Thoughts
Random thoughts I thought worth sharing on here. Updated irregularly.
1.31.26: On streaming vs. physical media.
I've recently heard a few arguments on YouTube, TikTok, and just about five minutes ago, in a mass e-mail from indie pop artist mxmtoon about "wanting to get away from streaming media and its algorithms" and more into physical media.
I understand the argument. I just don't think it would work for me.
I'm completely going to date myself here by saying this, but I was born in 1967, which means that as of this writing I'm 58. It's only a number, I don't give a shit. Outside of my knees, which sometimes feel like they're 78 (fuck you, minor arthritis!), I don't feel 68. But as a music-loving Gen-Xer (and proud of it), I am guilty as charged in one thing, and pleasing no contest: I have a fuckton of physical media and, as my finances may allow, I will continue to purchase physical media. Although, to be honest, the last new physical album I bought was Yeule's Evangelic Girl Is A Gun -- in all three formats (vinyl, CD and cassette), yet! That, and about a half-dozen Elton John cassettes from a Facebook vendor that I've bought used CDs from in the past for my sturdy FiiO Walkman.
When I was a teenager in the 80's, I had an all-in-one stereo system -- turntable, AM-FM radio, cassette recorder/player, and eight-track recorder/player -- that I had gotten for Christmas 1978 (the season of the KISS solo albums, and yes, I got all four (The Ace Frehley and Gene Simmons ones were my favorites of the bunch), plus Alive! I. Eight-track was my least favorite format -- that was the format my father listened to Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash and Jerry Lee Lewis on in his Lincoln Continental. But at the same time, I had adopted my mother's eight-track cartridge of Elton John's Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and would let all seventy-six minutes of that album loop through a few times. I could do a whole rant on how much I hate that format in retrospect.
I liked cassettes better. My grandfather, who introduced me to classical music at around two years old (He gave me my first Beethoven album, his Symphony No. 5 by the London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Antal Doráti, on the Mercury Living Presence label [Get used to classical lovers rattling off not just the piece, but the orchestra, conductor, and label when you ask questions of them or hear them talk about it!]) would buy classical albums and operatic box sets and tape them to cassette -- a habit I'd leter start emulating as a teenager. I got my first boombox (a Panasonic) in 1980 and my first Walkman around 1982, which shifted my music buying habits a bit: I'd either buy the record and some blank tapes, or if the release was a cassette-only release, something I'd encounhter around that time in the early punk/new wave days, I'd buy that instead. And the major labels were noticing the upflow in cassette sales and reissuing back catalog on cassette as two-in-one releaes. I remember the first one I bought was a Doors relesae with their first album on Side A amd Waiting For The Sun on the other. When I got more serious interest about classical music a couple of years later, I'd buy those recordings on cassette instead of vinyl and save myself a step (and a lot of hassle, since on classical albums, mastering engineers would easily cram more than 20 minutes of music onto one side of vinyl, and they didn't always list track timings on the label).
But more importantly, cassettes were also things you'd trade with friends. You'd tape your friends' albums that you borrowed. You'd make mixes for yourself and your friends (especially friends of the opposite sex--that was the teenage mating ritual of Generation X, and I still have a bunch of mix tapes from my first girlfriend to prove it). And if you were a musician like me, you'd record your band practices on your boombox or, once you got a cassette portastudio, you'd make your own recordings.
But having realized I just got into nostaliga mode and rambled, I'll get to the point I was trying to make three paragraphs ago. For example: Often when I went somewhere, I did not just stick one cassette in my Walkman, I'd bring a couple. If I was going to play with the first band I was with (Fallacy, 1985-1987), I'd have at least a half-dozen tapes with me. When the Discman happened, I was saved from the minor inconvenience of tapoing my favorite CDs, especially since one of the reasons I had wanted a CD player was because I could start getting classical music, as well as Black Flag and Frank Zappa, on that format. And yes, when Case Logic came out with CD wallets, I'd loyally fill one with whatever music I wanted to listen to when I went somewhere.
And then came more portable digital media: the MiniDisc and the iPod. Until it died sometime in 2921, my main home CD player was a Sony model I had gotten in 2000 that could also record direct to MiniDisc. Getting an iPod in 2004 only made the habit of having a lot of music with me at all times even "worse" (if that is even a bad thing!).
When I'm at my day job, at least 90% of the time I'll listen to music through Apple Music. I'm fortunate that at my current job, I can listen on earbuds or headphones, as a lot of my co-workers to. Sometimes, I'll use my Hidzis AP80 digital audio player, filled with FLACs ripped from my personal CDs or bought from Bandcamp or Qobuz. Ripping my CDs to lossless FLAC files is the third generation of the "record my new albums" habit that I "inherited" from my grandfather (the second generation was of course, ripping mp3s from my CDs; my MiniDisc era was a transitional generation of CD ripping, mp3 loading from my old desktop, and sometimes recording vintl direct to a MiniDisc.) At home, anything goes. It'll be either physical or streaming, depending on my mood or my energy level.
When I was mxmtoon's email this afternoon, she mentioned wanting to "get rid of streaming songs and leaning on algorithmic playlisting to serve us new music". But honestly? I happily embrace those algorythms. I've discovered artists I've never heard of and rediscovered albums I haven't listened to in eons. She also mentioned embracing listening to albums front to back, which I've always done anyway. But at my day job? Every morning before I go to work, I'll pick out a bunch of different favorite albums, usually around six of them, put them in a playlist, and I'll hit shuffle when I sit down at my desk for the day. And when new albums from favorite artists come out? I'm on those like lox on bagels. When Yeule dropped her new album last May, I played that album four times in a row. And rarely a week goes by where I don't slot one of her albums in one of those album shuffle playlists.
To me, giving up streaming entirely would be like being stranded on a desert island. It saves me the hassle of carrying a half-dozen CDs and a Discman or CD boombox everywhere I go. I love my music, period, any way I can get it. Just not on those horrible eight-tracks.