HMV's 32 Australian stores have been sold to Brazin. Brazin also owns Sanity and Virgin in Australia. The sale became effective on Sunday. The stores will continue to trade under the HMV name.

Today I read that HMV in Prahran (Chapel St) is closing.

That leaves the average Melbourne CD buyer with seven choices:

• JB HiFi
• HMV/Sanity/Virgin
• chain department store (K-Mart, Target, Myer, David Jones)
• chain discount store (eg. Dirt Cheap CDs)
• indie store
• second hand store
• the internet (Amazon, eBay)

Have I missed anything? I'm talking buying pieces of plastic here, so digital music doesn't count.

Gaslight closed recently, and Second Spin (right next door) is closing. To be honest I'm surprised Collectors Corner is still open. Second hand stores like Dixons do very well out in the 'burbs.

From The Age:

Physical sales fell 6.3 per cent to $US12.4 billion ($A16.31 billion) in the six months to June, but digital downloads rose from $US220 million to $US790 million, says the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry.

Digital delivery now accounts for 6 per cent of total sales, almost cancelling out the 6.3 per cent fall in sale of compact discs.

I've only bought 3 non-second-hand CDs since July. Two of those were singles/EPs (Regurgitator) and one was old, live and discounted (Nirvana unplugged).

In fact I've barely bought 10 recent music albums this year, and most of those were Ipecac, Mike Patton and/or Web Of Mimicry related.

This has nothing to do with piracy of course, simple more things more important to spend my money on.

Why spend US$5000 on a G4 when you could get a G5 for less?

When that G4 was owned by Mike Patton.

Seems a bit suss to me... I'm sure there is more to this story than is revealed in the eBay auction.