Vinyl: The Analogue Record in the Digital Age - Hardcover

Bartmanski, Dominik; Woodward, Ian

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0857856189 ISBN 13: 9780857856180

Publisher: Routledge, 2014

Synopsis

Recent years have seen not just a revival, but a rebirth of the analogue record. More than merely a nostalgic craze, vinyl has become a cultural icon. As music consumption migrated to digital and online, this seemingly obsolete medium became the fastest-growing format in music sales. Whilst vinyl never ceased to be the favorite amongst many music lovers and DJs, from the late 1980s the recording industry regarded it as an outdated relic, consigned to dusty domestic corners and obscure record shops. So why is vinyl now experiencing a rebirth of its cool ? Dominik Bartmanski and Ian Woodward explore this question by combining a cultural sociological approach with insights from material culture studies. Presenting vinyl as a multifaceted cultural object, they investigate the reasons behind its persistence within our technologically accelerated culture. Informed by media analysis, urban ethnography and the authors interviews with musicians, DJs, sound engineers, record store owners, collectors and cutting-edge label chiefs from a range of metropolitan centres renowned for thriving music scenes including London, New York, Tokyo, Melbourne, and especially Berlin, what emerges is a story of a modern icon.

About this title

Review:

· In the age of the digital, with the ubiquitous smart phone and MP3 technologies providing consumers with instant access to global sounds irrespective of where they are, Vinyl explores the persistence of an old technology within the production and consumption of music. In doing so it demonstrates the complex ways in which material objects form a meaningful part of our everyday lives not just through the sounds of vinyl but by how it feels and looks. The text is beautifully written, impassioned, yet critical. Welcome to the world of the post-digital.
- Michael Bull, University of Sussex, UK

· Vinyl is a state-of-the-art treatment of an unforgettable object and medium that raises many of the issues central to contemporary anthropology. Its subject-matter should make it appealing to students and general audiences, while its theoretical sophistication makes it relevant to scholars of music, technology, popular culture, and cultural objects. - --Jack David Eller Anthropology Review Database

About the Author:

Dominik Bartmanski was awarded his PhD in Sociology by Yale University, USA. He currently teaches at Bard College Berlin and Technische Universität Berlin, Germany, and Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic. Ian Woodward is Associate Professor of Sociology in the School of Humanities and Deputy Director of the Centre for Cultural Research at Griffith University, Australia.

About this edition

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 0857856189
• ISBN 13: 9780857856180
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 208