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It is just a guess. I never keep track, probably don't want to. I wish it could be more but the selections just aren't there anymore.
An owner of an audiophile record label recently asked us how much we figured audiophiles spent on music purchases each year. We reckoned it would be smart to simply ask you directly. How much money do you spend on recorded music each year?
$500 to $1000 I think, or it might be $1000 to $2500, but don't tell my wife! It's hard to believe I spend that much when there is so little worth buying, but I've just spent about $200 in the last month on vinyl alone. So, possibly it's actually $2500 to $5000. I don't want to think about it.
Probably a grand or more, but with the decreasing sources for buying those hard copies, it probably will drop. The store sites locally are pathetic in what they offer, and I lost my favorite online site. And, I won't download albums, I WANT A HARD COPY, DAMN-IT!
I'm in the fortunate position that I live in a place where $500 US will buy me over 100 (new and copyrighted) CDs. But even if I had to pay $10 per disc, I probably wouldn't spend more. In fact, I think I'd spend less. It's the low price that lets me experiment and discover new music.
The next question should be how much do you spend on live performances? I budget $100 per month for recorded music but I exceed that budget. As long as it stays around $2000 per year I feel that I am under control. That must be tempered by my collection of music of over 50 years and my son's influx of contemporary music each month.
I buy about a dozen CDs every month, but most of them are $12 or less. As a classical music fan, I can find great older and even new discs (on Naxos, for example) in that price range. Even so, if I had to add up all my purchases ($2000?), the total would be less than what many Stereophile readers spend upgrading one component. I'd rather have the music.
Can't find anything I really want to buy. Actually I don't have the time to listen like I used to. Plus I'm probably not in the right demographic. Most of the artists I like have stopped producing new music and seem to prefer touring instead. They probably can make more money anyways.
I would spend 10 times that if I had the money, but I need to ask record companies to realize that prices need to be more affordable, or else this business will be history in 20 years. I don't steal music, but teens do, and that is no good. But teens spend their dollars on cell phones now, not on music.