Demise of CD Singles

The singles format has been dead for years. It was evident as early as the eighties when vinyl singles were dominant and CD singles were just making in-roads.

By the early nineties, CD singles had become the dominant format but they were never as prevalent as the 7" vinyl singles were during the heydays of records in the sixties and seventies.

Then came Napster, Sound Galaxy and other means of electronic distribution. The day of the CD single was clearly limited and would probably see limited production in future, much like how small batches of records are manufactured.

The recent announcement by A Different Drum and Metropolis Records to cease issuing CD singles is a reflection of hard economic realities. The returns from the amount of sales generated often does not justify the initial capital outlay and the creation of the singles themselves.


Todd Durrant from A Different Drum noted that:

"But as the label has trudged onward through the last 10 years, it has become more and more apparent that singles are nothing but a cash drain. Maybe if I'd looked around and seen that other similar labels had already given up singles, and that even the major labels were releasing fewer singles, I would have caught on. But I enjoyed the fact that ADD was different-- we were keeping the maxi-single alive!

CD singles cost nearly as much to manufacture as the album, when it comes to material costs. When we're also paying for remixes, artwork design, etc. it starts to cost a lot of money. I'd justify the expense by clumping it in with the cost of the album production. By considering the single an appendage to album, I could just say that the extra $2500 spent on a single was just part of the album budget. But hey, that made for some very large album budgets for such a small scene. Realistically, so few people were buying the singles anymore, and so few DJ's were actually using them in the clubs, that it has finally hit me like a brick in the head that I have to give them up."

It is unfortunate that more and more niche players and specialists are bowing out. In the end, it is going to be major labels with their CD singles of sorry acts like Madonna, U2 and others. Tragic. Oh well. This is the end of an era.

'Foreign coin on a telephone box
A question mark on a calendar
An empty seat on the alpha line
A sorting code, an account number"
'Playgirl' Ladytron