Part of the excuse for higher prices charged by record companies located in the United States is the loss of stateside pressing plants requiring SACDs to be pressed overseas. This is why both Analogue Productions and Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab raised their high retail price of $24.99 per SACD to an even higher $29.99 per SACD.
It is also the reason Telarc and most other USA record labels are no longer issuing SACDs. For example Telarc's retail price was $18.99 per SACD ($2.00 more than their CD price), and Concord Music Group is likely afraid that the higher price necessary due to imported pressings would hurt sells too much! Record companies do have to make a profit to stay in business.
So where does that leave us? With specialty audiophile companies and a few European and Japanese classical labels that care more about sound quality than profit. Many of the European companies sell their SACD hybrids for the same price as their CDs, however if Europe lost their SACD pressing plants like the USA did I am sure they also would have to either quite making SACDs or drastically increase their price. If any of the single inventory companies stayed with SACD they would have to go back to double inventory or loose their CD customers. It may never happen to them, and I pray it doesn't but it happened in the USA and from what I have read SACDs are the most popular in the Far East and Japan so what if the only remaining SACD pressing plants are located there. Scary thought!
Case in point: Eric Clapton's 461 Ocean Boulevard SACD versus Japanese SHM-SACD price:
Polydor SACD B0003638-36 $16.65 from CD UniverseUniversal (Japan) SACD UIGY-9024 $66.05 from CD Universe
My question: no matter how much better the SHM-SACD sounds is it really worth $49.43 more than the regular SACD version? Or it put it another way, is one SHM-SACD as enjoyable as four regular SACDs?
In the long history of audiophile recordings they generally have a 50%-100% premium over the regular issues. The smaller market for SACDs combined with the closing of SACD pressing plants this seems to be greatly exasperating this divide.
CD pricing is going DOWN not up, many front-line CDs now retail for as low as $9.99. SACDs need to sell for the same price as CDs in order for SACD to fulfill their historic role of replacing the outdated low resolution CD format. In order to do this we NEED dozens of SACD pressing plants opening up in the USA, and dozens more worldwide. We NEED all recordings to be released as SACD/CD hybrids and the single-layer CD format retired.
As many are aware dual-layer DVDs now cost no more to manufacture as single-layer DVDs. The same should be true for SACD, the lower price for pressing SACDs will not happen until all pressing plants are pressing SACDs. We need to make this happen and NOW!
Those are very salient points you raise about SACD's future. The lack of new, regular-priced SACDs for the average music consumer is likely to drive away anyone but those with the deepest pockets. That does not bode well for the format's future growth.
ReplyDeleteAgreed! With some European companies pricing their SACDs for the same price as their CDs I was hoping this idea would spread to the USA. It never did as American companies priced their SACDs at a premium. The distance in the price gap was getting smaller and then WHAM all of the USA pressing plants either closed down or quit pressing SACDs forcing American companies to go to Europe or Japan to press their SACDs which is what a few American Audiophile companies are doing, however most just quit making SACDs instead of raising their prices.
ReplyDeleteWhat I believe needs to happen is current USA pressing plants be tooled-up for SACD production. Short of that physical formats will die completely in the USA. I am no fan of CDs however I believe CD's only hope is the CD layers of SACD/CD hybrids.
Dual-layer DVD movies cost no more to press than single-layer DVDs and indeed it was more cost effective to quit making single-layer DVD blanks and press all DVDs on dual-layer blanks and just leave the second layer empty if it is not used. If the music industry as a group quit pressing CDs and made all media SACD/CD hybrids the pressing costs should follow DVDs lead and be at parity. Any remaining CD-only programs could be pressed on SACD/CD hybrid blanks with SACD layer empty to avoid double inventory of blanks. Will this ever be done? I'm not holding my breath.
Getting pressing costs of SACD/CD hybrids at parity is only part of the increased cost of SACDs. For Stereo SACDs there is double the mastering cost (CD layer and Hi-Rez layer) and for Multichannel the mastering cost is even more as there are three programs, plus to get the best sound from both Stereo and Multichannel requires using separate microphones for each. These are one time costs and some smaller companies may not be able to afford the extra costs to do multichannel and I believe this is what has kept some of them away. If they could only be made aware that SACD is also a 2 channel Stereo high resolution format then many of these high resolution Stereo masters might make it to SACD. Many of these are recorded in DSD, DXD and high resolution PCM and it is a shame they are currently only available on CD or as MP3s.
I guess vendors simply put SACD into the luxury niche audiophile category and set the prices accordingly (that is, almost robbery).
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, what you're saying is true. There is one issue no one has addressed. The American record industry is no longer owned by America. Japan, Hong Kong, China and other non-domestic companies now rule another American industry. Sorry folks, but the truth hurts. The U.S. has sped up it's selling off of American jobs. All except the military industrial branch. The next war won't be a police action. Oh Yeah, there's one coming. It won't be to long from now either. Someday we will as a nation, tell the rich hawks to fight their own war. I'm disgusted seeing our young men and women die, to enrichen more corporate think tanks. WAKE UP! Disregard the propaganda, don't kill for rich corporations. Use your intelligence. They are.
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