3 ms·

I wonder what must it be like for the streaming generation to not have the concept of an "Album". I used to love buying albums and going through the artwork, r

I wonder what must it be like for the streaming generation to not have the concept of an "Album". I used to love buying albums and going through the artwork, reading footnotes, the familiar smell etc. I get that we still have vinyl but for most streamers that's not a thing.

Mikeb85 9y ago
When you pay a streaming service, you get access to full albums, and thus can listen to them, beginning to end if you like. I often do...
- ghaff 9y ago
  You can but I'd be willing to wager that's the (vast) minority approach. I'll deliberately listen to an album now and then but the vast majority of the time it's some sort of playlist, even if it's a playlist from a single artist.
  - marpstar 9y ago
    I'm not sure it's much different than in the 1990s and people buying singles of their favorite songs instead of the full album. I may even go as far as to say that more people have access to the full albums today than ever before.
    - ghaff 9y ago
      90s I'm not so sure. I was probably mostly buying CDs then--at least before Napster, etc. in the late 90s. I was thinking about more the pre-digital download eras when albums were the default through long play vinyl, CDs, and cassettes. I agree that initial per song digital downloads definitely favored buying individual hits even given some discounts for buying entire albums.
    - trentmb 9y ago
      There were tons of 'Various Artists' compilations too.
  - bigiain 9y ago
    To be fair, I don't see heaps of albums lately that're composed/curated into specific orders of their songs - which might not be true, it might just reflect that I used to listen to a lot more of "that sort of music". You don't just listen to a single Pink Floyd song in isolation - or you can, but you'll miss out on it's context which might be fine for Great Gig In The Sky, but many of their songs loose heaps of the "art" in isolation. Same with Yes, old (Peter Gabriel) Genesis, King Crimson, Rush even some less "prog rock" groups like Supertramp and Queen had albums that mostly told stories - Meatloaf as the canonical classic example I guess. I think the only thing I've listened to recently that had an "obvious order required to "get it" is Petrified Forest by Biosphere. I don't hear or notice artists doing that so much these days. I kinda feel like "an album" is gonna end up a strange relic of the '70s through maybe the 90s from a future music historian point of view...
- jv22222 9y ago
  Yeah, but you don't queue up at the store to buy it and then sit on the bus ride home checking it out excited to get home and loose yourself in the music...
hprotagonist 9y ago
I am an apple music subscriber. My atomic unit of music remains the album.
tuxxy 9y ago
I would think that if you're more than a "casual listener" of music, then you stream entire albums. I'm pretty involved in my local music scene and I don't know many, if any, who selectively stream songs.
Brendinooo 9y ago
I find that when I buy an album I end up listening to it a lot more than if I streamed it on Spotify. Something about investing in it, or maybe the fact that my library doesn't even crack a six figure song count. I wonder if the constant possibilities of millions of songs to choose from keep people from settling in on particular pieces of work, or if it's just hard for me to grasp that it's possible on that platform.
santaclaus 9y ago
> I get that we still have vinyl Last year was a bumper year for vinyl sales [1]. FWIW I've seen multiple new record stores open up in my current city (Oakland), and in my previous city (Portland) I had like 4 vinyl/cassette shops within walking distance of my apartment. A few bands I'm into release exclusively on cassette. One of the first things I see when loading an artist page on Spotify is ads to purchase vinyl. The physical medium is still there. [1] https://www.economist.com/news/business/21722232-only-two-firms-still-make-lacquer-discs-used-mastering-hunger-vinyl-means-chronic https://www.economist.com/news/business/21722232-only-two-fi...
- smelendez 9y ago
  Cassette is such an interesting medium. Bands, fans and labels have told me they like it because it's analog not digital, portable (unlike vinyl), cheap and quick to manufacture (vinyl isn't economical for small runs or quick turnarounds between recording and tour, which small bands need). But if you started designing a medium around these requirements from scratch today, would you design a cassette?
  - ghaff 9y ago
    I'm not sure what you'd design because, honestly, I have trouble understanding why analog is a feature rather than a bug. Because it's a little harder to replicate and distribute further?
    - logicfiction 9y ago
      One aspect can be that it turns the audio itself into a physical medium that decays with environment. There are related factors to how audio is reproduced from analog formats as well that change the character of the sound. Perfect fidelity is one goal for music listening that digital was taking to the ultimate end. But there's an opposing goal of having individual character, slight warping of a vinyl creating modulation wobbles and similar for tape. For me I liken it to how people find electronic music more interesting when dynamic articulations are added to the parameters of the sounds. For example, varying the amplitude of the hi hats will make it sound more natural and appealing versus just playing the sample back perfectly at equal amplitude every time. Variation can add detail. It's a bit different in how it happens with a vinyl or cassette, but still within those bounds.

Mikeb85 9y ago

When you pay a streaming service, you get access to full albums, and thus can listen to them, beginning to end if you like. I often do...

ghaff 9y ago
You can but I'd be willing to wager that's the (vast) minority approach. I'll deliberately listen to an album now and then but the vast majority of the time it's some sort of playlist, even if it's a playlist from a single artist.
- marpstar 9y ago
  I'm not sure it's much different than in the 1990s and people buying singles of their favorite songs instead of the full album. I may even go as far as to say that more people have access to the full albums today than ever before.
  - ghaff 9y ago
    90s I'm not so sure. I was probably mostly buying CDs then--at least before Napster, etc. in the late 90s. I was thinking about more the pre-digital download eras when albums were the default through long play vinyl, CDs, and cassettes. I agree that initial per song digital downloads definitely favored buying individual hits even given some discounts for buying entire albums.
  - trentmb 9y ago
    There were tons of 'Various Artists' compilations too.
- bigiain 9y ago
  To be fair, I don't see heaps of albums lately that're composed/curated into specific orders of their songs - which might not be true, it might just reflect that I used to listen to a lot more of "that sort of music". You don't just listen to a single Pink Floyd song in isolation - or you can, but you'll miss out on it's context which might be fine for Great Gig In The Sky, but many of their songs loose heaps of the "art" in isolation. Same with Yes, old (Peter Gabriel) Genesis, King Crimson, Rush even some less "prog rock" groups like Supertramp and Queen had albums that mostly told stories - Meatloaf as the canonical classic example I guess. I think the only thing I've listened to recently that had an "obvious order required to "get it" is Petrified Forest by Biosphere. I don't hear or notice artists doing that so much these days. I kinda feel like "an album" is gonna end up a strange relic of the '70s through maybe the 90s from a future music historian point of view...
jv22222 9y ago
Yeah, but you don't queue up at the store to buy it and then sit on the bus ride home checking it out excited to get home and loose yourself in the music...

hprotagonist 9y ago

I am an apple music subscriber. My atomic unit of music remains the album.

tuxxy 9y ago

I would think that if you're more than a "casual listener" of music, then you stream entire albums. I'm pretty involved in my local music scene and I don't know many, if any, who selectively stream songs.

Brendinooo 9y ago

I find that when I buy an album I end up listening to it a lot more than if I streamed it on Spotify. Something about investing in it, or maybe the fact that my library doesn't even crack a six figure song count. I wonder if the constant possibilities of millions of songs to choose from keep people from settling in on particular pieces of work, or if it's just hard for me to grasp that it's possible on that platform.

santaclaus 9y ago

> I get that we still have vinyl Last year was a bumper year for vinyl sales [1]. FWIW I've seen multiple new record stores open up in my current city (Oakland), and in my previous city (Portland) I had like 4 vinyl/cassette shops within walking distance of my apartment. A few bands I'm into release exclusively on cassette. One of the first things I see when loading an artist page on Spotify is ads to purchase vinyl. The physical medium is still there. [1] https://www.economist.com/news/business/21722232-only-two-firms-still-make-lacquer-discs-used-mastering-hunger-vinyl-means-chronic https://www.economist.com/news/business/21722232-only-two-fi...

smelendez 9y ago
Cassette is such an interesting medium. Bands, fans and labels have told me they like it because it's analog not digital, portable (unlike vinyl), cheap and quick to manufacture (vinyl isn't economical for small runs or quick turnarounds between recording and tour, which small bands need). But if you started designing a medium around these requirements from scratch today, would you design a cassette?
- ghaff 9y ago
  I'm not sure what you'd design because, honestly, I have trouble understanding why analog is a feature rather than a bug. Because it's a little harder to replicate and distribute further?
  - logicfiction 9y ago
    One aspect can be that it turns the audio itself into a physical medium that decays with environment. There are related factors to how audio is reproduced from analog formats as well that change the character of the sound. Perfect fidelity is one goal for music listening that digital was taking to the ultimate end. But there's an opposing goal of having individual character, slight warping of a vinyl creating modulation wobbles and similar for tape. For me I liken it to how people find electronic music more interesting when dynamic articulations are added to the parameters of the sounds. For example, varying the amplitude of the hi hats will make it sound more natural and appealing versus just playing the sample back perfectly at equal amplitude every time. Variation can add detail. It's a bit different in how it happens with a vinyl or cassette, but still within those bounds.