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'There’s endless choice, but you’re not listening’

Those quitting spotify now are not going to start spending on physical media or make an effort to search out music, they don't care enough about it. If they did, they wouldn't be using it in the first place.
 
farfromthesun said:
Those quitting spotify now are not going to start spending on physical media or make an effort to search out music, they don't care enough about it. If they did, they wouldn't be using it in the first place.
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I did exactly that, and I care very greatly about music. I used Spotify in the first place because it fit my life circumstances at the time
 
Also young people have always mostly only listened to tracks and not albums, for me as a kid it was about vfm, so compilations and best ofs were all I looked at. See also taping the top 40 off the radio on a Sunday evening.
 
theadmans said:
In the old days when as a teenager I rode on a bus into Leicester city centre to trawl round half a dozen record shops before finally selecting an LP...

...even if my first listen wasn't that good - I carried on listening until I liked the album.

The effort and expense of obtaining the LP meant I was damn well going to have to enjoy the album.
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I agree with this literally word-for-word. To an extent, I sort of miss those days. The quest, the anticipation etc.

theadmans said:
- it is all to easy to click on another album after just the first 30 seconds.
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Again true to an extent, but those early days did at least make me understand that you might have to listen to an album 10 times or more, before it clicked in your brain.

And streaming itself has opened up a lot of music that I would not have taken a risk on buying, so for me, despite the afore mentioned "cheapening" of music, a massively good thing.

I cannot see myself ever not subscribing to a streaming service. I would happily pay more, if it went to the musicians themselves.
 
paulfromcamden said:
If you go right back a hundred years to the birth of the record industry 78s of 'popular' music were issued as 10" 'sides' and only 'proper' (i.e classical) music was issued on the more expensive 12" shellac format. The first 'albums' - literally albums of several records with their sleeves bound together into a book - were almost exclusively classic music.

I think there's an argument to be made that those elitist assumptions about music consumption based on ideas around class, social standing and race are still with us today when kids streaming the latest tracks are dismissed as not 'proper' music lovers - with the inference that their music isn't 'proper' music.

Sean's point about jungle made me think as well. In the early 90s vinyl was the only way of getting new tracks out. I would walk to uni on Fridays past the queue of producers and DJs waiting to get dubplates cut on Holloway road. That's all gone because now you can stick 100 brand new tracks on a USB stick and plug it into the club's CDJs. Even if you wanted to press up a new track to sell on vinyl, with a nine month waiting time at the pressing plants it's going to be old news by the time it's actually ready.
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I was actually referring to the LP rather than shellac whereby the like of Capitol marketed to 30 somethings with disposable income. This was arguably a golden age with Frank Sinatra selling records to Bobby soxers who’s grown up.

A very similar thing happened with CD & now various audiophile vinyl releases. It’s very cyclical, you can’t blame consumers for taking to Spotify;)
 
matt j said:
Also young people have always mostly only listened to tracks and not albums, for me as a kid it was about vfm, so compilations and best ofs were all I looked at. See also taping the top 40 off the radio on a Sunday evening.
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Home Taping is….
 
farfromthesun said:
Those quitting spotify now are not going to start spending on physical media or make an effort to search out music, they don't care enough about it. If they did, they wouldn't be using it in the first place.
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I disagree. Many of my friends who love music use Spotify, as do my teenage kids.
But so much choice is not an advantage in my view.
 
awkwardbydesign said:
Really? I like music from around the world, Rai from Algeria, classical Indian music, Brazilian, West African, chamber music, rock, folk, jazz, Baroque, and so on. I didn't notice any streaming going on when I became interested in any of them.
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Yes but you (everyone in fact ) can do this now for a tenner a month, that’s the difference.

.sjb
 
Vinyl is not an alternative to Spotify or really relevant to anything now, don't know why the thread is yacking so much about it. I listen to it, but I'm just a boomer with old fashioned habits. That said, people engage with music they feel invested in or linked to. There are old and new odd and manifold and strange ways that happens, and I'm sure I know awfully little about it. Neither does Spotify, I get the feeling. But I strongly suspect one's peers, via word-of-mouth and sharing, are still the gold standard for this. I think of the song 'Secret Agent Man,' by Johnny Rivers. First heard that when I was 13, on an terrible off-air cassette recording played on an awful player. But format and media are totally unimportant. What was important was the enthusiastic intro from my slightly-older cousin. I will always know that song is Really Cool.
 
Growing up in the eighties and early ‘90s I would listen to new music on the radio.
I was lucky that we had an alternative/indie music radio station when I was in my late teens and early twenties, which was partly responsible for me exploring artists that were not very commercial.
Whenever I liked a loose track enough I would buy the album which I would listen to for weeks on end to explore every nuance. Later that decade (88?) I convinced my dad to get ‘us’ a CD player but CDs were twice as expensive as vinyl which meant I could only buy one after a long spell.
My kids have millions of albums available at the tip of their fingers and have to be coached into delving deeper into a single album; they’re just used to random tracks, zapping as one does with the TV, and don’t listen to the radio anymore although there are YouTube channels that they can watch. One of them also listens to music all the time, it’s just background noise… My sister used to do that with the TV, she’d turn it on whenever she got home from school (maybe to keep her company).
 
tuga said:
Growing up in the eighties and early ‘90s I would listen to new music on the radio.
I was lucky that we had an alternative/indie music radio station when I was in my late teens and early twenties, which was partly responsible for me exploring artists that were not very commercial.
Whenever I liked a loose track enough I would buy the album which I would listen to for weeks on end to explore every nuance. Later that decade (88?) I convinced my dad to get ‘us’ a CD player but CDs were twice as expensive as vinyl which meant I could only buy one after a long spell.
My kids have millions of albums available at the tip of their fingers and have to be coached into delving deeper into a single album; they’re just used to random tracks, zapping as one does with the TV, and don’t listen to the radio anymore although there are YouTube channels that they can watch. One of them also listens to music all the time, it’s just background noise… My sister used to do that with the TV, she’d turn it on whenever she got home from school (maybe to keep her company).
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But this isn’t anything new, people have always listens to things in different way with differing levels of engagement. It doesn’t really matter, you can’t really dictate how people listen or to what.

Music is now easier to fit into peoples lives, this started with the Walkman. Why do you think compilations sold so well back in the day?
 
Whaleblue said:
This thread has prompted me to cancel my Qobuz subscription. It only recently renewed on an annual basis so I’ll try to adjust over the next 11 months.

What I’d really like to do is buy just one or two CD/LPs a month, chosen via recommendation by friends (mostly here I suspect), so will concentrate on the annual Album of the Year threads.

Possibly because of the streaming avalanche approach I’m subjecting myself to I think I’m currently buying too much stuff that doesn’t really have/get a chance to stick. Perhaps I’ll also curate the physical collection to reflect what I’ll actually likely listen to.
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18 months on. What happened?

I let the Qobuz lapse last August. Lived without a streaming service for a couple of months, but my three yearly iPhone upgrade cycle meant an offer of a free 3 months Apple Music subscription, which is just now about to expire. I barely lived without some kind of subscription, and that was in late summer. I really cannot see how I’d enjoy finding new stuff, and hearing discoveries that visitors bring when they come, without one.

I’ve just signed up again for 12 months of Qobuz Studio, and look forward to firing up Roon again. The Apple interface is fine, but casting to my Matrix Audio had the odd glitch (including an infuriating one at 30 seconds into many tracks - which funnily enough I think I fixed yesterday!). Roon has so much more depth of information, and very importantly my experience is a glitch free playback.

I’ve also cut right back on physical purchases - I have probably achieved the 2/3 purchases a month, but through simple financial budget setting, not because of streaming/not streaming.

I’m looking forward to spending the day exploring what ‘24 has thrown up.
 
tuga said:
How do you go about doing that?
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Just looking at the various charts that Qobuz (and all the other services) curate. Obviously it’s limited in that it won’t throw up Bandcamp low volume/niche type offerings, but it’s a useful way in.
 
I still have a pile of fairly new records in the middle of the floor next to the turntable along with some old favourites. Same as it ever was.

PS The pile is getting bigger as I’ve now formally run out of shelf space!
 
Whaleblue said:
Just looking at the various charts that Qobuz (and all the other services) curate. Obviously it’s limited in that it won’t throw up Bandcamp low volume/niche type offerings, but it’s a useful way in.
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I've been unsuccessful in using Spotify to discover new music (I like).
 
Tony L said:
The pile is getting bigger as I’ve now formally run out of shelf space!
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I dread to think what would happen if I had a whole house I could fill with records!

I have capacity for about 2,500 in our flat and I suspect I'm a bit over that as the piles in the living room and spare room are growing... time for another big cull.
 
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