If I was more inspired I’d make some clever analogy with the myth. As usual, in the absence of inspiration I instead indicate what I would do if I was inspired. (One perk of this way of talking is that it saves time - works with humor too, rather than tell jokes say “if you wanted you could make a joke about this….”)
My friend Ted showed me this website called Pandora where you put in music you like and it plays you other music that it thinks you’ll like. It’s like a combination of the recommendation function at Amazon Dot Com with a radio station. Neat. So far most of the best music that it’s played for me is music I already own and it sometimes plays stuff that I think is really pretty lackluster (stuff that sounds to me like watered down radio and major label versions of good indie stuff that I like). Why would anyone buy music anymore? (Why do I still?)
Pandora offers a solution to a problem resulting from my not having much money, not having much time, and my being damaged by a stupid sensibility picked up in my younger punk rocker days - I got really into punk and indie music and all that stuff, and part of my getting into it was in that bad sort of way exemplified by this joke:
Q: How many indie rockers does it take to change a light bulb?
A: You mean you don’t know?
That is, I used to obsessively track down related artists and musical histories - “their bassist’s first band sounded like … and on that band’s second record …” etc. I missed some of the sillier extremes of the drive to classify music (power violence, crust, grind, emo violence, etc etc, I remember reading debates about that stuff - and worse reading record reviews that used those terms casually [”you mean you don’t know?”] - in zines and all that [my forays into trying to navigate techno have felt similar, in that nightmare-where-you’re-back-in-school-again way: 2-step, break-step, tech-step ….]), thankfully, but I didn’t miss all of it. Part of that was driven by excitement - I loved that music and I wanted more music that felt as good, and with some bands it was like ‘what in the hell are they doing, how do they make that noise with that instrument?!’ and I wanted terms to sort bands so I could talk about them. But it added up to a stupid approach to music.
As I’ve gotten older and started to enjoy other music again (partly in response to trying to mess with writing a bit of electronic music on the computer and being stymied by not listening to any of it and not having any sense of beats except a repetitive punk beat and partly in getting tired of dealing with the crowds at punk and hardcore shows) this sensibility has been nothing but a problem. I’m not often comfortable just hearing music and being like “ooh I like this” unless it’s music that just happens to be on - on the radio or at a friend’s place. That is, I only put down (and only partially put down) that bad approach if I’m passively encountering new music. If I try to go actively looking for new music it’s a different story. I get irritated quickly, and self-conscious (and irritated with myself for feeling self-conscious cuz I’m too old for this nonsense, dammit) and often give up.
Pandora, like internet radio (I’m partial to somafm, and I’m also partial to some of the xm radio stations that I’ve heard on flights where they have satellite radio) helps me get around that and hopefully can help make that habit atrophy.
one thing about Pandora that i don’t like is the fact that they present it as if they can play anything, but due to some very strict copyright rules they only play stuff that they are somehow licensed to play so in addition to “suggesting” rather strange stuff they also cannot play certain tunes even if they will play tunes that are like the one you want - it becomes more obvious, i think, with more complex types of (electronic) music like certain types of IDM or very modern (classical) music - type, for example, “alfred schnittke” and you’ll get a note about why they can’t play any of his music and then you’ll hear the same two-three CDs they have a license to play… plus the whole “music genome project” goes against everything i believe music to be, a kind of “analytics of music” that i detest: oh you like this? you must like this then!
Comment by Mikhail Emelianov — January 7, 2008 @ 2:14 pm
There’s also last fm http://www.last.fm/. Like Pandora, I guess, but bigger and slicker (not that that’s bad). But too bad they were bought up by CBS in May.
Anyway, here’s a pretty song (do you like the Frames?)http://www.indies.eu/mp3/Glen_Hansard_Swell_Season.mp3
Maybe not what you were looking for, but maybe something new. Or not…
Really enjoyed your post on the edufactory. Been quoting it.
Comment by fanboi — January 7, 2008 @ 10:50 pm
Mikhail - recommend me some music! (Please.) I’ll get back to you with more specifics of the elements of the music genome that I prefer.
I’ve been using a combo of Pandora and Wikipedia the past few days to find music that sounds like music I like, some of which I like very much and some of which I like quite a bit but not enough to want to buy. For instance, I followed the wikipedia links for “mathcore” to find all this good heavy dissonant music. I think of it as a sort of a helping hand, I suppose. It’s also nice for doing things around the apartment - I can put on one of the stations and hear blips and beeps and awkwardness or put on the other to hear blast beats and roaring while I do dishes. I also have one of old hard rock that I like very much, like AC/DC. Unfortunately I pretty regularly run back to the computer to be like “ooh what was that, I like that” and to click thumbs up.
Fanboi - thanks, you’re kind. I’ll check out Last and the link in the morning (my wife’s asleep and our apartment is small and I’m not sure where my headphones are just now). Thanks as well for the kind words on the edufactory thing.
take care,
Nate
Comment by Nate — January 8, 2008 @ 1:22 am
Nate, i think Pandora is indeed good for that kind of “research” - i regularly clean my place or do something mindless to Pandora but as i mentioned above it quickly runs out of options, and i have more of a “who else is not obscure enough that i think they would have?” - so it’s less of a discovery than a kind of self-congradulatory “oh yes, i knew you were going to go there” reaction which isn’t so good for discovering. as for recommending music, i honestly wouldn’t know where to even begin - “mathcore” you mention is i believe a kind of a blanket term for all kinds of nice stuff from heavy and disturbing to spooky and spacey (but again, i think, “math-” prefix is just a “new” way to refer to syncopation and rhythmic instability) - i personally am not very hip on the recent terminology and mostly just listen and decide, not necessarily “like” or “don’t like” but something like “interesting, worth another listen” and “will listen to this until die from hunger” kind of stuff.
also i believe in a sort of musical education that involves a lot of “coercion of taste” as in “i know you don’t like it, but you will because this is good music, you’re just not there yet” - because that’s how i got my education
Comment by Mikhail Emelianov — January 8, 2008 @ 4:23 am
hi Mikhail,
“Coercion of taste” is a really good phrase. Several of my favorite bands and albums I didn’t like initially. This happened several times in a row when I was first getting really into music - I bought something on a recommendation or bought an other record by a band where I already had one. It was music that to me sounded very confrontational and strange. I happened so much that I ended up setting myself a rule that I had to listen to everything three times before deciding for sure if I liked it. Often on the third time stuff had grown on me. (Not always, though. I really don’t like the influential punk band Crass and I really don’t like Ani DiFranco, as much as I’ve tried.)
I’m not up on terms either, I found the term by looking up stuff on wikipedia. It’s all kind of silly, term-wise, and often - with both really heavy music and with electronic stuff - the subgenre microdistinctions are too fine-grained for me to notice the differences.
Comment by Nate — January 8, 2008 @ 9:11 am
What is Pandora…?not available to me…those copyright constraints?
Dear Pandora Visitor,
We are deeply, deeply sorry to say that due to licensing constraints, we can no longer allow access to Pandora for most listeners located outside of the U.S. We will continue to work diligently to realize the vision of a truly global Pandora, but for the time being we are required to restrict its use. We are very sad to have to do this, but there is no other alternative.
Comment by fanboi — January 8, 2008 @ 1:59 pm
Yeah I used to use Pandora until that happened.
Comment by Mike B — January 8, 2008 @ 6:57 pm
Hey dude, I’ve got invitations for a similar site. I’ll send you one. I’ve found that those kinds of services do turn me on to things that I don’t already listen to, but that by and large, they eat too much RAM to not be annoying.
Comment by Jim Withington — January 9, 2008 @ 2:14 pm