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Death of the Album?
panth0r asks: "I know that a simple search for ' death of the album' will give you about 2000 finds of personal websites and their owner's opinions of what is to come of the music industry. Of course I can't resist the chance to ask Slashdot for their take on the issue, so here it is: Do you think the traditional music album is dying out because of advances in technology?"
The idea of an album has become a conceptual structure. Each song tells part of a the story that an album represents. So no, I don't think the album is dead at all.
Technology isn't the problem, it's marketing and distribution. Albums are sold on one or two songs because the advertising - radio, clips on MTV, even concerts in most cases - has given us a singles-driven marketplace in a market where singles, for the most part, are no longer available for purchase. How did Britney Spears become the youngest female artist to debut her first album at #1? Because they had been playing "Hit Me Baby One More Time" constantly for six months, but there was no way to purchase it. By the time the album dropped, the demand had built to such a point most people never clicked past the first couple of songs (at least not more than once).
Because the suits are only concerned with marketing, they don't care how crappy the rest of the album is as long as there are one or two decent singles. This has led to the decline of the album because most artists don't have the power - or even desire - to do anything better.
So no, technology hasn't done this. Sure, technology makes it easier to shuffle songs around and mix them to our own desires, but most of us desire to listen to the music in the way it was intended or that provides the most fufilling listening experience; in this age of flash marketing it's just that many artists don't produce albums that benefit from being played in order, in most cases much of the disc usually isn't worth playing at all.
I don't blame this on the fact that technology allows me flexibility to customize my listening experience, I blame it on the producers and record companies that don't give me a reason not to.
AE
the death of full recorded albums is not due to any new marketing trends, it's because by and large bands aren't making albums anymore. This will surely feed the flames, but I can't recall the last time I bought anything that flowed together as a single work, regardless of what track I was listening to. I recall things like Metallica's Black, Chili Pepper's Blood Sugar Sex Magik, Houses of the Holy, and I think of how much they were great albums. I scratch my head when I think of anything else I've bought that was recorded in the past ten years that was even close to that level of completeness.
What is dying is singles. Just look at the sales figures; internet downloads (legal and illegal) are killing the CD single off bigtime. Not surprising when (to use UK figures) it is 3-4 pounds for the disc, with only 2 B-sides (usually remixes that few care about), or 79p for the track you actually want from iTunes (assuming you don't just copy it).
Meanwhile, everyone who wants actual physical product in their hands buys albums, which have come down significantly in price in recent years. Here in the UK, sales measured by number of actual discs sold are well up; it's only when the record companies are doing their "piracy is killing us, honest" that they go on about how they haven't seen a huge increase in sales by value.
"I Know You Are But What Am I?"
If you go back even as far as the forties or fifties, you had a lot of groups that existed just to pound out singles and disappear. One-hit wonders aren't a new phenomenon.
Even in the sixties (the height of album-oriented rock), both albums and singles had their place. In 1967, the Beatles released the Sgt. Pepper's LP and "Strawberry Fields Forever" c/w "Penny Lane." Both formats have their strengths (and the Beatles certainly got the most out of both of them that year).
Last year, we had, to start, the Fiery Furnaces' Blueberry Boat, the Arcade Fire's Funeral, and Green Day's American Idiot, so clearly album rock isn't a dead form yet.
I'm reminded of this review of (of all things) Vanessa Carlton's first album. Basically, he says that her single, "A Thousand Miles," was great, but that the record company is a bunch of bastards for trying to milk an entire (horrible) album out of her. He makes a good point that some people just have one good song in them, and that's that. Why not simply allow them to make their statement and get on with their lives?
I think that's what the trend of digital music will help accomplish. A lot of artists only have one good song. People just want that song instead of the entire album, and now there's an easy distribution method in place for that.
(Of course, this may not be the case either. Why are single sales so bad in the U.S., I wonder? I miss B-sides.)
But there are also a lot of artists who are full of great songs and, moreover, know how to use the album format to form a complete and coherent artistic statement (and don't listen to the cynics here who say all modern music is crap, there's still a ton of good stuff out there if you look for it). They'll continue to do so, like they have been through all the other format shifts. Record companies will continue to support this since they can sell albums at higher margins than they can sell individual songs, iTunes or not.
As an addendum, I hope that the era of physical media for music isn't over yet. There's something nice about getting something tangible for your money (not to mention you get the freedom of ripping it in the format of your choice, given that the disc isn't crippled with copy-protection crap). I think this will always exist, if only as an audiophile niche (maybe SACD has a future after all?).
I still buy the original, full CDs.
Amazingly in this digital age, some of us still have CD players. I rip everything I buy - all my music is on my computer and I listen there or on my MP3 player. But I like to have the originals in a lossless, archivable physical format. Not to mention that I still have a CD changer in my car.
However - the second they start encoding the CDs I buy with "copy protection" that makes it impossible - or a hassle - to rip my CDs, that's probably when I'll switch to buying music online and do something like wiring up an iPod to my car. All DRM will do is kill the brick & mortar retailers.
Actually, since the death of the CD longbox, albums have generally become something relegated to the past. It's no longer something that you buy to add to your collection, rather it is something that you consume and toss out when the latest fad washes away the fading memories of it.
"you"? who is "you"? is this what you feel is how "it" is designed to work these days or something? is this what "you" are doing? (although, of course, when things where better 'back then' you didnt, and neither did everyone else, because everyone was right and proper and knew what a music meant, and they felt it man, they really felt it!)
whatever.
yes there is a lot of trash out there, and yes it is all what the majority of the visible media portrays as music, but it is hardly the extent of music. yeah, you are right, the 14 year old who buys whatever is hot and all over mtv is probably going to simply consume it and be done with it pretty quickly. but there is still many many people who it all means much more to.
one thing i often thing about is how there certainly are the people who dont really care about the music or the creators and are simply 'consuming', and how there must be a rising number of them (my little 17year old brother included) who could care less if they download a poorly encoded 128kbps mp3 instead of buying an album. i can hardly blame them, i am sure there are only a few songs they actually like on the album anyways. i think maybe at some point some change will gradualy occure, where these crappy albums dont even get released, but rather just the hits that will make it to the charts. the problem is, i guess, that the stupid recod companies wouldnt be able to get away with chargin 15-20 dollars for a few hits. even though thats what it comes down to at this point anyways (if somonne buys an album for the songs they heard on the radio/tv and the rest ends up being filler). maybe it could lead rise to a stronger focus on 'single' releases (which have never really been a proper thing in NA) and maybe albums wont even be released
but i do tink its a little insulting the way youve written your first paragraph as if there is no decency left in music or albums
and also....most artists suck these days (Rush? ... 'rush'?? wtf, a quick search shows they released their first album in '73 and havnt released anything for 7 years or so. they may suck (i dont know...) but if they are one of the groups that suck 'these days' then how old exactly are you? i suspected you were older due to your tone of longing and mourning for the lost 'faded' good old days, but you must be ancient.
you should have a little faith in the music listeners of today, we dont all listen to trash, and in any case, there has been bad music around for a long time. im sure you listened to some crap when you were younger, whenever that was
With a youth culture that, for the most part, has been force fed their musical tastes so that they will buy what Viacom is pushing, I am not surprised that some are predicting the end of the album. Rant.end() I have learned that there is nothing better in the world than exploring my own musical tastes and have found the internet a blessing in this regard. If an album sucks except for one song it can't escape internet reviews.
If we use the term in the sense of a plastic disc with a bunch of songs....yes
If we use the term to capture a set of songs, that toghether form a story....no
We become so involved with the now, that we forget why we actually started doing things the way we do.
In the end...nothing but semantics!
I listen to a lot of electronic music and with some styles like drum & bass for instance, the album concept never really has been a big thing there. Tracks are released on 12" mostly.
With other genres though, many albums are a concept of music/art (rather than a bunch of songs randomly put together on a disk, slapped together in an appealing package). For artists there's usually a whole process of creating the album, and often there's a story told througout the songs on an album. I don't think this will change much with new technology.
Sample this!
I think a lot of this has to do with the ever-increasing media machine slowly giving everyone A.D.D. You can't watch television or listen to the radio without having your senses routinely assaulted. This makes it difficult to concentrate on any one thing, and as a result, the populace tends to get tired of products at a much faster pace, and has begun to expect instant replacements that are more exciting.
I think these things come and go in cycles. Right now we're in a depression when it comes to things like quality, social consciousness, creativity and the product forms that represent the latest advances in these areas. There are always exceptions, like the iPod which is compensating for the lack of good music by enabling new generations to discover older, better-crafted music. I see much of the new technology ending up exposing people to a more "golden age" of music/media where people subscribed to bands and albums instead of formulaic, over-produced singles.
Perhaps we'll see younger kids getting into more 60s music... that was about the last time an artist that could write an anti-war song and get any airplay. Maybe when corporate america sees the money they're losing by "playing it safe" with their "art" they might start giving interesting, inciteful artists a chance to share the spotlight with the current crop of plastic automatons.
I've read a couple of comments saying negative things about "the music of today" and such.
Stop!
Don't you understand that this is exactly what your parents thought of your music? And their parents before them? And so forth?
You're getting old, buddy.
Too old to just listen to the music.
Too old to enjoy music.
I'm not a big fan or R&B and rap, but once in a while a good track comes along and I will enjoy that track.
Wouldn't it be a shame of you would deprive yourself of the vast richness that is music, just because you don't want to keep an open mind to what is out there?
You're missing out on a lot of great music just because you're stuck to a nostalgic notion of what music should be like.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
What I'm talking about is the "music" that can be tested with that silly audio analysis program Slashdot had a story about several weeks ago.
But is the album dead? Of course not. To most artists, a single track by itself is only part of a whole, not a standalone work of art.
There's plenty of good music out there, you just have to look for it. Don't let them shove the top 40 down your throats.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
This is an endless circular argument. The "Death of the Album" has been talked about for the past fifteen years at least, and it doesn't happen.
Even if you look at Billboard's Top 200 chart you're going to see a lot of, well, albums.
If anything, I would imagine the re-birth of the album. As single tracks are easier to get and download (and not pay $7 for a CDS with four tracks), artists will focus on the album.
But we'll have the same mix we've always had. About twenty percent of good and great stuff, twenty percent of really awful stuff, and sixty percent of material that might have a good song or two but is ultimately forgettable.
Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.
Why not ask: SHOULD the album be dead? The march of technology produces new devides, formats and gadgetry while message boards, newspapers and water-cooler chats decry the death of one thing or another. Progress does not do this because it ceases to like the old; it simply produces improvements, and the ones which people at large decide represent something "better" survive and flourish.
I don't know much about music, but to me the arguments sound a lot like "is the floppy disk dead?" - well, arguably it is. Do any of us want it back? Game and application manufacturers used to be constrained by the storage capacity of disks, and often came up with ingenius optimizations (or were forced to leave out unnecessary frills) to do so. They don't have to do that any more. The value of the results of this I leave as an exercise to the reader, but I would still not go back to having floppies as my only option.
If musicians could tell a story with the selection of songs on the album as a whole, it was because their talent allowed them to find a means of expressing their thoughts which fit within the boundaries of the medium - an ~hourlong LP that you had to flip over halfway through. I bet those same artists can and will find entirely new means of expression to fit within the boundaries of today, and tomorrow.
You can still buy a spinning wheel if you want to process your own wool. The fact that the vast majority of people in this country prefer not to doesn't mean that we, as a society, have "lost" the spinning wheel.
Perfectly Normal Industries