After decades of streaming and digital, music fans returning to some old-school ways – National

Somewhere in a box in my crawlspace is a silver first-gen iPod Nano, which was my gateway drug into the Apple universe. It’s probably tucked away with a first-gen iPod Touch. Sitting on a shelf in my home office are two old-school iPods. One is the red-and-white special U2 edition that I bought in October 2024. Next to it is a white fourth-generation unit, the first with the touch-sensitive click wheel, which I somehow acquired about 10 years ago.

Elsewhere in the house, I have a couple of DVD players I no longer use, along with a Blu-ray player that got disconnected due to underuse. And back in the crawlspace is a Pioneer LaserDisk machine from some time around 1995, along with a cache of the massive 12-inch discs it used. I kept them out of sheer nostalgia. I consider them museum pieces that will never be used again. Then again…

Music fans — especially Gen Z — are getting a little disenchanted with new-fangled digital ways. Tired of having to have an app and a subscription for everything, there’s a movement afoot to return to somewhat simpler times. Not only have sales of vinyl increased by double digits every year since 2008, but CD sales are also slowly stabilizing after years of decline. And lately, there has been an uptick in interest in CDs, Blu-ray discs and plain old iPods. What’s going on?

Psychologists point to the fact that nostalgia tends to spike during times of economic and political uncertainty, both of which are in ample supply thanks to the Trump era, Ukraine, the lingering post-COVID fallout, and dire economic prospects; we’re looking for things that remind us of the good old days.

Vinyl

The vinyl revival has been discussed ad infinitum over the last decade. People want something that’s forever theirs, a tactile representation of the music they love. They come with artwork, liner notes and lyric sheets. They can brag to their friends about how many linear/cubic feet of their home are dedicated to an ancient, highly inconvenient music storage format. A turntable? Don’t need one. One study says that 50 per cent of vinyl buyers don’t own a record player. If they want to listen to the music, they can stream it, leaving the vinyl in pristine shape forever.

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Cassettes

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While there’s no technological need for a return to the cassette era for listening to music — who even has a working cassette player anymore? — they are finding a second life as souvenirs, collectibles and tchotchkes. Although Luminate, the official counter of music things sold, doesn’t break out weekly sales of cassettes in stores — they’re included in a category label as “other” (only 3,300 “other” products have been sold so far this year in Canada), many more are being sold off the books by indie and DIY artists. Because production costs are low, young artists can make a decent profit by selling them at gigs. It’s the audio equivalent of supporting a band by buying a T-shirt.

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iPods

Apple stopped making its last iPods on May 22, 2022, bringing production of the device to an end after 21 years. Given the focus on the iPhone, it was amazing that the iPod lasted that long. But now, millennials and Gen Zers are either firing up old iPods or scrounging online or searching stores for gently used players.

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There’s a certain romanticism to this, much like we saw with cassette mixtapes. Fire up an old iPod, and chances are you’ll find music of a bygone era when life was simpler. They’re an attempt to reclaim autonomy in the era of the algorithm.

With the right cables, it’s still possible to transfer music from a computer to an iPod, skirting the need for any subscriptions to a streaming music service. Millions of people have posted iPod tips and tricks to social media with hashtags like #iPod. Some independent Apple stores and gadget repair shops are also willing to help. But because they’re not making iPods anymore, be prepared to pay above the original list price from the olden days.

DVDs and Blu-rays

Anecdotal evidence from the video rental shops that still exist says that there’s been a slow rise in Gen Z customers. Subscription fatigue with streamers is a big problem, and the move back to physical media is helping to staunch the decline in sales of physical sales. There’s no danger of Blockbuster coming back, but I wouldn’t throw out that box of DVDs and Blu-rays yet. If you’re not going to use them, sell them. There are buyers.

Wired headphones

Lost an earbud? Tired of constantly having to charge them? Batteries worn down so they don’t hold a charge anymore? Tired of the latency that comes with some of them? Want to listen to lossless digital files? Subscribe to conspiracy theories about harmful radiation caused by Bluetooth connections? Then your best option is headphones with a wire. And despite smartphone manufacturers eliminating headphone jacks (I’m looking at you, Apple), there’s a growing desire to wire things up again. 

Have you noticed that many TikTokers use wired headphones? They’ve become a new, hip fashion aesthetic, an attempt to reclaim a bit of the Y2K lifestyle. They can also be cheaper and more reliable. And they never need charging.

What’s next?

I’d like to see renewed interest in linear cable TV. I’m tired of paying subscriptions for multiple services (Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple TV, Paramount+, etc.) that always seem to increase every few months. And with more of these streamers contemplating adding commercials, I’m evaluating if I really need to subscribe to all of them. After all, by adding commercials, they’ve basically reinvented network TV. No wonder a growing number of people are watching free YouTube videos on their laptops, phones, tablets, and smart TVs.

As for everything else, just remember that it’s not hoarding if you’re saving things for posterity and future use.

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