For many of you, this may be old news, but it appears that the art of the album is all but extinct. And along with the physical album itself, whatever the incarnation, so goes various other necessary aspects. Some of these include artwork, liner notes and track sequencing. These things I will address individually in upcoming posts, since they each deserve their own special attention.To clarify, I am not against digital music or individual tracks. In fact I love the ability to find those long-lost nuggets and then be able to consume them almost instantly. I believe that through this instant gratification, one's attachment to the song, album and even artist is greatly diminished.
...ripply effect for fade-out to daydream sequence... Some of my first memories of really becoming involved with the music I was listening to was when I would sit myself by the radio all day long on a weekend and wait for one of my favorite songs (Pour Some Sugar On Me, Electric Blue) to play on the radio so I could hit the record button on my cassette player while yelling at the DJs to stop intro-ing and ruining my recording. I had to put effort and dedication into my music, and the payoff was that much sweeter.
Later, when I started being able to purchase full albums, the medium itself was a limiter. If you wanted to listen to a song over and over, you had to put in at least a little work to rewind the cassette. But more often than not, I would listen to the song I really liked a couple of times, then let the rest of the album play through, thus developing a connection to the the album as a whole and discovering songs you would never ever hear otherwise. You couldn't just random through a bunch of albums. Again, even with CDs, if you wanted to listen to a huge variety of music, you either had to put in the time to create a mix-tape, or swap out discs all the time, which was relatively annoying. (Shut up... I'm talking pre-disc changers)
...fade back to reality... So as you can see, having a physical connection and limited access to music ended up making the music mean a lot more to me. It could be that this occurred during my more formative years, but I feel that the music from that time is more heavily associated with happenings in my life because I was more active an involved with it. This same theory, to me, applies to buying vs. pirating (which I've never done, because that would be wrong... I'm only guessing here) music. I feel more of an obligation to the music if I've spent my hard-earned money to support something I believe in.
So in summary, I love digital music. I won't stop utilizing it or buying digital singles. But I think that this trend is an unfortunate one, if for nobody else than the individual listener. What kind of memories will the kids of tomorrow have of their music growing up. Will it have emotional ties? Will they recognize complete bodies of work, or will they just remember a randomly sequenced collection of disposable melodies? So next time you fire up the iPod, take the small step of instead of shuffling all songs, shuffle just between albums, and enjoy your experience. ...If you have the willpower.
I think that now, as music in electronic form has become so much more readily available and the forms of carrying it with one have become so much more compact, most people have substituted quality, like you had with your Kermit the Frog cassette recorder, for quantity with the 3, 492 songs on their iPod, of which they listen to about seven on a regular basis. I mean, why have to work for something for it to have meaning to you, when you can just steal it for free and listen to it in your ears over and over and over again until you hear it in your sleep?
ReplyDeleteI have also become more excepting of the individual track... I guess. I personally don't download music too often. The quality is the main factor for me. I think that iTunes is killing music. I get MP3s occasionally from Amazon in 320 VBR, but only when I get some free credit to do so. I recently downloaded Britney Spears’ tune “Womanizer” from Amazon because I find it kind of infectious (take that any way you like).
ReplyDeleteI would like to add one thing to your most recent post here on the death of the album. That is the iTunes proprietary album!!! I see some album that I want on CD get released on iTunes exclusively… WHAT!!! I have also seen bonus tracks and live stuff that you can only get if you download the album on iTunes. This is just wrong and I really feel stabbed in the back by the artist and music industry as a whole.
I have also seen the shelf life of the CD get shorter and shorter every year. I am now cataloguing my entire library of CDs in a spreadsheet and am listing MSRP and other such information. Well, I am absolutely blown away be the number of albums I own that are now OUT-OF-PRINT. Even newer stuff man.
I have also been ripping my entire collection to MP3. I will NEVER get rid of my CDs… ever. I will never quit buying CDs either (as long as they keep making them). It is just a convenient way to listen to my albums on the go. I still listen to CDs in the car and at home but when I am “out” I do listen to the MP3 player. Wanna hear something funny about an old school jerk like me though? I still listen to the whole album straight through. If my MP3 player has a shuffle function, I wouldn’t know it.
Anyway, keep up the great work and I look forward to your next post!!