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The "death" of the music industry

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Akima:

--- Quote from: Scandanavian War Machine on 22 Feb 2011, 16:39 ---All the time?
--- End quote ---

It always seems suspicious to me that some tracks from an album can be snipped out and packaged separately as "hits". If that can be done, where is the value in the collection? I'm sure it was fun to compile that list, but what actually was it supposed to convey? Other than that you're cooler than I am, which I do not doubt...  :-D


--- Quote from: Johnny C on 22 Feb 2011, 18:02 ---you've all also hit another weird side-effect of the contemporary moment which is the idea of like spending time getting to know those records. and to like really, really think about them. i mean – are you even going to buy a record like joan of arc's the gap, if your attitude towards music is "well i'm not spending money on filler"?
--- End quote ---
I'm totally confused. Maybe we mean different things by the word "filler". A slow movement, or a quiet or minimalist passage, or one in an unfamiliar time, or whatever, isn't filler in my book, if it is good, and makes sense to me (yes that is a subjective judgement, but we are talking about music here). Filler is stuff that I think is bad, or at least markedly less good than other tracks on the same album. I took the trouble to listen to some tracks from "The Gap" since you mentioned it (thanks for the tip BTW, I'm going shopping when I get home), and don't understand why I would be expected to call them filler. Is the idea that if I expect value for money from a record, I'm too crass and materialistic to appreciate Joan Of Arc or something?

My spending money represents hours of my effort working at my job. Why is it wrong for me to use it to buy things of value to me, and not buy things that don't appeal? Surely any artists who expects to be paid for their work can hardly complain. Unless they're packing some sort of "my work so fabulous that you (horrible little consumer that you are) cannot possibly appreciate it, but you should pay me for it anyway" attitude. What was that about entitlement?

Edit: On rereading, I realised I misunderstood part of Scandinavian War Machine's post, so I've adjusted that part of my posting. Sorry.

imagist42:
Honestly I think that's just the result of the monetization of anything. The minute you put a price on something, people are going to think of it in terms of its value relative to whatever good or service they provide others in order to make money, and the amount of money it takes to purchase other things. It's really hard to make a disconnect between the art of something when that same thing shares a commercial identity as merchandise, especially when the thing is subject to mass production and consequently mass consumption. I mean, honestly, if I had to purchase all the music I've ever listened to just to hear it, I'd probably be thinking the same thing, but I think that's one of the great things about recent trends in the industry, because you don't have to. So many things I can stream and listen to and digest in their entirety, and then make the decision that I really want to lend monetary support to their creators in the hopes that I'll receive more quality pieces of their work, that through their efforts I can further connect with the universe and human experience or whatever it is that I value about the thing.

And, to be fair, I think talking about the "death" of the music industry here is a bit of a misnomer. Really we're discussing a change in paradigm, or a metamorphosis, as the old model centralized around major labels is being shed with more and more releases for alternative models of distribution. And while, certainly, that is lending itself to a breakdown in the album as a format, I don't think it's going to necessarily preclude people from producing cohesive albums meant to be seen as a whole. I mean, it's not like that was necessarily a popular thing to do in the 90's mainstream, either.

As for the point about "they should have done that part this way, I think it comes down to a fundamental difference in the way people view a product. I think most people (read: the kind of people who are probably not going to be on this forum) approach music, just like movies, as a source of entertainment rather than some meaningful artistic message from the author. And when you see it that way, inevitably you're going to say "well that part wasn't quite so entertaining" and think of ways in which you might have enjoyed it better. This may be missing the point in many cases, but well, I don't see how it's tyrannical per se. In the end, the artist made stuff the way he or she intended and that's not going to change. It's up to the artist to decide if they have the integrity to continue making future stuff according to their own whims or public criticism, and there are plenty of people who have maintained at least the same level of success sticking with the former, so it's not like there's some kind of totalitarian "MAKE THIS THE WAY I WANT OR YOU DIE" business going down on a large scale.

David_Dovey:

--- Quote from: Akima on 22 Feb 2011, 19:50 ---
--- Quote from: Johnny C on 22 Feb 2011, 18:02 ---you've all also hit another weird side-effect of the contemporary moment which is the idea of like spending time getting to know those records. and to like really, really think about them. i mean – are you even going to buy a record like joan of arc's the gap, if your attitude towards music is "well i'm not spending money on filler"?
--- End quote ---
I'm totally confused. Maybe we mean different things by the word "filler". A slow movement, or a quiet or minimalist passage, or one in an unfamiliar time, or whatever, isn't filler in my book, if it is good, and makes sense to me (yes that is a subjective judgement, but we are talking about music here). Filler is stuff that I think is bad, or at least markedly less good than other tracks on the same album. I took the trouble to listen to some tracks from "The Gap" since you mentioned it (thanks for the tip BTW, I'm going shopping when I get home), and don't understand why I would be expected to call them filler. Is the idea that if I expect value for money from a record, I'm too crass and materialistic to appreciate Joan Of Arc or something?

--- End quote ---

I think the reason Johnny C chose to use Joan of Arc in his example of things being misconstrued as "filler" is because Joan of Arc are a notoriously difficult band. I remember the first time I'd heard of them was a post that tommydski made in which he stated that he had to listen to one of their albums a good 200 times before it began making real sense to him, which is remarkable -to me at least, seeing as I'm not sure I've listened to anything 200 times on purpose.

This ties into his original statement about taking time to let records sink in, in that there is a concern that things might be labelled "filler" or just passed over because they aren't immediately gratifying, and this in turn leads to a lot of good stuff getting passed over when there is a) so much choice available to listeners that it's entirely likely that something that doesn't immediately grab a listener is going to be passed over on the way to the next Youtube vid or 30-second sample on Amazon or whatever and b) album-based songwriting is being stripped of it's context by being presented on it's own in the abovementioned Youtube/Amazon format et al.

Tom:
This is basically the reason why I used the scare quotes.

Jimor:
I think the album as a unit of art still has its uses, and it seems to be at a fairly stable equilibrium as far as length goes, both on the creative side, and the listening side. It also marks epochs in an act's career in a way that very little else does. While the system now could easily support a Single based system, with a new song once in a while to keep the interest of fans, the impact still seems to be greater to have that complete set, whether in a label system or independently. I'm sure there are acts experimenting with this right now, and it would be interesting to see the results.

I used to be tied to the album as a whole listening experience because my early music listening occurred when that was the available format (mid 80s). I heard a couple songs on the radio or saw a couple videos, and bought the rest of the album unheard, then played through the whole thing on tape at first, then quickly shifted to CD as my format of choice.

And yet I've personally moved over to an almost completely song-based listening habit because of the ability to put my music all on the computer, and a selection of that on an mp3 player for portable use. Back in the day, my younger brother's computer was faster than the family computer, so at one point, I bought a 20G HD to add to his 8G Win95 machine just so I could rip my CDs to MP3s then put the whole collection on shuffle. There was even a time when the fact that I had 5000 songs on my computer impressed the college-aged kids I worked with! But anyway, the point is that now when I get a new album, the "highlight" tracks quickly get put into a higher rotation and the rest of the songs only come up when the filter to the top of the big playlist on random.

Man, these discussions are always frustrating because there's topics about the industry I'm definitely interested in discussing, but I get caught up in so much background laying, and now this post is already too long. Hopefully more later.

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