Buying singles vs albums in 2025

How do you guys feel about your singles purchases or just singles produced in general now? I find myself purchasing fewer albums now that I can individually buy a track digitally off an EP or album on bandcamp instead. Music releases where you have to digitally purchase the whole album to get one particular track tend to be higher quality overall, imo.

I'm wary of cherry picking digital purchases off albums although I still do so. Bandcamp or Delsin/Hardwax/Boomkat make that process very easy and U can achieve a very varied purchase that way but imo get no feel for what the producer was trying to do via the LP format.

It has become too expensive in my opinion!I don´t buy as many records as I used to.It seems like a rip off to me nowadays.Maybe it is better to buy cheaper used records but you have to find them in good condition.
25 Euro for an EP is clearly too much or 40 Euro for an album.Who can afford this?We fought for vinyl to survive and now they charge incredible prices.I don´t buy digital at all.It is useless and has no soul.
How can a young person who is into collecting vinyl ever grow a collection like we did in the 90s/2000s?

Long gone are the days of cheap postage and cheap vinyl. Or CD's for that matter, so I buy A LOT less than I used to. Still, I often prefer whole albums rather than just single tracks. Having said that, I do miss the CD single for some reason. Having a radio version that was often radically different from the album, or a bunch of remixes was a lot of fun.

As a CD album purist I never buy singles. The album format is so much more satisfying. An opportunity to really delve into an artist's musical world. While plenty of releases no longer appear on CD there's still more than enough good music coming out on the format which costs far less than vinyl and isn't the subject of endless posts about pressing quality that fill up the so called review sections on this site with scarcely a mention of what matters - the music. Many will disagree but I ain't changing!

Jazzual beat me to it. Nothing more satisfactory for me than listening to an album. I do play single tracks off of compilations or cd-singe in my deejay mixes, but when I sit down and give my attention to an artist for over an hour, it's a more in depth experience than any mix or playlist can provide. What I also really like with listening to albums, is that you have the singles that drag you in but there are also the songs that grow on you after repeated listening or the hidden gems that suddenly pop up when you play an album after a longer time of not hearing it.
From a cost perspective, cds have become so much more cheap than vinyl, both new and second hand.. That, plus superior listening quality, no need to turn over after 15-20 minutes, completely add-free and without silly distractions. CD albums all the way!

AlexisNembrode
Long gone are the days of cheap postage and cheap vinyl. Or CD's for that matter, so I buy A LOT less than I used to. Still, I often prefer whole albums rather than just single tracks. Having said that, I do miss the CD single for some reason. Having a radio version that was often radically different from the album, or a bunch of remixes was a lot of fun.

Exactly this. I also have a big weak spot for the 90s/00s (dance) CD Maxi single with its remixes which often offered an interesting look on how other artists and the original artist re-imagined the original concept. Not suitable for listening as a whole like an album of course, but they provide interesting and adventurous digs though my collection and bins at record fairs. You can always make your own compilations from the best tracks.

I don´t have a CD player anymore at home.Haven´t ever tried to mix on one of those Pioneer CDJs.They seem to be very expensive nowadays around 3000 Euros....
The best player to me was this one from Technics years ago!

https://www.ebay.de/itm/175624162470?

musicshaolin
Haven´t ever tried to mix on one of those Pioneer CDJs.They seem to be very expensive nowadays around 3000 Euros....

The main problem with those is that (as a retailer) it is near impossible to get hold of a new one unless you get on an eternally long waiting list that will be delayed regularly.

I personally think the number of physical singles and maxis has declined these days, Because, Digital piracy has been a thing ever since the invention of the internet, and you wanna know which music trend started growing and growing around the same time as the invention of the internet? Sampling, When you tell people they can make music by tweaking random parts of songs, They WILL try, everyone wants a piece of that music fame, I swear, Everyone and their mom has tried making a song out of samples before, Thats how DJs are made, They start remixing songs, making their own hour long mixes, You know the deal.

Eventually they start producing and composing their own music sample free, The problem is, no one wants to sign to a label anymore because, well, no one wants to deal with label crap, So what they do is just go independent or start their own label, And they usually just release a few singles and thats it.

At one point they'll want to release their titles physically, The problem is, As we all know, physical manufacturing, especially when you want it done specifically in your way, Does not come cheap at all, and when it is cheap, It usually never goes your way, You have to follow the rules of the distributor, Use their limited tools, bla bla bla, you know the deal, Every artist wants their physical release to go exactly the way they want, And with SO many independent artists ri these days, Those independent artists don't get the chance to do stuff the way they wanna, Which is SO important when it comes to physical singles and maxis, Which is why I say physical singles and maxis have reduced SO MUCH these days, It's sort of depressing.