The New Musik
American YouTuber Rick Beato's latest video "The Reason Music Is Getting Worse" struck a chord (pun intended) with me. I expected it to be another one of his occasional "Old Man Yells At Musical Cloud" rants, but it actually made some great points.
His assertion that 'Music Is Too Easy To Consume' is pretty on-the-nose. He explains that with a $10 subscription to Apple Music you have All Music Created, Ever at your fingertips. Don't like a track? Skip it with a jabbed finger, onto the next one and the next.
Rick then tells how he saved up $8 from his first job in order to get Led Zeppelin II. He describes cycling to the record shop, rifling through the shelves, buying the record, cycling home, getting the disc out of the inner sleeve, placing it on the turntable, dropping the needle down and spending time with an album that he really wanted to hear. The effort expended to get it and listen to it meant that there was a contract between artist and listener. "It cost me so much to get this, I must invest time and attention to it."
Contrast to now, when you can just listen to Led Zep 2 for free on Spotify and just skip the songs you don't like, instead of getting familiar with them and allowing them space and time to reveal their own magic to you BECAUSE IT TOOK SO MUCH TO GET TO THIS POINT.
As for me, I've been making the most of Bandcamp Fridays, bulking out my online collection of music. But I found I wasn't enjoying what I'd bought. I've got 3 albums here, I'll just listen to them one after the other and then they just merge into some huge New Musical Blob of new music that makes no impression. I then put all the album tracks on shuffle on my phone, but they still didn't register, in fact it was worse because it was a lot off stuff I didn't know made by an artist I wasn't familiar with.
It wasn't until I listened to Cold Gawd's Album "God Get Me The Fuck Out Of Here" two times in a row that I realised what was happening. I wasn't giving the albums the attention they deserved, the "sit down at the record player and listen to that record you just brought back from the record shop in town" time that they needed. The nights I'd listen to a new REM album over and over until all the songs stuck. I wasn't doing that any more.
So that is my goal from now on. More concerted, repeated listens to albums on a regular basis; paying attention rather than having them as a background soundtrack.
I'm sorry, music collection. You've not had the best of me. But now I am back. You better not all be shit.