaels said.
Michaels bought United Record Pressing about eight years ago, when vinyl’s popularity had melted away.
“In 2009, we had gone down to running one shift a day, six hours a day,” he said. “Today we run 24 hours a day, six or seven days a week.”
Over Christmas, the number-one selling audio device at Amazon was a turntable. And baby boomers aren’t the ones buying them — their grandchildren are.
“It’s warmer,” Michaels said. “It’s art. You should be able to touch it, feel it and experience it. And they started to want their music on vinyl.”
If you grew up in the 50s, 60s, 70s or 80s, you know what we’re talking about.
“No one remembers their first download,” Michaels said. “Digital music doesn’t make that lasting impression that a vinyl record does.”
Sales of vinyl records are growing faster than downloads and streaming. United Record Pressing is making around 30,000 to 40,000 records a day, and the company is building a second plant to keep up with demand.
