Lost 29 Years: This Japanese Comeback will Surprise You

What is old is new again in Japan. Next year Sony will begin doing something it hasn’t done for 29 years. With incredible demand for vinyl records from consumers looking to recapture the excellent analog sounds of their youth, Sony will begin making its own vinyl records once again in Japan. As I wrote earlier this year, Becky and I love our vinyl record collection. And we’re not the only ones. “2015 sales of $416 million were the highest since 1988. Stay tuned for 2016’s numbers.” NPR’s Bill Chappell writes that fans want the rich sound of vinyl, and they also love the liner notes and album art that go along with the physical music medium. He continues:

Here’s what a then-28-year-old record store customer told NPR about the format’s appeal, back in 2014:

“The way I consumed music has been so instant and so immediate, especially with Spotify and online streaming services,” Veronica Martinez said. “I kind of just want to go back to the way I used to listen to it as a kid.”

Sony has already installed record-cutting equipment at a Tokyo studio and will start pressing records again in the spring of 2018 — nearly three decades after it made its last in-house vinyl back in 1989.

“Cutting is a delicate process, with the quality of sound affected by the depth and angle of the grooves,” Nikkei reports, “and Sony is scrambling to bring in old record engineers to pass on their knowledge.”

With the move, Sony will make records that could be played on the new turntable it sent to market last year — although we’ll note that the player includes an audio converter and a USB outlet for converting songs into digital files.

At the end of 2016, sales of vinyl records outpaced digital music sales for the first time in the U.K., as The Guardian reported.

Revival of the vinyl album at Sony

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E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy

E.J. Smith is Founder of YourSurvivalGuy.com, Managing Director at Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd., a Managing Editor of Richardcyoung.com, and Editor-in-Chief of Youngresearch.com. His focus at all times is on preparing clients and readers for “Times Like These.” E.J. graduated from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with a B.S. in finance and investments. In 1995, E.J. began his investment career at Fidelity Investments in Boston before joining Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd. in 1998. E.J. has trained at Sig Sauer Academy in Epping, NH. His first drum set was a 5-piece Slingerland with Zildjians. He grew-up worshiping Neil Peart (RIP) of the band Rush, and loves the song Tom Sawyer—the name of his family’s boat, a Grady-White Canyon 306. He grew up in Mattapoisett, MA, an idyllic small town on the water near Cape Cod. He spends time in Newport, RI and Bartlett, NH—both as far away from Wall Street as one could mentally get. The Newport office is on a quiet, tree lined street not far from the harbor and the log cabin in Bartlett, NH, the “Live Free or Die” state, sits on the edge of the White Mountain National Forest. He enjoys spending time in Key West and Paris. Please get in touch with E.J. at ejsmith@yoursurvivalguy.com To sign up for my free monthly Survive & Thrive letter, click here.