It’s Patio Speaker Time (Update)
UPDATESonos Move – During this pandemic there are many of us working on our patios, decks and balconies, so good quality outdoor music is even more important. This in part …
The best way to store your treasured vinyl LP collection.
Contact UsWhat’s happening at Vinyl Cubes and in the world of vinyl music recording.
UPDATESonos Move – During this pandemic there are many of us working on our patios, decks and balconies, so good quality outdoor music is even more important. This in part …
Before the internet and social media – yes, there was a time when these did not exist – if you wanted to reach young minds, you used cereal boxes. I …
There’s no end of gifts that the vinyl record lover in you life will be happy with. However, if vinyl isn’t your world, then knowing what gift is most appropriate …
Those of us who collect vinyl do it for so many reasons. Some are unique, and some we all share. I collect in part for the nostalgia. I’ll be flipping …
There’s thousands of record collecting YouTube videos. Some are great – some are not so great. Here’s a few that I’ve come across that I like with a brief explanation …
Vinyl is not perfect, but then neither are digital recordings. One of the inherent flaws in vinyl that, truthfully, I think may be reserved for the truly obsessive in “inner …
As vinyl continues to grow in popularity, ways for bands to fund vinyl projects also continues to grow. I wrote about a number of these fan and crowd funded projects …
The first LPs were introduced to the world more than seventy years ago. This was right around the time North Americans became obsessed with their automobiles. The Eisenhower administration was …
I know I’m not going to win any vinyl or audiophile fans by blogging about the RokBlok, but you’ve got to be impressed with the ingenuity. The usual means to …
The portable record player isn’t a new idea. I recall my brother and sister both having them. As the baby of the family, I caught the cassette wave for music …
It’s a challenge to get your music out to interested fans if you don’t have a major label backing you. The reality is that getting started in most businesses can …
Love em or hate em, they are coming in a few days. Like all awards, winners will be happy (generally) and the “also-rans” will bravely say “it was an honor …
With support from HMV’s suppliers, Sunrise Records of Canada has acquired Britain’s oldest music retailer. The acquisition will keep all but 27 stores open a save close to 1,500 jobs. …
I spoke with Doug Putnam a few years ago when he acquired many of the HMV locations in Canada and vowed to keep vinyl front and center in more than …
The lists will never end because everyone has their own unique musical tastes – and that’s great. What I love about these lists is there is always some vinyl that …
Yes, I came to learn of Dr.Don Shirley through the lens of Green Book. If you haven’t seen it, do so now! Great movie. I’m also posting this in honor …
Many of us remember LP albums when they were supplanted by the much smaller CD. We lamented the loss of the 144 square inches for album cover art work. And …
I’ve made it no secret that I’m a huge fan of Viryl Technologies. It’s great to watch a company believe that they can improve something that has been around for …
Most of the vinyl subscription services use curators of some sort. It may be just the individual who runs the service like Turntable Kitchen or a crowd sourced curation like …
Christmas is almost here, but many are still searching for gifts for the vinyl lover on their list. Check out the Five best albums to own on vinyl for a …
Whenever something gains popularity it is inevitable that counterfeits are going to start showing up. I suppose it started with currency, but it has grown to a global market of …
It happens at this time of the year. We start seeing the “Best of” lists, so lets start with NPR’s 50 Best Albums of 2018. NPR’s list is probably the …
Another very cool record of the month concept – music and food pairings from The Turntable Kitchen. The food and coffee pairings are definitely a very cool idea, but I …
When I started buying vinyl in my teens I had a few options. There were great dedicated record stores with huge selections in any genre you wanted. My personal favourite …
The Grammy nominations are in with lots of recognizable names like Drake, Lady Gaga, Kendrick Lamar, and Taylor Swift. Song of the Year and Record of the Year are going …
The end of the year always brings “best of ” list, so I thought I’d look at the worst albums of the year instead. You may also be interested in …
I spend hours digging through stacks of polka albums in my local thrift stores and sometimes I get lucky and find a memory. Not necessarily a musically great album, but …
I put on Paul Simon’s There Goes Rhymin’ Simon and Kodachrome popped out of the speakers. It hit me that it is a song about a long gone photographic artifact …
They just keep popping up. Seems that when I see the light at the end of the tunnel in reviewing vinyl subscription services a new one appears. To be fair, …
The RIAA mid-year sales report is good news for the music industry and for those who love vinyl records since vinyl sales continue to rise. For the first half of …
Links that Vinyl Cubes “swaps” with other sites that have content that we think you may be interested in…
Vinyl Cubes is a flexible and beautiful storage system for your valued vinyl record collection.
This is the story of the journey to Vinyl Cubes.
Like most music lovers of my vintage, my first experience with recorded music was the vinyl LP. I ordered my first LP (Teaser and the Firecat by Cat Stevens) through the Eaton’s Trans-Canada sale. That was back in the day when Eaton’s existed and they had a catalogue. The album was delivered to the house. I still remember waiting for the black and maroon delivery truck. I took off the cellophane and gently slipped the disk out of the outer and inner sleeves, and carefully placed it onto my mom and dad’s record changer ensuring I only touched the edges. Yes, they had a record changer that allowed you to stack up six albums. Not the best for the albums, but those were the first “playlists” that we had.
Fun fact, that ridge around the edge of albums was in part to separate stacked albums
so the groves containing the music were not damaged by stacking albums.
That started my love for music. My collection grew to many hundreds and I spent countless hours scouring used record bins in downtown Toronto. I lined up for hours for Boxing Day sales which back then were December 27, because in Toronto-the-Good, stores were not allowed to be open on the 26th.
The 8-track and cassette did rival the LP and had a significant impact on LP sales. You could play a cassette in your car with music you copied off your LP’s – enter the mix-tape. The Sony Walkman introduced in Japan in 1979 made the cassette even more popular, but it still lacked the sound quality of the LP.
The compact disk was believed by many to be the LP killer. During the first year of CD sales, LP sales in the US dropped by 27%. But, by the early 2000’s the vinyl LP began to carve out a new group of devotees.
For me, I began to re-collect many of the LPs I had sadly given away in favour of CDs. I love the process of placing the LP on the turntable and actually listening from beginning to end. No skipping tracks or changing the track order that the artists put considerable thought into creating.
Then my children began to collect LPs. While they have vast MP3 collections and use streaming music services, they love the sound of the LP and enjoy the physical presence of the LP.
So, the collections continued to grow. I wanted to find a way to store these LPs that was both multi-functional and attractive. I spent the first year of my retirement building prototypes of what I now call Vinyl Cubes. I manufactured both pine and cedar Vinyl Cubes from my home and retailed them from a local store in Ottawa (Maker House). Based on feedback from our clients, we have begun manufacturing Vinyl Cubes from locally grown poplar. This is a harder and denser wood that has been found to be more stable and longer lasting.
Vinyl Cubes solve all of your vinyl LP storage problems:
Vinyl Cubes is also pleased to be affiliated with Feedbands – an innovative platform for developing new artists and getting them heard on vinyl – and ideally stored in Vinyl Cubes.
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