Customer just asked if the record we were playing in-store was available on itunes.......
— Rough Trade (@RoughTrade) August 11, 2012
@ everyone thats asking We smiled and told them we had no idea and went about our business (selling records)
— Rough Trade (@RoughTrade) August 11, 2012
Ironically, this brief exchange popped up in my twitter feed whilst I was in the middle of writing an anti-itunes article. One of the main points in it is wondering why the indie music scene hasn't created a digital equivalent of Rough Trade.
It begs the question as to why on earth music shops don't sell digital versions. Rather than lol'ing on the internet that someone wants to buy music on one of the most popular formats they could have sold him a card with a download code on. Regardless of recession & financial crisis stuff record shops are closing left, right and centre. But the last bit says it all "our business (selling records)". Notice they didn't say "our business (selling music)". In Hank Hill's voice I hear "we sell polyvinyl chloride and polyvinyl chloride accessories".
Anyway, these ideas will be more fleshed out in forthcoming "why i don't buy from itunes" and "why don't touring bands sell downloads on the merch table" pieces.
This is precisely my biggest beef with certain distributers'/labels' negative attitudes towards selling digital downloads. They seem far more interested in selling an object than they do promoting the music which is printed on it. If all I was interested in was buying a fancy bit of plastic I'd go to poundland and go mental. The absolute NUMBER ONE purpose of a label is to promote and distribute awesome music. End of. Get your fucking priorities right.
ReplyDeleteI think that Rough Trade label and the Rough Trade shops are completely separate entities. But yeah, I hear you.
ReplyDeleteLittle download cards totally make sense. Especially as 7"s in shops now regularly hit the £7 mark. I mean, it's a fair enough price. Back in the mid-90s I'd be paying £4 in Rough Trade for an import 7". But still, £7 is still a bit.
Be ace if you could go in and get 4 or 5 7" downloads for a tenner or something. I'd totally do that. And i'd totally take a chance on buying stuff I hadn't already heard as well.
Oh, and Rough Trade did tweet a few days ago that they were setting up some kind of digital store in conjunction with The Guardian (!?!).