DJ Shadow on record stores and his new album

The music industry today is a completely different business to that of 2006. And vinyl junkie Shadow is concerned that downloading could be ruining artists’ work.

He says: “We’re in the twilight of the physical world.

“But we haven’t segued into the digital realm comfortably.

“I think the advent of copyright afforded an unprecedented explosion of human creativity. What I’m seeing now is music in stasis — where nothing is moving forward.”

It’s a gloomy outlook confirmed by the demise of the music obsessive’s natural home — the record store.

He says: “Some of this now seems quite futile to me. But I don’t think what I’m doing is futile. This is my life and passion.

“I just feel weird sitting idly by and pretending everything is hunky dory as a recording artist.

“What does it even mean these days to have a new album out?

“All the record stores are closing so there’s no place you can even buy it from.

“As artists in an industry we’re now trying to build a house after we’ve removed the foundations. It’s extremely difficult to get anyone excited about an album in 2011.