HMV opening new stores

[py_megapixel]

Physical music will sound better than its digital counterparts for a long, long time.

Physical media and digital encoding are not mutually exclusive, and CDs are both. The standard for encoding music on a CD is called CD-DA, which "Compact Disc - Digital Audio". A digital file encoded with the same parameters as a CD shouldn't sound any different to the CD if both are played using the same equipment.

Plus, you don't actually own digital media (something to do with how it's licensed iirc), but you own that record or cd.

You do own the physical piece of vinyl or polycarbonate, but what you can do with the music is still restricted by copyright law.

 

[MikeWM]

Just as a side note, IMAX 70mm film's native 12k resolution is yet to be topped by its digital counterparts, despite being some 50 years old. The Arri Alexa 65 can only manage an image resolution of half that and Blackmagic have only recently announced a digital camera capable of equalling 70mm. Right now, physical media trumps digital media in terms of quality.

I always found it quite amusing when people couldn't understand how you could make a beautiful-looking BluRay from a film from the 1930s (or indeed why you couldn't make one from a TV show considerably more recently). Film is good Quite a shame that it is very difficult to find 35mm or 70mm projected anymore in a cinema.

There's a related and rather important issue here to do with archiving - assuming it has been stored correctly, it is trivial to pull an old reel of film out of an archive and play it. Will we be able to say the same about a film stored on a hard drive in 50 years from now?

Though to be fair, neither of those points directly relate to HMV, sorry!

 

[johncrossley]

There's a related and rather important issue here to do with archiving - assuming it has been stored correctly, it is trivial to pull an old reel of film out of an archive and play it. Will we be able to say the same about a film stored on a hard drive in 50 years from now?

Presumably the people doing the archiving simply transfer files from one format to another as technology progresses. There should be no degradation when transferring from one digital format to another. On a personal note, I've got files from the 90s which I intend to keep for life. They were originally saved on floppy disks, then I copied them onto CDs, then removable hard drives and now they are on cloud storage. I've also got hard drive backups at my mother's house.

 

[MikeWM]

Presumably the people doing the archiving simply transfer files from one format to another as technology progresses. There should be no degradation when transferring from one digital format to another. On a personal note, I've got files from the 90s which I intend to keep for life. They were originally saved on floppy disks, then I copied them onto CDs, then removable hard drives and now they are on cloud storage. I've also got hard drive backups at my mother's house.

Yes, but from that you sound significantly more organised than most people!

The assumption is that there is the will, the money and the persistence to track all this and actually do this continual transferring in a comprehensive and logical way. I fear that is unlikely.

 

[dgl]

They opened a new/relacement HMV in Southampton somewhat recently (not quite sure when), that a bit more rough+ready and is in a large single story shop whereas the original one had at least two floors.

As for physical media, I have CD's Tapes, and Vinyl and have the facilities to play all three, but I generally rip the CD's using a lossless encoder for phone/laptop use and if I do use the Hi-Fi then I usually just use the CD's.
Naturally artisits make more money out of physical media than streaming so it helps them, plus buying a nice box set is a much nicer experience than a download. I also think that the extra effort that goes in to buying physical media is appreciated by the artist(s) as more thought has to be put into the purchase.

 

[Pinza-C55]

They've probably got rid of all their high rent premises.

When they went into administration the staff turned up at the Oxford Street store to find the doors padlocked. They had to come back in the afternoon to collect any personal belongings and it never reopened.

 

[Bevan Price]

HMV barely feel like a thing any more - it was always my place to browse in while my sister was off in clothes shops but it's gradually diminished over the last decade. In Glasgow, we used to have the large Buchanan St store and the one on Argyle Street plus in the 3 out of town shopping centres - Fort, Braehead & Silverburn. Now the 3 out of town ones are all gone (the Fort was first downsized before closure and they seem to have an on-and-off relationship with Braehead, they reopened in a few other units there and then closed again), the Buchanan one is gone and the Argyle one is downsized. It used to be a bit larger and with an escalator, now a really cramped staircase at the back to go downstairs.

Then there were all of the other larger ones in other cities (London Oxford St, Manchester Market St & Edinburgh Princes St) that have all gone.

The Manchester Market St HMV moved inside the Arndale Centre years ago. Not been to Manchester since Covid started, so I don't know if HMV in Arndale still exists, but it used to stock a wide range of CDs - although not enough of the Prog Rock that I was often looking for.

 

[LOL The Irony]

The Manchester Market St HMV moved inside the Arndale Centre years ago. Not been to Manchester since Covid started, so I don't know if HMV in Arndale still exists, but it used to stock a wide range of CDs - although not enough of the Prog Rock that I was often looking for.

It did last time I checked and probably still does. The music is upstairs with video, memorabilia and audio equipment on the entrance level.

 

[Strathclyder]

Have visited HMV's Argyle Street store quite a few times to buy new sets of headphones as my old ones wear out (they get heavily used more or less daily). A decent range of brands/types of headphones (buds/ear covers & wired/wireless etc) I've always found. I've tended to plump for the wired Sony ones priced at around £25 as they do what I need/want them to do without breaking the bank. Have also bought a fair amount of DVD boxsets either from there or from the now-closed Buchanan Street store (most of my classic Simpsons boxsets, the complete Looney Tunes Golden Collection, the complete pre-revival Still Game boxset, the complete One Foot In The Grave boxset, among others), plus a few other odds & sods from both stores (train/bus ticket holders, badges/pins, posters and most recently, a Pride tote bag/mug). None of them were outrageously priced for what they were, though I suspect Amazon would've had most of the DVD boxsets for quite a bit less. But when push comes to shove and barring large/one-off/really expensive items, I've always preferred actually going into a shop and buying what I want as opposed to online shopping.

HMV barely feel like a thing any more - it was always my place to browse in while my sister was off in clothes shops but it's gradually diminished over the last decade. In Glasgow, we used to have the large Buchanan St store and the one on Argyle Street plus in the 3 out of town shopping centres - Fort, Braehead & Silverburn. Now the 3 out of town ones are all gone (the Fort was first downsized before closure and they seem to have an on-and-off relationship with Braehead, they reopened in a few other units there and then closed again), the Buchanan one is gone and the Argyle one is downsized. It used to be a bit larger and with an escalator, now a really cramped staircase at the back to go downstairs.

Then there were all of the other larger ones in other cities (London Oxford St, Manchester Market St & Edinburgh Princes St) that have all gone.

Within Glasgow's environs, Clydebank used to have a HMV store within it's shopping centre for a time, plus a Fopp for a few years in the same section of the complex. The HMV closed down a good few years ago (at least a decade at this point); JD Sports now occupies the old HMV unit.

 

[Techniquest]

HMV in Hereford got replaced by Sports Direct/USC/Game (the latter has fallen a long way from grace!) and in the other part of the building is Flannels. I went in there to look around last year, as I was curious, but what a strange idea that place is. Definitely a more-money-than-sense shop!

I would love to see HMV return, and it is pleasing to hear they are coming back in some places. It's not really my sort of shop these days, I must confess, as I don't even have a DVD player. I just don't bother with movies and boxsets in general, but it would absolutely be welcome by a lot of people. As someone else on this thread said, streaming just isn't as great as it could be, and I have to say I do prefer the physical copy of something to something I can download.

Case in point, my New Zealand guidebook. I bought an e-book version but I just don't enjoy reading such books in a digital form. It's something I much prefer to have in paper form, and it's similar for my cycling maps. I have no doubt if I wanted to, I could get a digital map and mark off my coverage on that. Same with walking coverage, I know there's a function in the OS app that supposedly does that. It's just not for me, I like having the paper map to unfold, put on the bed (or if I'm on my travels, on the table in front of me) and study it at my leisure.

So I totally get why people want to buy physical media, and I have to say I hate buying stuff online. Being able to browse HMV (amongst other shops) and actually enjoy shopping for something is just brilliant. Repeat purchases of something, then yes indeed I will happily order those online if needs be, but for most things I prefer to turn up at the shop and buy it.

Doing things that way has the best advantage of not supporting Amazon, I just despise ordering something with them. So much so I will happily go elsewhere and buy it, even if it's more expensive, just to avoid giving them my money.

As for HMV, sorry I got a bit distracted there, I haven't looked lately but I know the one in Worcester lasted for quite some time.

 

[MikeWM]

They opened a new/relacement HMV in Southampton somewhat recently (not quite sure when), that a bit more rough+ready and is in a large single story shop whereas the original one had at least two floors.

I visited there yesterday and it felt very like a carbon copy of the Oxford store. I guess most 'new' HMVs are going to be like this now, much less emphasis on physical media and much more on the other random stuff. The recently moved store in Bath is very similar too. The only 'new' one that still has a reasonable amount of emphasis on physical media (that I've visited) is the relocated store in Liverpool - even there it is relegated to the back, but there is still a substantial amount of it.