Another big blow for eMusic (and its subscribers)

As reported previously, the mp3 downloading site eMusic is on the brink of undergoing some big changes. If the news in October didn’t make you cringe, the latest certainly will.

Late last night, a number of big hitting indie labels decided to pull their catalogs. Soon, you’ll be able to download artists from major labels like Sony and Universal, but in just a few hours, you won’t see anything from Domino, Merge, or Beggars Group (which includes Rough Trade, Matador, XL, and 4AD). In other words, if you want to download something by Animal Collective, Spoon, the New Pornographers, Dirty Projectors, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, Panda Bear, Pavement, Elliott Smith, Deerhunter, Blonde Redhead, (the upcoming) Iron & Wine, Camera Obscura, Efterklang, The National, St. Vincent, Bon Iver, Beirut, Mountain Goats, Pixies, tUnE-yArDs, Cat Power, Belle & Sebastian, Shearwater, Yo La Tengo, Arcade Fire, Antony and the Johnsons, Jeffrey Lewis, Little Joy, Sufjan Stevens, Taken By Trees, The Decemberists, Vampire Weekend, Sigur Ros, Beck, Caribou, Teenage Fanclub, well… you may just be out of luck.

When it comes to a record store, what’s more important, a comprehensive selection or a carefully curated assortment of options?

That’s the question posed by NPR Music in regards to the news. I think you know where I stand on the issue.

With their huge ads in (now largely defunct) Paste magazine, eMusic has traditionally catered to an indie-music loving audience, but with such a painful hit to their catalog, will they be able to keep the very audience that got them going in the first place?

This is your two-hour warning. If you’re an eMusic subscriber, you may just want to download some of your favorite artists… before it’s too late.

How long before Sub Pop, Secretly Canadian, Jagjaguar, Polyvinyl, and Fat Possum follow suit?

eMusic gains Universal, but at a steep price

As an alternative to iTunes, eMusic has long been in the hearts of many music lovers because it boasts a decent catalog of indie music and offers low subscription plans that allow you to download a set number of tracks each month for a price much lower than many major competitors .

But everything is about to change.

Starting in just a few weeks, eMusic, a decent (but surprisingly under the radar) source for mp3s, will be adding more than a quarter of a million tracks to its library. Surely that won’t affect me, you might be thinking to yourself. I mean, it might become more mainstream, but I’ll deal. Sorry. Think again.

With the addition of the Universal catalog, the site will no longer be offering neat little monthly download packages. Instead, everything will jump to a pay per model – like iTunes. Sure, the prices are still lower, but long-time members will lose their handsomely discounted packages.

According to the site,

“Under the new currency pricing system, eMusic members will enjoy savings of 20%-50% compared to iTunes a la carte prices. The majority of albums on eMusic will be priced from $5.19 – $8.99. Single track pricing for members will vary as follows:

○      $0.49 for most tracks currently in our catalog

○      $0.69 – $0.79 for more popular content

○      $0.89 for tracks that generally sell for $1.29 at iTunes
The exact difference this will make remains to be seen as eMusic settles on its price points, but I can’t help but feel like we’re at the end of an era here.