E-Digging SUCKS!? Really?

STR8 Fiya

New member
Well i started this discussion because i've seen a lot of threads bashing e-digging.If it wasn't for e-digging i would never get into sampling period.Where i live there's no record stores , there's nothing .So when i found out about sites that you can download records from i was really happy , i love sampling.So my thing is ,do whatever you feel like , if you feel like digging in the crates and you have the option to do that , go ahead , if you want to e-digg , than do that , if you want to do both , do that . Personally i would like to have crates with records , i just don't have that available.And i think with the way technology is going , e-digging it's the future.
 
Thats exactly how i feel about e-digging so ppl jus dont have the means or resources to get vinyls. I think its all about the music and whatever gets the job done is what im gonna do
 
hasn't this topic been beaten to death? I think most E Diggers miss the point that a lot of people are making about actual digging. There are a lot of things you just miss out on when E Digging. A big one being the happy accidents that come from discovering new music. Most people who E Dig are only digging up commonly known songs only. I think many only E Dig because you don't have to pay for it. Sure some don't have access to record stores but people also miss things like thrift stores, ebay, Itunes, craigslist, ect. Actually in some ways its almost stupid to dig at an actual record store when a lot of that stuff can be found at good will for 25 cents.
 
hasn't this topic been beaten to death? I think most E Diggers miss the point that a lot of people are making about actual digging. There are a lot of things you just miss out on when E Digging. A big one being the happy accidents that come from discovering new music. Most people who E Dig are only digging up commonly known songs only. I think many only E Dig because you don't have to pay for it. Sure some don't have access to record stores but people also miss things like thrift stores, ebay, Itunes, craigslist, ect. Actually in some ways its almost stupid to dig at an actual record store when a lot of that stuff can be found at good will for 25 cents.

i know , i would love to have records but the thing is i don't even have access to ebay , itunes lol well i have access but it doesnt work for my country (i live overseas btw) , and really i didn't know and still don't know a lot about soul music , i learned it all from my e-digging so i don't look for commonly knwon songs , i just pick up stuff that is on the sites that have records , but yeah i understand what people miss out on "real" digging but e-digging it's not that bad
 
i know , i would love to have records but the thing is i don't even have access to ebay , itunes lol well i have access but it doesnt work for my country (i live overseas btw) , and really i didn't know and still don't know a lot about soul music , i learned it all from my e-digging so i don't look for commonly knwon songs , i just pick up stuff that is on the sites that have records , but yeah i understand what people miss out on "real" digging but e-digging it's not that bad
its not the actual trip to the store that people are missing though. its the stuff thats out there thats not as common or well known that people miss out on. Many will say E Digging isn't that bad and that sound quality isn't that important but I usually question those individual's passion for making great music. Music isn't just notes and drums in the sense of recordings/beats/songs. Idk I refuse to sell my artists less than the best quality I can attain. I truly believe in quality over quantity and I believe sonic quality trumps most things.
 
hasn't this topic been beaten to death? I think most E Diggers miss the point that a lot of people are making about actual digging. There are a lot of things you just miss out on when E Digging. A big one being the happy accidents that come from discovering new music. Most people who E Dig are only digging up commonly known songs only. I think many only E Dig because you don't have to pay for it. Sure some don't have access to record stores but people also miss things like thrift stores, ebay, Itunes, craigslist, ect. Actually in some ways its almost stupid to dig at an actual record store when a lot of that stuff can be found at good will for 25 cents.


You're right about one thing...many people E Dig because they don't have to pay for it...

But for everything else, I dont agree..

For instance, there are no record stores where I live. There is an antique shop about 40 minutes away, but the average cost of their shit is at least $15 per record.. Including the gas to get there, I can't afford that. So I look at thrift stores...Now depending where you live, a thrift store can be a great resource for good material.. But where I live, I'm lucky if I find anything half interesting. Most shit is old Christmas albums, Albums about Jesus that you've heard millions of times, and Johnny Mathis..

Craigslist is a good source because you CAN find people locally that are selling decent records for decent prices, if you have the cash.

But places like ebay and Itunes, you need to pay electronically..not everyone has the means to do so.


So whats that leave us with....E DIGGING!!

For me, E Digging is the same as going to a record shop out of state...I can spend hours looking, reading, learning about music that is new to me. Whether I'm on the internet or in a record store, I personally am looking for something that can provide me with at least 2 things... 1. New music I've never heard of or heard before...and 2. Education.....about the music, band/artist, era..etc.

I find something on youtube..I google the artist and learn what I can..then I see what albums they have, what their best/worst was..their history, their musical influences...In a sense I connect to them..And if I like their music enough, I'll sample it lol
 
Whatever floats your boat I guess. I've found good records digging through crates. I've found good records by just randomly surfing YouTube. Hell, I've even found good records by just listening to the music channels on Time Warner and Direct TV.

It's 2011, don't pigeonhole yourself in to what you can and can't do musically. Be free as an artist and use social media and technology to your advantage.
 
Whatever floats your boat I guess. I've found good records digging through crates. I've found good records by just randomly surfing YouTube. Hell, I've even found good records by just listening to the music channels on Time Warner and Direct TV.

It's 2011, don't pigeonhole yourself in to what you can and can't do musically. Be free as an artist and use social media and technology to your advantage.


Its great that you mentioned Direct TV..I hadn't even thought of mentioning that, or any other digital cable/satellite provider that offers the Music Choice and MC-type channels... I too have found some GREAT tunes listening to those music channels..there was even a time when my internet was not working, so only digging I could rely on was the music choice channels on my digital cable provider. Definitely don't sleep on that!
 
You're right about one thing...many people E Dig because they don't have to pay for it...

But for everything else, I dont agree..

For instance, there are no record stores where I live. There is an antique shop about 40 minutes away, but the average cost of their shit is at least $15 per record.. Including the gas to get there, I can't afford that. So I look at thrift stores...Now depending where you live, a thrift store can be a great resource for good material.. But where I live, I'm lucky if I find anything half interesting. Most shit is old Christmas albums, Albums about Jesus that you've heard millions of times, and Johnny Mathis..

Craigslist is a good source because you CAN find people locally that are selling decent records for decent prices, if you have the cash.

But places like ebay and Itunes, you need to pay electronically..not everyone has the means to do so.


So whats that leave us with....E DIGGING!!

For me, E Digging is the same as going to a record shop out of state...I can spend hours looking, reading, learning about music that is new to me. Whether I'm on the internet or in a record store, I personally am looking for something that can provide me with at least 2 things... 1. New music I've never heard of or heard before...and 2. Education.....about the music, band/artist, era..etc.

I find something on youtube..I google the artist and learn what I can..then I see what albums they have, what their best/worst was..their history, their musical influences...In a sense I connect to them..And if I like their music enough, I'll sample it lol
Sounds like a lot of excuses to me to be totally honest. Who doesn't have a debit card or a free prepaid credit card in 2011? I have like 4 of them that i only use for various things. I keep gas money on one, pay bills with another and make my internet purchases on another. Hell I was on a site where they even paid me to get the cards and theyre totally free. Or you can go to any store and get a prepaid Itunes card. Again excuses. I have heard a ton of great flips off christian records, christmas records and johnny mathis has some fire too. But in the end its your music settle for crap quality if you want to I couldn't stop you even if i wanted to.
Whatever floats your boat I guess. I've found good records digging through crates. I've found good records by just randomly surfing YouTube. Hell, I've even found good records by just listening to the music channels on Time Warner and Direct TV.

It's 2011, don't pigeonhole yourself in to what you can and can't do musically. Be free as an artist and use social media and technology to your advantage.
Those are all great learning tools. I just wouldn't directly sample from them. Lots of great songs have been made from sampling off movies or tv though my favorite being Regulators by Warren G. Saw a video some time ago where he said he sampled the songs off his tv into his mpc 60 back in the day.
 
Sounds like a lot of excuses to me to be totally honest. Who doesn't have a debit card or a free prepaid credit card in 2011? I have like 4 of them that i only use for various things. I keep gas money on one, pay bills with another and make my internet purchases on another. Hell I was on a site where they even paid me to get the cards and theyre totally free. Or you can go to any store and get a prepaid Itunes card. Again excuses. I have heard a ton of great flips off christian records, christmas records and johnny mathis has some fire too. But in the end its your music settle for crap quality if you want to I couldn't stop you even if i wanted to.
Those are all great learning tools. I just wouldn't directly sample from them. Lots of great songs have been made from sampling off movies or tv though my favorite being Regulators by Warren G. Saw a video some time ago where he said he sampled the songs off his tv into his mpc 60 back in the day.

Hah that's crazy, would've never thought of that.
 
i'm not bashing on sampling off the internet, but don't get diggin in the crates and e-clicking mixed up...
 
Sounds like a lot of excuses to me to be totally honest. Who doesn't have a debit card or a free prepaid credit card in 2011? I have like 4 of them that i only use for various things. I keep gas money on one, pay bills with another and make my internet purchases on another. Hell I was on a site where they even paid me to get the cards and theyre totally free. Or you can go to any store and get a prepaid Itunes card.


Theres obviously quite a few people who don't have those cards...For whatever reason(s) it may be.. Plenty of people dont have em..

I have heard a ton of great flips off christian records, christmas records and johnny mathis has some fire too. But in the end its your music settle for crap quality if you want to...

I've heard plenty of great flips off christian/christmas albums, and a few from johnny mathis.. Doesn't mean I'm interested in purchasing those records..

And settle for crap quality? I hope you're not implying HQ Wav's are "crap quality":rolleyes:

---------- Post added at 03:10 AM ---------- Previous post was at 02:59 AM ----------

The whole point is...It is 2011, almost 2012....The way things work have slightly changed since the 80's...We have done switched to Digital.. How awesome would it be to still have record shops in my town, but they all went out of business because of the digital music..Most people started buyin online, or simply downloading for free..So you gotta work with what you have..So why there is any negativity what so ever, to anyone doing things their way, is beyond me..If everybody did the same exact shit, where would we be...what would we be doing? You dont have to like what someone else does, but if their purpose resembles your own, as in they're out to find good music, learn about that music, the artists, the time, the genre, the individual record itself, and to sample it here and there, does it really matter what route they take?
 
Theres obviously quite a few people who don't have those cards...For whatever reason(s) it may be.. Plenty of people dont have em..



I've heard plenty of great flips off christian/christmas albums, and a few from johnny mathis.. Doesn't mean I'm interested in purchasing those records..

And settle for crap quality? I hope you're not implying HQ Wav's are "crap quality":rolleyes:

wav even in 24 bit doesn't mean HQ if the recording was originally shit. I can give u a 24/88.2 file that on paper is great but sounds like shit because its a shitty recording from the sample source. So yes I am implying that some of those recordings are crap quality. People convert low quality mp3s to HQ wav and pretend like its the same thing but its not. As far as the cards and people not having them thats still just an excuse. If you don't have one go get one. Paypal offers free ones too. Why continue to make excuses when you are given solutions? At the end of it all you are settling for something lesser and making excuses to your situation. If you are trying to sell a beat to someone and your beat is of a lesser quality than the next man's what happens then? Will you tell them the same things you are telling me? Quality matters and to some extent it is one of the most important things about music production unless your only aspirations are to be a hobbyist.

---------- Post added at 12:13 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:12 AM ----------

Hah that's crazy, would've never thought of that.
theres tons of em. I see commericals for green dot on tv almost daily. there are others too took me 3 minutes to sign up for a green dot card and I use it for paypal purchases.
 
wav even in 24 bit doesn't mean HQ if the recording was originally shit. I can give u a 24/88.2 file that on paper is great but sounds like shit because its a shitty recording from the sample source. So yes I am implying that some of those recordings are crap quality. People convert low quality mp3s to HQ wav and pretend like its the same thing but its not. As far as the cards and people not having them thats still just an excuse. If you don't have one go get one. Paypal offers free ones too. Why continue to make excuses when you are given solutions? At the end of it all you are settling for something lesser and making excuses to your situation. If you are trying to sell a beat to someone and your beat is of a lesser quality than the next man's what happens then? Will you tell them the same things you are telling me? Quality matters and to some extent it is one of the most important things about music production unless your only aspirations are to be a hobbyist.

I'm not disagreeing about quality.. I believe in quality over quantity...But the way you mentioned "crap quality" in your previous post, was perceived as.. If I'm not physically going somewhere that has a stock of records, and picking vinyl, then I'm settling for "crap quality"...and that simply is not true. Yes, of course, if you download files off the internet, there is chance of the audio being damaged, and of "crap quality"..If you're ripping audio from youtube, the chance is even bigger..But is this always the case? Are you always getting "crap quality" music when acquiring it digitally? Absolutely not. And I think we can both agree on that.
 
i personally e-dig because i use a specific genre for my sampling which isn't commonly found in most record stores. while amoeba does have a huge selection of said genre, they don't always have the titles i want. i look for specific albums, i don't currently download things i'm not acquainted with because i need to have an emotional connection to said work before i can do anything with it. i found a particular set of websites that specialize in my tastes and have a huge community, so even if i can't find a certain album i can request it and there's a likely chance someone will pass it to me.

so, for me at least, e-digging works more often than not. and if i can't find it there, i go to amoeba and maybe they'll have it.

digging depends on your taste and style. if you're trying to find random unique shit and like that element of surprise and finding stuff noone might have used or heard before is important to you, then actual physical cratedigging can't be topped.

for me, edigging is optimal due to the fact that i already know what i want, and it's hard to find in stores.

and no... i don't use shit other people sample. edigging doesn't mean you can't still be unique.
 
I'm not disagreeing about quality.. I believe in quality over quantity...But the way you mentioned "crap quality" in your previous post, was perceived as.. If I'm not physically going somewhere that has a stock of records, and picking vinyl, then I'm settling for "crap quality"...and that simply is not true. Yes, of course, if you download files off the internet, there is chance of the audio being damaged, and of "crap quality"..If you're ripping audio from youtube, the chance is even bigger..But is this always the case? Are you always getting "crap quality" music when acquiring it digitally? Absolutely not. And I think we can both agree on that.
I don't think vinyl is the only way of getting great sound. In some cases like 80s records for example where drum machines were dominant in the recordings I think it would be better to use a sample library of those sounds or even recreate them on a synth yourself. Itunes also offers a lossless file format that I think is a good idea. Its just people sample any and everything these days w/o really caring about the quality of the sound and trying to fix it in the mix doing some weird extra bullshit like layering a mp3 kick drum with 10 other mp3 kick drums to get a decent sound from some old break beat that sounds great from vinyl and knocked more before it was compressed. things like that was what I was mainly touching on.

i personally e-dig because i use a specific genre for my sampling which isn't commonly found in most record stores. while amoeba does have a huge selection of said genre, they don't always have the titles i want. i look for specific albums, i don't currently download things i'm not acquainted with because i need to have an emotional connection to said work before i can do anything with it. i found a particular set of websites that specialize in my tastes and have a huge community, so even if i can't find a certain album i can request it and there's a likely chance someone will pass it to me.

so, for me at least, e-digging works more often than not. and if i can't find it there, i go to amoeba and maybe they'll have it.

digging depends on your taste and style. if you're trying to find random unique shit and like that element of surprise and finding stuff noone might have used or heard before is important to you, then actual physical cratedigging can't be topped.

for me, edigging is optimal due to the fact that i already know what i want, and it's hard to find in stores.

and no... i don't use shit other people sample. edigging doesn't mean you can't still be unique.
I find that the only people who buy records with little to no idea of what they are buying are just inexperienced diggers. digging doesn't mean aimlessly buying records it means digging through stacks of records to find gems. with the resources and technology we have now theres no reason why one shouldn't research what they want before buying. Youtube is great for that. I use Youtube all of the time to discover whats out there and then when I go out I keep an eye out for it. I very rarely buy records that I don't know whats already on it or at least have some sort of idea of whats on it.
 
I find that the only people who buy records with little to no idea of what they are buying are just inexperienced diggers. digging doesn't mean aimlessly buying records it means digging through stacks of records to find gems. with the resources and technology we have now theres no reason why one shouldn't research what they want before buying. Youtube is great for that. I use Youtube all of the time to discover whats out there and then when I go out I keep an eye out for it. I very rarely buy records that I don't know whats already on it or at least have some sort of idea of whats on it.
word. i sometimes feel like although physical crate digging is very rewarding, saying stuff like e-diggers only get common tracks is inaccurate, because you can e-dig through pages of posts on a blog or what have you, ignoring the wack and common stuff and only downloading the good gems. that's how it was for me at least; i'd google an obscure album i couldn't find physically, and then go through pages and pages of google results, many of which would take me to blogs of forums full of garbage where i'd have to dig another 20 or 30 pages through posts to find the thing i wanted, and hopefully the dl would still be available. so in essence, i was doing the same thing as a physical digger would be doing, just in a digital form.

and i definitely agree that while coming up on new and random shit is cool and an integral part of the history of sampling and how a lot of dope tracks get made, that doesn't mean that you need to be going and buying random obscure shit just because it's some kind of unbreakable rule or somethin like that. i prefer that a producer know the material he's using and have some kind of emotional connection to it, ie. the sound is good because it triggers a certain emotion in him and thats why he wants to sample it. i get kinda annoyed by cats who just dl a bunch of random shit and then choose whatever is pleasing to the ear without even having some kind of bond with it... feels inauthentic to me i guess, but then again i'm overgeneralizing because not everyone is like that.
 
I think E-Diggins good for beginners who aint really sure if samplings gonna be a major thing in there beats, I don't see anything wrong with trying it before u invest money in a turntable. I was sorta like that, and now I really feel it's time to move onto the 'real thing' lol. Right now I'm just checkin out prices n models n shit like that, also seeing if there's any good record stores round my area or any place I can buy em for a decent price. Still will probably use the blogs n youtube for referencing stuff n makin notes of things to look out for, but that should probably be it.
 
I look at e-digging as the newest face in the hiphop game. DO IT. If you're making music and not noise who cares what your sample material is? Check my blog if you e-dig too
 
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