Does the digital revolution drive music obsession?

Alright, so here’s the deal.

I’m riding the subway today, just minding my own business and listening to some tunes. Then I notice this person pull a greasy iPod out of their pocket—must’ve been at least 120 GB—and they’re just frantically scrolling through it. Being the total nerd that I am, I tried to sneak a peek to see what was playing, but I gave up. It was too far away, and my eyesight isn't exactly what it used to be.

It honestly sent me straight back to the glory days of the Walkman. I remember how religiously I used to pick out exactly two tapes to bring with me before heading off to college. And I wouldn't dare swap them until I had listened to both of them—start to finish, every single side.

Anyway, getting to the point, even if it’s a bit of a tangent. I still remember those cassette days and the obsession with looping the same stuff over and over, giving every single band at least three or four fair shots by sitting there and actually listening to the entire album. Then it moved to CDs, burning tapes, then Discmen, then those early MP3 players...

Long story short, I realized that this year I’ve probably cycled through about thirty albums released back in 2008. Some of them I even heard before they were officially dropped, kind of like how you guys do it. It’s actually a little depressing, I guess. I feel like I’m more prone to judging an artist based on just two or three tracks now. I mean, who has the time to listen to everything when there’s still so much undiscovered gold out there? And who’s actually going to catch every subtle layer or notice the tiny details anymore?

Look, I’m not anti-tech. I’d be an idiot if I said I was. I love the internet. I love MP3s. It just feels like technology has changed me, somehow. I’m fighting it, though. I don't brag about having massive amounts of music on my hard drive, and I try my best not to download
anything new until I’ve finished what’s already sitting there.

I can't help but wonder just how much this constant accessibility has ruined the whole experience.

Certain changes definitely killed the ritual of it all, but if I look at it objectively, everything is just more accessible now. You don't have to wait around for your cousin's kid to drop that one specific XY group album you've been hyped for. Even back then, there was a certain weight to the wait. At the end of the day, how someone uses this freedom is up to them. Some people will just hoard millions of albums just to flex, while others will actually sit down, listen, and truly appreciate the music. I still download stuff sometimes; I'll listen and realize it’s total garbage, but I usually find myself circling back to give that album a second chance later on. I don't know...

Finally, a thread worth reading...😍

Personally, I still find myself romanticizing those days when you’d obsessively loop the sixth track on your seventh copy of an album (recorded onto a 🙂 TDK D cassette) just because it was a "must-have"... but, honestly...

Even with all the digital clutter we have today—which is honestly getting pretty cheesy, kind of like a kid in a candy store 😍—I still stumble upon certain albums that I’ll just play from start to finish without stopping... and man, that feeling is pure bliss 🎉🎉🎉

Miles Davis 😳

The more accessible something is, the less value it seems to hold, generally 🤷

And nowadays, it's easier than ever... if you don't vibe with something right away, you just download something else. Just keep scrolling until something hits. But it isn't just about how easy everything is to get... it's also about growing up. Maybe... 🙂

It’s a rare occurrence—if it even happens at all—for me to sit through an album solely for the purpose of memorizing every single ambient noise and subtle texture. I suppose there is a distinct, palpable difference in how you experience music when you actually have to put in the effort to acquire the specific record you're craving.

Arthur Barnes said:Basically, if something becomes easier to get your hands on, it loses its value, right? 🤷

I don't even follow... by that logic, is Daydream Nation somehow less valuable now than when we were all kids killing ourselves just to track it down? 😕

Topic! 🙏 Generally speaking, I should probably say that all of this—well, it certainly has its own set of pros and cons. If we consider the procurement of legal physical media here in the States, the situation hasn't actually shifted much from ten or fifteen years ago; it remains quite difficult to track down certain releases through standard retail distribution. Take the latest Andrew Bird album, for instance—which isn't even particularly obscure compared to, say, those niche records that boldscout72 listens to. As for pricing... I won't even go there: the latest LP Conor Oberst was listed at Dancing Bear for $60. Meanwhile, online, that exact same record is sitting at 12 dollars. Even if we factor in extra for shipping, it’s still $17 cheaper. On the other hand, the internet allows us to catch a scent of everything that might otherwise be out of reach... and we get to decide whether or not we want to part with our money for it. Jeff Tweedy offered an interesting perspective on this matter in Wired a few years back. Regarding the actual hoarding of music—as much as I admire the unquenchable thirst for new sounds possessed by anti-person or richkid (hey, guys! 😬)—I personally don't lean that way. That is likely why I decided to dust off the turntable... because I truly believe I can always discover something fresh within the music I already love. Provided, of course, that I listen closely enough. I also tend to keep a lower-capacity iPod, as I fear one might simply lose themselves in such a vast quantity. And regardless, it seems to me that I still achieve a perfectly solid ratio of new discoveries to familiar favorites.

Well then.
The modern machinery of music distribution—which effectively grants everyone immediate access—is fundamentally dictating how we consume art.
It is a formula that could just as easily be applied to cinema, television, and quite possibly everything else in our cultural landscape.
I find myself wondering what the ultimate consequences will be, and how this shift will broadly alter our collective aesthetic experience.
Personally, I don't bother downloading anything; the effort simply isn't worth it to me. ☕ 😳

Nothing.

Hey there.

Fish.

🙂

LET US NOT BECOME COMPLACENT :MAD:

driftingowl27 said:I don't get it... by that logic, is Daydream Nation suddenly worth less than it was back when we were kids killing ourselves just to get our hands on it? 😕

Yeah, because how much something is "worth" is totally subjective.

I totally forgot to mention this in my first post, but it just hit me. A good buddy of mine once told me—and I quote—"If Midlake had dropped Trials of Van Occupanther back in '97, I would've listened to them way more than Radiohead's OK Computer. As it stands, they're alright, but they're just alright. Whatever, who cares"

😉

Brenda Scott14 said:The whole new way music gets released—where basically anyone can stream anything whenever they want—it forces us to consume it differently.
It’s a formula you could pretty much apply to movies, TV, or honestly just about everything else.

I feel like you're blurring the lines between format and form here. I mean, the actual structure of a feature film hasn't really changed much in like, 90 years. You could watch something like *Gone with the Wind* on your iPhone, but I highly doubt that (assuming you even like that movie 🙂 ) would actually give you any kind of satisfying viewing experience 🙂

It's the exact same deal when it comes to the format of a classic LP 🙂

Arthur Barnes said:Exactly, because any judgment on "value" is totally subjective anyway.

That’s why I used the phrase "I'll just throw out..." instead of just dropping Daydream Nation in there. You know, pick an album you actually have to work a little harder to get into, rather than just the easy go-to.

I suppose the digital revolution has really just provided a way for people to finally act according to their true nature. Those who were always scavenging—you know, hunting for some new record, a cassette, or even just a low-quality bootleg copy of a tape—now finally have an open road to satisfy that hunger. And those who used to be more selective, buying less but diving deep into what they owned? Well, they’re doing the exact same thing today. (I won't get into the whole "which format is better" debate, because honestly, that's entirely subjective and there's no such thing as "better" or "worse.")

Personally, I find myself in these weird cycles where I won't download a single thing for a month or more, and then suddenly, out of nowhere, I'll grab fifteen albums in a single afternoon. But somehow, I always gravitate back to what I genuinely love, and I'm always willing to give something a second chance if it didn't click immediately—sometimes a mediocre track turns into a favorite. Or vice versa, I guess.

For instance, TVotR really blew me away when I first saw them on TV. It was the music video for Staring at the Sun, which is easily one of the most beautiful things ever made. 😳 After that, I listened to the first album, then the EP, but eventually, I realized the band wasn't quite hitting me the way I wanted them to. I didn't even bother downloading the second album. Then their third one came out, and Cici nudged me to check out a few tracks from the second one. So, naturally, I recently ordered all three LPs. 😳

I think the way I listen to the albums and bands I like now is pretty much the same as it always was. It’s just that, back in the day, I had to navigate so many filters because music was so hard to come by—I mostly listened to whatever someone recommended, lent me, recorded for me, or gave me as a gift. Nowadays, I suppose I can be a lot more liberated in that regard.

Kyle Jackson54 is dropping some serious wisdom here 👍

driftingowl27 said:That’s why I said "I'll hit it"... instead of using Daydream Nation, pick an album you actually love, something that took some effort to discover...

I don't really get what you're asking.

Like, say I have Album X that I loved back in the day, and it was hard to find. Is it worth any less to me now? Not really. But it would feel like it's worth less if I hadn't discovered it then, rather than just downloading it today...

If I understood your question right 😕

edit: Kyle Jackson54's post 👍

Look, if the album is actually good, then I’m gonna dig it, regardless of how I tracked it down. I don't have some obsessive-compulsive thing where the music somehow means more to me just because I had a harder time hunting it down.