Category Archives: Music

Non-business music news, reviews and opinion.

Release dates have all but faded into music industry history, to my mind.

There was a time, probably not so long ago as it now feels,when I’d scour the release schedule – particularly at the start of a new year – to make a mental note of the artists lined up to deliver new music.

Between increased productivity from bands, and the battered barriers to entry so unceremoniously torn down by the move online, there’s now so much music coming out that a scheduled release feels more like a formality for the artist than a foundation for the marketing campaign.

Two established bands both proved and rejected that hypothesis for me this week, as I completely overlooked a new release from Mastodon, yet took to Google to find the drop date for the next album from The Gaslight Anthem.

It’s the latter I’ll take a quick look at here, as the two advance singles – ‘Rollin’ & Tumblin‘ and ‘Get Hurt‘ – caught my attention on Spotify and did their job of piquing interest for the main release.

The Gaslight Anthem – ‘Get Hurt’

It’s a song I can listen to repeatedly. There’s a quiet beauty… some distant, vague longing… that lends the song a subtle but deep impact.

The lyrics aren’t exactly challenging, but the universal application of Brian Fallon’s laments is perhaps what makes ‘Get Hurt’ resonate so quickly. There’s an inevitability to lines like “I came to get hurt. Might as well do your worst to me.” The refrain speaks to all those times you committed to some course of action in full knowledge that it would probably end in heartache. There’s both comfort and contempt in that unerring alignment of our decisions and fate.

“And maybe you needed change. And maybe I was in the way.”

More than love, this relates to any important relationship. How often do we see the negative impact of our own selfishness too long after the fact? It’s a call to

And it brings us back to the music industry.

It has indeed changed, and our attachment to previous ways of working have been in the way for more than a decade. As much as I adore record stores and the memories of countless afternoons lost to browsing the bins, Millennials are largely confused by the concept. “But, I can get it all on my phone at home…?!” And there’s no argument against convenience.

When all’s said and done, even though my interest has been stoked by the pre-release activity, I’m still unlikely to buy the physical album. The game has changed. It’s an attention economy now and merely breaking through the noise to be spun and heard is an achievement.

Play the long game: attract ears, aim for spins on Spotify et al, and build lasting relationships with fans. We can still make memories with music, but it’s time to accept that far fewer of them will be through albums and physical releases.

Entertainment, Music

On Spotify’s Train Wreck Recommendations

July 2, 2014 Steve Leave a comment

Back in secondary school, resting on one’s laurels would earn the dreaded “Must try harder!” remark from the teacher.

Fast forward to 2014 and that’s exactly the treatment that hardcore music listeners should be giving to Spotify for its frankly appalling email artist recommendations.

I enter for the court’s consideration, exhibit A:

“Because you listened to: The Gaslight Anthem

…. drum roll…

The Black Keys!!

Hooray!”

Exaggerated for effect, sure, but a train wreck recommendation for a regular listener if ever I saw one.

And before I come off as some elitist nerd music buffoon (too late), here’s a raft of reasoning as to why this is just a boring, basic recommendation with no thought for user experience:

The Gaslight Anthem are popular, but The Black Keys are another level entirely. They crossed into mainstream awareness a few years back and can sell out Madison Square Garden. If I know about The Gaslight Anthem, there’s very little chance I’ve never heard The Black Keys.

This isn’t an isolated incident. In every recommendation mail I give another chance, Spotify will send a handful of fairly well-known artists, most of whom I’ve listened to before. There is no discovery happening here.

There’s no way to adjust the recommendation settings to tell Spotify’s algorithm I’m okay with it getting a bit more adventurous. I get that users with less listening history than me may want popular recommendations, but this is a service dedicated to all kinds of listener and with 20 million tracks at its fingertips… we need some control!

Finally – and most importantly – Spotify has my listening history, so it knows exactly how many times I’ve used its service to listen to The Black Keys. I can’t access the exact number in their database, but most of my plays on Last.FM are sourced from Spotify, so a good proportion of those 331 spins are on Spotify’s books. How the hell are you recommending a band to me that’s almost at the top my listening count?! This is the antithesis of discovery!

Getting Recommendations Right

I get it, this is a minor gripe in an otherwise excellent service, but it’s just because I’m rooting for you, Spotify.

Apple, Google and Amazon are all lining up for our streaming dollars as part of a much wider master plan, but I at least credit you guys with a passion for music… for satisfying listeners. With that in mind, I have the following suggestions to get music discovery right for every listener, every time:

Cross-check recommendations with listening history and filter out artists with a significant number of spins. Better still, allow users to import listening history from services like Last.FM so that speccy nerdy music geeks can get a head start on discovering gems in your vast archives.
Set up easy-to-use filters that let us customize the recommendations. Safe to adventurous. Similar styles to new genres. Closely related artists to loosely connected. Any of these and more would help users to tell you what they want to see.
Have a clear recommendation notification sign up from the get-go. It’s been so long since I first signed up that I forgot what I agreed to, but guiding listeners to a variety of ways to receive suggested new music (recommended playlists, email notifications, app notifications etc.), combined with those filters we talked about, would make for a much better user experience.
Make it easy to completely opt out of all recommendations and discovery. Some people like what they like and don’t want to be bothered with anything else. I don’t understand them in the slightest, but we should respect their desire for musical ignorance all the same.

What else would you add? Have you actually found an artist you’ve never heard of but now love, thanks to Spotify’s suggestion emails?

Let me know in the comments here or on Twitter/Facebook. Together, we can discover better music.

(And for anyone who truly hasn’t ever heard The Black Keys, here’s what the fuss is about…)

Entertainment, Music, Opinion

Change is Inevitable. Growth is Intentional. Songza is ?

July 1, 2014 Steve Leave a comment

Google Sharks — *Will Google support Songza, or swallow it whole?*

Just as I’m struggling to decide the best way to get the writing rolling again, up pops suggestive streaming app Songza with the required inspiration.

Unusually though, it isn’t the service’s music that’s inspiring this time, but its news: Google is swallowing… sorry, “joining with” Songza.

There goes the (Street View-scoured) neighbourhood.

Sic Transit Songza Mundi

I enjoy Songza.

It’s always been a reliable alternative to the tedious automation of other radio-style streaming services, or the sheer volume of music on Spotify (which is both blessing and curse to the Swedish streaming champ). I like the personal touch, the hand-crafted playlists, and the general feeling that the app’s team have built around their service.

So despite the reassurances that the service will remain in tact, I have my doubts.

Google is operating on a much wider scale in the music industry than the niche that Songza currently occupies. Streaming radio is a viable business, as Pandora has proven, but it’s a field full of competition and limited in its potential as a standalone offering. Songza the independent company can be proud of its 5.5 million monthly active users. Google the international behemoth, meanwhile, would deem that figure a disappointing volume of hourly search queries.

Of course Google has deep pockets and the potential to vastly expand the service. I’m a paid up Google fan boy myself in some ways, with Nexus devices and plenty of business pushed through the Play Store in terms of movie rentals and app purchases, so I don’t decry the general trend for tech companies to improve their entertainment offerings.

What troubles me is their distance from the personal listening exprience, and the pleasant alternative provided by curated platforms like Songza.

Cutthroat Consolidation

The worry for listeners on any independent streaming service must now be that the big sharks are circling in their shallow waters.

It’s not so long ago that Beats swallowed up MOG, only to itself be acquired by Apple for an eye-watering sum last month. After several years of experimentation, the industry is in consolidation mode as the big boys see the potential of Spotify’s model and look to head it off at the pass.

But for the likes of Google, Apple, and Amazon, this is about even more than all music, it’s about offering all content.

These tech giants want to lock consumers into their ecosystem for years to come, most likely via mobile devices. Music is an important factor in attracting consumers to play in their respective sandpits, as are movies and television. The important decision for the wider game that they’re playing is which device you choose to consume this content on, rather than the individual listening or watching choices you make, hence the new Amazon Fire phone.

All this leaves music – and more generally entertainment – as a possible loss leader for Google and its rivals; a piece of a much larger puzzle that needs to be delivered en masse as audiovisual bait for more lucrative transactions in future. Today the new Black Keys album on Amazon Music, but what price a new bog roll subscription for life on Amazon Prime?

And therein lies the antithesis of what Songza offers music fans, a carefully curated listening experience with a focus on the personal side of songs.

The algorithm-driven approach of Google in itself is cause for concern, but the wider worry must be that the company simply swallows up the Songza experience and bakes it into the more anonymous Google Play ecosystem.

So, Songza Sharky… sink or swim?

Entertainment, Music

Quick Cuts: Typhoon – ‘Young Fathers’

November 19, 2013 Steve Leave a comment

“Certain songs they get so scratched into our souls.”

Ever true, not a month flows by that I don’t find some song that captures my mood and comes to define a certain moment or period. As a part of my move to more music writing, these Quick Cuts entries will chronicle the best (and perhaps worst) of those defining single songs.

Crashing in on the ever powerful wave of NPR’s infallible ‘All Songs Considered’, Oregon’s Typhoon demanded my attention with ‘Young Fathers’.

With a balmy opening worthy of summer, the song swiftly descends into the familiar elements of autumn… busier, darker, flooded with transition. Glimpses of beauty return like an Indian summer, only to be cast back by defiant percussion and and lyrics that delight in an intangible sense of futility. Wasn’t it only a few weeks ago that life was much simpler, that sunshine season that was never going to end?

The title is relevant to my circumstances without recalling them all too much. If anything, it’s a reminder that circumstances don’t last. Enjoy what you have while you have it, because it’s frightening and fantastic and everything that comes between but, wherever it hits, it’s not sticking there.

Truth be told, nothing else on the full album ‘White Lighter’ quite lives up to the promise of this track, but only because I adore it so. Certain songs, indeed…

“I was born in September and, like everything else, I can’t remember,

I replace it with scenes from a film that I will never know.”

Annnnd, scene.

Above The Static |