Ben Sharp, the creative force behind Cloudkicker, just released a new seven-track instrumental album, Woum. The near 25 minute album is available digitally today, but won’t be pressed to vinyl due to the logistics of making records these days.

Said Sharp via Facebook:

“This will no doubt be a bummer for some but Woum and conceivably any future releases will go back to being digital only like everything was pre-Beacons. Sorry, I know how much people dig the physical releases. But I feel like I have a pretty good reason: Making vinyl is a tremendous pain in the ass. For lots of reasons, not the least of which is the 3-4 month lead time on production that always feels like an incredible drag on momentum.

I will for sure be losing out on money by doing this, and oh well. The time I’ll have back by not dealing with the production and distribution of these things will more than make up for it to me. I’ve been feeling a little squeezed by the entire merch process recently, and by simplifying things in this way I’ll have more time to actually make music, which I’m excited about. Life has gotten busier in the past year and it doesn’t look like it will slow down any time soon, so this is a way for me to keep things balanced.”

With so many bands putting out vinyl these days, and with two Record Store Day events each year, turn times and delays at record pressing plants have become a major obstacle. Given that Sharp is self-releasing his albums (aside from Live with Intronaut which was released by Century Media), it makes sense that any one-man operation would want to keep things simple.

(via Metal Sucks)