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Old 13-05-2022, 17:26
IntlDebris IntlDebris is offline
I am purity, they call me perverted
 
Join Date: May 2015
Posts: 304
Nah, there's more than that, but there are still a fairly small number. And some of them are shit (there's a Czech one that's notorious for bad quality pressings).

There's only one place in the world that producers the lacquers needed for manufacture, though, since a place in the US burned down about 18 months ago. That's when the lead times on manufacture basically doubled. Majors still get stuff done comparatively quickly because they book slots years ahead, often before they even know what's going to fill them, but this means that smaller independents get totally shafted, hence the 12 month waiting times.

I'm generally still a CD buyer, and it's frustrating that the CD release is always delayed so it can be released alongside the vinyl (usually for first week chart positions), but this is sometimes months after the digital now too. Roddy Woomble from Idlewild released an album last year, the digital came out in May, the physical versions in August. Given that CD manufacture time is still usually just a couple of weeks this struck me as odd - surely they didn't need such a long pre-order time? And then the CDs were released on time, with the vinyl still delayed by a further couple of months, making the whole thing even dafter.

The whole thing isn't helped by everyone pushing the multiple coloured vinyl bundles and stuff. I know it really plays into sales so it seems necessary for a lot of people, but I do wonder just how much vinyl doesn't even get played these days. If people were literally only buying copies they'd actually use, the manufacture backlog would be so much shorter.
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