• Reason #2: Even if Einstein had said it, he would have been laughed at as the biggest scientific hypocrite of his time. On the contrary, more than anyone, Einstein should know that the due methodology of science demands and relies upon the rigor of repeated experimentation, expecting results to change through replicating a large number of identical trials around a set of initial conditions. Those are the rules of the game, after all.

• Reason #3: Even if Einstein had believed it, he would have had more to beef with on quantum mechanics than in his famous (correctly-attributed) quote: “God does not play dice.” To elaborate, the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics infers that our universe is probabilistic, rather than deterministic in nature. For example, the Law of Large Numbers (LLN) states that through enough repeated trials, over time the results will converge to a stable average. In other words, if you toss a coin 10 times, you might get an average of 80% heads and 20% tails, but after flipping it a million times, the average evens out to ~50/50. De facto, this indicates how doing the same thing over and over can predict a consistent result. Insane, right? What’s more, the Law of Truly Large Numbers expresses how when tossing a coin a million times, you are also more likely to experience highly improbable outcomes, such as getting heads 150 times consecutively, than in a sample set of just 150 flips. You might actually go insane trying that experiment. But it does demonstrate that eventually, novel outcomes will arise from many repeated attempts. So, if God plays dice, surely God expects there to be different results.

• Reason #4: “Practice makes perfect.” If you have ever tried to learn a new skill, like picking up an instrument, or taking a course in archery, you know that practice itself, an activity involving constant repetition, is a necessary factor for growth and achieving results. In other words, doing the same thing over and over is exactly how you should hope to achieve an outcome that diverges from what you got on your first few tries. Hence, this definition of insanity amounts to something like, “practice makes psycho.” Well, touché to that!

• Reason #5: In spite of these reasons, people keep repeating this quote, as if they expect it to hit differently than the last time it was said, and frankly that drives me bonkers! Y’all are maniacs by definition!😭

Jaded by the March of many cold nights-in

A couchy lad laments his potato chip famine

No Lay's for his luck

Not giving a fuck

He makes do with a bottle of bourbon.

Incidentally, both this year and last, I charted as my own top-played artist (f*** yeah)! Also, despite appearances, the featured thumbnail at the top of the post isn't a screenshot from Spotify. Early in 2025, I canceled my Spotify subscription in favor of a custom Last.fm, Apple Music-infused approach to listening in the digital streaming era, detailed in my post, About My Roundabout Listening M.O.. Thankfully, someone made an online tool that lets you scrape a Last.fm profile for scrobbles and stylize it like a Spotify "Wrapped," which is how I got my Top Tracks/Artists.

At the bottom, you'll find a list of honorable mentions, as well as an inventory of cool albums I discovered this year that were made before 2025. Have you heard any of the albums from the Top 10? Drop a comment!

Top 10:

*clicking the cover art brings you to the album on either Bandcamp or Youtube.

1. Alex G: Headlights

Alex G's LP Headlights is the right amount of weird. Brandishing unconventional chord progressions, enigmatic lyrics, and daring dissonances, Headlights shimmers in the strange glow of a memory of a late night drive, this nape of the woods. Initially, this record didn't pique my interest. Yet over a few listens during the summer, I grew to appreciate its bittersweet quintessence, a drop of the saccharine past mixed with prickly notes poised in the present. It's these proportions which instill a veritable balance between comfort and unease, like a venturous tight-rope walk above the album's dreamscape. Upon entering the soothing summer strumming of Headlights, you might first dip your toes, then your torso, deeper into surreal reminiscence—the musk of a sleeping bag from camping trips gone by, the faded pages of a chronicle from your childhood journal, a lover you once knew—while in the background, you hear the tugs of chromatic haunts, ambient choruses, symphonic un-accompaniments. Are they there to coax you out, or lure you in? Coming at you, or leading you away? When you're called to a quest of the mind, you're in for the ride; just make sure to put your beams on.

2. Aesop Rock: I Heard It's a Mess Out There Too

Earlier this year, Aesop dropped Black Hole Superette to stellar underground acclaim. Little did hip-hop heads know that the cat from May was only half out of the bag. Two days before Halloween, Aesop Rock shadow-dropped I Heard It's a Mess There Too. This treat appeared out of the red, self-produced, in the nova left behind by BHS. And boy, these beats are SLEPT ON. Dare I say, it's the better cut of the two. So, "That's what's up." The beats are stripped down, yet not low-effort: snappy snare, basslines that state their case, spooky synth with occasional plinky piano. Don't forget the bare bars, of course, which Aesop delivers with extra syllabalistic swagger and nothing to prove: all GOAT, no cheese. This is the kind of Hip Hop that's made for the sake of Hip Hop. It doesn't miss, even when it's a mess out here.

3. Chaparelle: Western Pleasure

It's usually rare for anything new from the country genre to cross my radar. Western Pleasure came around through my appreciation of Jesse Woods, a Texas indie/folk singer-songwriter whose atmospheric desert musings and starry-eyed balladry tend to strike a vein of poignancy you might elsewhere score on a Hope Scandoval record. Chaparelle is a collaborative project between Woods and Zella Day, another American singer-songwriter from the alternative/indie scene with a knack for evocative, Parton-inspired karaoke-esque vocals. I appreciate how Western Pleasure manages to fit within the boundaries of country music instrumentally, but owing to both artists' background in unconventional styles and their individual personalities, it remains as accessible to fans of country as to those who, like me, typically shy away from it. Far from tired tropes, pet trucks, drunk dogs, that sort of thing, Western Pleasure's charm is to wrangle up the standard honky-tonk getup and swing it into an old-fashioned night on town, three whiskey shots down, and hun’, don't stop spinning those 45s till the cows come home. You can't help but be lassoed in by the romance, that cute to-and-fro interplay, you and yours tumbling together across pastures and wastelands, suede hat, spurs, and leather boots abound, not "giving one hella heck." Even if you don't usually listen to country, give it a shot! You might be dazzled.

4. Ralph Castelli: Hope, Alaska

Hope, Alaska brings together some of Ralph Castelli's best-sounding music, in my opinion. Castelli's third LP was self-produced in his cabin at the base of the Kinai Mountains in the eponymous village: Hope, Alaska, a population of 28. It's refreshing in a lot of ways. There's the acoustic guitar plucking, a lively yet laid-back indie-pop beat, gentle homestead harmonies, but also Castelli's audible sense of wonder and introspection, and once in a blue groove, an upland draft of air wafting through the brisk Alaskan altitude. What I like most about this album is how some tracks, like "You Resemble Everything" or "Used B**ch" spiral off the beaten path into a lofty panorama of sound, as if to pick a spot to suspend the view and behold some enchanting natural spectacle—The Aurora Borealis, one imagines, or a mama bear and her cubs drinking from an alpine stream. In an interview, Castelli describes Hope, Alaska as being a "destination album," more about setting a scene than making a statement. At the same time, he notes being more vulnerable and transparent in his music than on previous work, enhancing the evergreen themes of renewal, casting an aura of aubade over the record. On balance, Hope, Alaska is like a heartfelt postcard from a distant friend, inspiring thoughts of travel and warm memories.

5. Turnstile: Never Enough

This record rips, man. The riot energy of Turnstile on Never Enough ought to set a new legal standard for mainstream rock, if it hasn't already. It feels like scratching an itch, bearing eminent punk/hardcore/alternative influences like The Pixies, Tame Impala, Rage Against the Machine, The Strokes, and 311, to name a few, yet not without rousing its own style. What stands out to me is that for being considered "hardcore rock," there are still tons of mellow, instrumental synthy parts that linger out (for example, the last minute or so of "SUNSHOWER"). Not to mention "LOOK OUT FOR ME," a clashing rager that bends the rules by brushing shoulders with a DJ trance set partway through, and it slaps! I appreciate this sort of artistic risk-taking and choice, as much as the killer lead guitar solos, headbanging drum breaks, and Brendan Yates' raucous pipes. A band like Turnstile is slightly prone to skirting on butt-rock; however, to me, this album feels true all the way through. My first listen was, oddly enough, in the backseat of my parents' minivan while we were caught for literally an hour at the top of a parking garage, waiting torturously for the traffic to clear. Luckily, this sh*t had just dropped. Popped it into my earbuds and rode out Never Enough the whooollleeeee hour through. Thanks for helping manage the traffic, Turnstile ;)

6. Youth Lagoon: Rarely Do I Dream

For a minute in early 2025, I was trying out a "buy my favorite album from this month on Bandcamp" routine. It didn't last very long, but Rarely Do I Dream was February's pick. Youth Lagoon's sound has changed considerably since their classic 2011 debut Year of Hibernation, but not in a bad way. The production on RDID is incredible, and it made for good company in the dryest, most wintery part of the year. A lot of the record can be experienced vicariously through Trevor Powers' personal archival moments and reflections, where old VHS tapes are woven-in nostalgically track to track. In this way, it operates as much like a photo album as a musical one. Sentimentality reigns, and you can hear it in the euphony, at times outward and groove-laden, while at others, more textural, bruised, and impressionistic. Merrily, merrily, merrily, rarely do I dream.

7. Earl Sweatshirt: Live Laugh Love

Live Laugh Love is only 24 minutes in length, but Earl Sweatshirt busts out some time-stretching superpower of his that makes the experience feel more like 42. How does he do that? I don't get it. Sometimes I feel like I do, but mostly, I don't. Cool. Still, it ends up being a top 10. Within the lo-fi haze, it can be challenging to stick with the lyrics, but occassionally while listening, you’ll be rewarded with a jolt of "getting it"-ness. Maybe you scoop a touch of tongue-in-cheek humor, a little satire in the sound, a little f*ck-it-all attitude toward the creative process in general. Though maybe not as "quotable" as other popular rappers, you've got to hand it to Earl for tapping the rap culture and turning the game on its head in a interesting way. Live, laugh, love, all the way, baby.

8. Mei Semones: Animaru

It's nice, and rare, to hear a contemporary jazz guitarist choose to embrace their idiosyncrasies and exercise them to their fullest extent. Mei Semones is the definition of sprezzatura, making complex runs and meter changes sound effortless and seamless on Animaru. It's not Semones' technical talent alone which makes this a fun record, but also the thoughtfulness spilling into the musicality. At any given moment, it can sound either lightweight or heavy: glamorous pop bossa novas mingling with indie-folk power ballads, orchestral prog rock morphing into jazz-fusion bangers. Throughout the album, you’ll hear Semones slip into some scatting, vocals tight on the heels of an acoustic melody, fluttering between Japanese and English in lyrical abandon. Nestled between the likes of Andrew Bird and math-rock groups like Elephant Gym, Animaru comes alive in the wildness of music and art.

9. Beirut: A Study of Losses

Study of Losses was written to accompany a Swedish circus act, Kompani Giraff, based on a book titled An Inventory of Losses by German author Judith Schalansky. Probably not an artistic concept you would glean just by passively hearing it over a pair of speakers. Though it’s classified as “indie,” this is a record that asks for intentional, disciplined listening. It's embedded in context and higher-forms of art so as to address deeper philosophical themes—entropy, evanescence, and melancholia. Beirut's music has always held worldly, vestigial qualities; Study of Losses utilizes these in an attempt to bring the listener nearer to a profound sense of beauty and abandonment. Movements on the record invite contemplation and affect, a trapeze of intrigue for the fleeting acrobatics of thought, memory, and emotion as they play out in the circus of the mind. I like this line from Kompani Giraff's program notes: "We are asked the burning question: What have I lost and what am I afraid of losing?" Lush harmonies, downtempo hymnal passages, and existential lyrics on Study of Losses can serve as the vessel by which we begin examining these questions.

10. Lola Young: I'm Only F***ing Myself

The title I'm Only F***ing Myself could be read in a few ways: 1) literally, as solitary self-pleasuring, 2) idiomatically, as a way of saying, "damn, displacing my negative feelings on the world is having a backfiring effect" and 3) implicitly, as an affirmation which states, "I'm uncompromisingly being myself." The tracks on this record play on the vocabulary of a difficult breakup in order to address larger, relevant issues like loneliness, disconnection, and misery in the modern world. I get a kick out of some of the production choices, like dog barking samples being part of the beat in "F**K EVERYONE," or the wacky oscillator on "Not Like That Anymore," techniques which are a little more 'out there' than on typical pop albums. I appreciate an artist like Lola being so overtly explicit, punk, self-destructive, and vulnerable, at a scale and era in the music industry that tends to favor the fake. I'm Only F***ing Myself belongs as a 2025 standout, a glittering relic of how utterly confusing yet immensely gratifying it feels to be only f***ing oneself in such turbulent times.

Honorable Mentions:

Mac Miller: Balloonerism
MIKE: Showbiz!
Peter Hair: Weathering Den
Oracle Sisters: Divinations
Blockhead: It’s Only a Midlife Crisis if Your Life is Mid
moonweather: fall in the void
Capyac: Songs From Celestial City
Darkside: Nothing
flipturn: Burnout Days
Ruby Haunt: Blinking in the Wind
Everything is Recorded: Richard Russell is Temporary
Saba: From the Private Collection of Saba and No ID
Bon Iver: Sable Fable
Car Seat Headrest: The Scholars
Dope Lemon: Golden Wolf
Kota: No Rap on Sunday
Japanese Breakfast: For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women)
BRONCO: Natural Pleasure
Salami Rose Joe Louis: Lorings
Gringo Star: Sweethearts
Andre 3000: 7 Piano Sketches
Mei Simmons: Animaru
Neu Blume: Let it Win
Jeff Parker: The New Breed
Aesop Rock: Black Hole Superette
Lorde: Virgin
Drop Nineteens: 1991
Dirty Art Club: The Silver Suite
Florry: Sounds Like…
Black Moth Super Rainbow: Soft New Magic Dream
Frankie Cosmos: Different Talking
Sam Prekop: Open Close
Wet Leg: moisturizer
Clipse: Let God Sort Em Out
Natalie Bergman: My Home is Not in This World
Lord Huron: The Cosmic Selector Vol. 1
Tyler the Creator: Don’t Tap the Glass
Kurt Vile: Classic Love (ep)
Big Thief: Double Infiinity
Anamanaguchi: Anyway
Chance the Rapper: STAR LINE
Cass McCombs: Interior Live Oak
Dominik Fike: Rocket
Mac Demarco: Guitar
Kid Cudi: Free
Ghostface Killah: Supreme Clientele 2
Atmosphere: Jestures
Water From Your Eyes: It’s a Beautiful Place
Babe Rainbow: Slipper imp and shakaerator
Whitney: Small Talk
Michael Hurley: Broken Homes and Gardens
Toro y Moi: Unerthed
Emily Sprague: Cloud Time
David Byrne: Who is the Sky?
Will Paquin: hahaha
Tame Impala: Deadbeat
Haley Heyndrickx: What of Our Nature
No Lonesome: Am I What I’m Not EP
Headache: Thank You For Almost Everything
Bahamas: My second last album
Damien Jurado: The Monster Who Hated Pennsylvania
Anti Lilly: All Good Things
Friendship: Caveman Wakes Up
Melody’s Echo Chamber: Unclouded
AKAI Solo: No Control, No Glory
Stereolab: Instant Holograms on Instant Film
Sabine McCalla: Don’t Call Me Baby
This is Lorelei: Holo Boy

Best Albums Discovered 2025:

*means it's a fav.

*Headache: Mission Impossible III
Port O’Brien: The Wind and the Swell
*Neu Blume: Softer Vessel
The Smile: Cutouts
*Das Racist: Sit Down, Man
Jackson C. Frank (1965)
*Broken Social Scene: Old, Dead, Young
The Uncluded: Hokey Fright
slimdan: Second Dinner
ssingssing: EP
Any Day Now: Garage Sale
A Hand Carved Garden Tool: Floating Action
Goodnight Summerland: Helena Deland
The Cat’s Miaow: Skipping Stones
Berlin Serengitti: Radio Citizen
*Hinterland: Aim
*The Point!: Harry Nilsson
*Emilíana Torrini: Me and Armini
Blood Sun Moon Run: Tim Hill

Thanks for reading!

How much is being reclaimed, you might ask? By my estimation, not much—at least in the grand scheme. The workarounds I've discovered as a result of my search for a better means of consuming music digitally are relatively limited to the standards I set for myself: niche when compared to the widespread and casual adoption of mainstream apps like Spotify. Indeed, one could say the impact on the world by this topic is trivial, and for the majority of readers, I'd expect there's not much of a there there. Sure, I could simply drop the whole matter and just use Spotify without a second thought. However, I remain motivated to discuss and share the details because within this idea lies a small touch of subjective success at having independently wriggled out a crag in a flawed yet rigid system—a sidequest in which I sought my own, valid alternative. And indeed, what I have wrought retains many of the same benefits as the original, at the cost of only a few minor conveniences.

First off, I am fully off of Spotify (as a user), refusing to support the platform financially for many of the same reasons artists are choosing to remove their work. I am not off the grid. I switched to Apple Music as a replacement. I paid a small fee for a service called Tune My Music to transfer the Spotify likes/playlists I'd made over the years, shortly before Apple announced their own native transfer tool. Which is a pretty good move on their part, being keen enough to capitalize on the growing frustrations of Spotify's userbase and their itch to switch to something of greater or equal technological + fiscal value.

For the sake of saving the reader a full-on point-by-point features comparison between Spotify and Apple Music, my simple rundown from the transfer is that they are ~85-90% similar in what they provide—Coke vs. Pepsi. The remaining percentage could be chalked up to some of the social features Spotify offers, like network queues and differing discovery algorithms. But in the end, they may as well be considered apples to Apple. Nevertheless, making the switch is what brought me to the next stage of reclaiming my music-consumption habits. That is, how to set up a worthwhile, personalized discovery "radio" system, one that could rival Spotify's.

If you spend some time navigating around this site, you'll notice my Now page. Here, I've embedded several disparate feeds from other platforms, calling their API in order to fetch my profile data and display them in automatically refreshing (vibe-coded) HTML widgets. Basically, you can view a bunch of my micro-activities ranging from gaming, reading, movie-watching, and music listening statuses gathered all on one page. In effect, this keeps the page feeling as personal as it does alive.

To create the music listening section, I use a freemium service, Last.fm. If you haven't tried it before, the main function of the site is to build a data map of your, the user's, listening habits by tracing playback history across platforms, called "scrobbles" (sounds like it could be a British name for aphids). While it isn't a music player in-itself, over time, Last.fm aggregates the statistics it collects from "scrobbling" and forms recommendations, which can then be played via Spotify or YouTube. These scrobbles can draw from a broad net of sources, expanding the diversity of the recommendations algorithm by scraping data from practically any corner of the internet given it has an audio player and embedded metadata. Additionally, users can then share their stats and connect with other users with similar taste profiles online, lending it a social element. It also allows profile info to be embedded on webpages, like on /now.

To say the least, Last.fm has become a favorite of mine for algorithmic music discovery. What Spotify and many other music-listening apps do in the background with data collection, Last.fm lays out bare and square. Whenever I want a mix of new music, for example, I head over to my Last.fm's account and check out the recommendations tab. With over 12,000 scrobbles, there is enough information to deliver playlists of wild variety yet tending toward what I like. This makes the process of listening feel rewarding and pure, more like a true discovery. What's more, choosing YouTube as a player (on a web browser, coupled with AdBlock) makes the selections even sounder. For example, many of the songs are accompanied by music videos, which often take equal effort and vision to produce as the music, provide entertainment value, and occasionally add layers of meaning, yet are typically absent from most regular streaming platforms. Unfortunately, there's one minor flaw with this digital radio alternative: Apple Music, which I use on my iPhone for 90% of my music listening, doesn't connect directly to Last.fm.

Fortunately, a paid, third-party app called Marvis Pro does. For $10, Marvis allows users to e x p a n d Apple Music's features into tons of unique configurations, from ultra-customizable aesthetic UI elements down to subtle settings like shaking your phone to shuffle a mix. And, for $5 more, it connects to Last.fm, so whenever I play a song on my phone from either Apple Music's catalogue or my own downloaded music, Marvis will automatically scrobble it to my Last.fm account, which also updates on my website in real time. This creates an endless feedback loop: the more I listen to music, the more variety it adds to Last.fm, the better and more accurate chance I have at discovering something I'm actually interested in, without paying a pittance to the mood machine. Pretty neat! Very rewarding. Am I shilling? Geeking out? Maybe a bit? Too bad. I think Marvis is great. A little dumb, but great. It serves my purposes well. Needless to say, it has fully replaced the default Apple Music app on my iPhone for the added benefits.

And that's pretty much the gist: in short, the whole roundabout way I devised to add a tiny bit more friction to my music listening habits and reap the benefits of my personal data heaps at the same time. On the surface, nothing really changed. Arguably, nothing was accomplished. Could I simply not care and use Spotify as normal per intended? Sure. These are not Maslow's needs (maybe Marvis' needs). Admittedly, it takes a certain neurotic level of obsession and spare time to pull off an idea like this. But what else could be worth it than the authentic sense of satisfaction? Ultimately, I forged a tiny trail through the thickets, cobbling together several alternatives that combine into a self-wrought solution, a valid "alternative," aka, an option that exists for someone looking for something different than what's already present, of greater or equal value. And because this exists, I feel like I've manually reclaimed a little of what was lost in the automatic, hidden profit-driven forest behind Spotify's algorithm, in a way that makes listening to and discovering music in digital formats feel rewarding again. Of course, vinyl and analogue will always take the cake. That said, while my endeavor to find a new MO may be slight, one may relate to the experience of reclaiming something that seemed at one point to disappear from one's life, yet only required searching for another means to take it back into their own hands.

I invite you to share. Are there any wacky workarounds you have come up with in the effort to regain a feature you miss from a bygone time? Has it lasted through the trials? Let me know in the replies below!

Granted, when it comes to music’s strength, part of that which mobilizes bodies to do more than dance, i.e., excites novel countercultural movements at large, has historically involved the audience’s awe at raw muscle power, from the digital dexterity of Jimi Hendrix to the cast-iron chops of Charlie Parker.

In parallel, there are many honors designated to classically trained virtuosos who push their physiological limits and achieve exceptional abilities, such as Yo-Yo Ma—hailed as one of the greatest cellists of all time.

In music, we need great instrumentalists like Yo-Yo Ma to succeed in bringing challenging compositions to life and to model a disciplined work ethic for aspiring performers in the future. Otherwise, we might never hear anything better than a 5th-grade choir’s rendition of Beethoven, and instead of The Beatles, we'd have The Shaggs as popular icons.

However, as much as this kind of modeling is necessary for the longevity of music, I would argue there is a threshold where technique can become so increasingly performative that it overrides and even harms creative genius.

The line becomes somewhat more stark when comparing a prestigious player like Jimi Hendrix with a contemporary player lauded for their exceptional skills, such as Tim Henson of Polyphia, to pick an example. Before diving in, however, I would like to preface that I am not attempting to disparage Henson or his abilities—on the contrary, I saw Polyphia live in 2018 at the House of Blues in Chicago, and I thought they were outstanding performers; moreover, the point I’m getting at isn’t concerned with pitting these two players against each other in a gladiator ring, but to highlight a social dynamic that reflects how we choose to value and define music in modern culture.

Both Hendrix and Henson can be seen as exemplars of technique, each having earned public acclaim specifically for their skill level as guitarists. For example, Hendrix is classically cited by many respected players, such as Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck, for his influential style and incredible technical abilities. Similarly, Henson's reputation as a "guitar god" or "fretboard wizard" is earned based on his impressive level of skill. While they share this in common, it doesn't take much magnification to see where the comparison breaks apart at the seams.

Focusing a little closer on the musicianship of both artists, we discover what doesn't at first meet the technically-trained eye. For one, most people are aware that Hendrix's legacy doesn't rest exclusively on technical haunches; he did more than impress his audience, he revolutionized them with his wild style, novel forms of expression, and 'instrumental' political commentary. By contrast, while Henson also shares the power to electrify the dancefloor with moshing bodies through ability alone, his playing seems to be missing much of the depth of what Hendrix brought via electric guitar. This sentiment is reflected more broadly by users' comments in this Reddit thread.

Of course, Hendrix or Henson could not have achieved fame by being bad players. On the contrary, their talent was most certainly a prerequisite in capturing their respective audiences. But although Henson's merit cannot be denied, his musicianship evidently falls short of the high level of creative potential that Hendrix executed in his brief yet impactful career. That's because Jimi Hendrix outshone his own merit through the multi-dimensionality of his creative spirit—the same reason why he is continually talked about as one of the most influential guitarists by such a variety of musicians in the last century.

That said, it might have been around the time of Van Halen when the idea of "who is the best guitar player, aka, most notes in the least amount of time?" rolled into rock in the 80s. Over the last several decades, this has shifted a portion of the music industry towards meritocracy, or "a system, organization, or society in which people are chosen and moved into positions of success, power, and influence on the basis of their demonstrated abilities and merit." According to meritocracy, your popularity is earned solely through your abilities/skills alone. So, for instance, you might be able to make it in the business, but only if you can nail the solo in Through the Fire and the Flames. If you can't do that, you might as well take your simple song structure and meaningful lyrics to the curb and have fun dying of starvation.

Maybe it's not that extreme, but at one level, meritocracy does persist, and it's evident throughout the performative, competitive spheres of the music industry. We find it today in Tim Henson's brand of playing and the viral popularity of videos on GuitarTok. Its reach spreads far and wide, effectively dampening the creative spirit along with it in exchange for promises of fame and fortune. To that end, meritocracy remains a profitable form of exploitation by the music industry: keep practicing, get faster, play all the right notes, and you're guaranteed a golden ticket. But as noted earlier in the comparison between two successful players, merit is only one aspect of a multifaceted musicianship. What's more, the legacy of an artist can never be established on the basis of merit alone, since there will always be someone (technically) better, now or in the future. Isn't that enough reason to explore, experiment, and expand all the unique qualities of one's own musicianship? Do you want to get "really good," or be truly Good?

At another level, meritocracy is not all doom and gloom. To reiterate, if we didn't have something like it, we would think, "Elvis in the 50s shreds, brah." Elvis does not shred. We needed a Van Halen to unleash epic fingerpicking arpeggios for rock to stay exciting, and I'd say Tim Henson does an exceptional job raising the bar for noodlers that want to become shredders in today's rock arena. But on their own, performativity and merit do not define music, or for that matter, rock.

Thankfully, although prevalent, meritocracy as it exists in the music industry today is not the only system for artists seeking success; there are thousands of successful artists who don't strive for merit and instead look to break the mold or chase a new sound. If that weren't the case, we would be all the more starved for culture, missing the deep emotions and creative spirit that lends music its infinite depth and potential.

I'd say this take on technique vs. creativity is recycled pretty frequently in conversations about the industry. It's a light topic to make a post about, though, and maybe you have a different stance. If so, drop a response in the comments below!

Why? No reason.

See?

Because there's no reason. That's the reason.

To elaborate, when something arbitrary or spontaneous occurs, one of two reactions by the mind may follow:

The first is to answer the question, "what reason did x occur?," with the statement, "no reason." This would be considered a rational response.

The second is to explain such an event with a deluge of imagined reasons. This would be considered an irrational response.

The upshot is that for one who adopts a philosophy of "no-reason rationality," the world and its many spontaneous events may occur for "no reason," and still appear within an adequately rational framework. Although this seems at first glance to reflect meaninglessness in one's worldview, "because there's no reason" instead reveals a singularly rational bearing on the nature of the world, and so takes on a meaningful quality.

By contrast, an irrational mind might fabricate ten-thousand reasons for an event's spontaneous occurrence, and in this endless spiral of "reasons," create a perception of the world unable to be apprehended within a "rational" framework. On the surface, these reasons could resemble rationality and appear very meaningful, but pursuing them would only lead further into ungraspable explanations and to the degradation of meaning in one's worldview.

Why?

Because there's no reason. Nor does rationality depend on there being one.

And this is how I wake up some mornings...

Compiling this list was somewhat of a meditation: while balking at the sheer quantity of music I've absorbed this year on Spotify (20,840 minutes less busy than Fantano, let's table the conversation about how I am my own most-played artist), the many hours have also inspired me to dig deeper for the reasons why these are the cream of the crop. What is it about the quality of music? Did I really like the album, or did I just really want to like it? Does it represent a memorable moment in my life? Or is there some more acute artistry to be recognized? It's a nice exercise, and whether you relate at all or would rather wax critical on the reviews, I'll leave it up to you in the comments ;).

Top 10:

*Hint*-clicking the album cover art will link you to either Bandcamp or YouTube, depending on availability.

1. Jeff Parker & ETA IVtet: The Way Out of Easy

When I first heard the single, "Late Autumn," a cerebral improvisation of 17:21 in length, I was transported. In "Late Autumn," you may begin listening by atomizing into the melding tones of the quartet, strung along at the pace of a drifting leaf, cued by Josh Johnson's saxophone silhouettes, Jeff Parker's perennial guitar movements, Anna Butterss' skipping bass, and Jay Bellerose's portentous splashes of percussion, until as that leaf, you find yourself at once snagged lugubriously in the hole of a wired fence beside a freeway memory, suspended in that frantic fluttering motion not unlike the sail of a distant offshore schooner as nautical winds pick up, urging the stringent balance and attention only a mariner could hold together in the dissonance before a storm, as unbridled hoots and whoops of the audience crew are cut loose on the canvas of gray skies and darker days ahead. If you let it, this album will spin you down the groove, owing to the fresh improvisational outpouring of its talent. I had the fortune of listening to it weeks before its online release through a vinyl pre-order from IARC's Bandcamp page, and having played it back more than a few times, chasing the developments on each track to the heart of their intrigue, it feels like an easy out to put The Way Out of Easy at the top of my favorite albums released this year.

2. STRFKR: Parallel Realms

STRFKR's latest LP, Parallel Realms, is one of the most just-plain-fun albums that released this year. By fun, I mean it's great to put on at parties and listen to with friends. One of my favorite memories this year was driving back into the Milwaukee city skyline with my friend Matt after a weekend lakeside vacation with this album playing beginning to end. It's great on its own, too: cohesive, catchy, with the right blend of lurid psychedelia. It's always nice when a band can evolve their sound, sounding "bigger" without going too far off the rails or selling out by half-assing. Boasting loads of great tunes, a pop-enough social essence, and mind-altering qualities to boot, Parallel Realms is my 2024 runner-up.

3. The Smile: Wall of Eyes

This came out early this year, and I remember it vividly for the winter's sentiment (solitary, somewhat void), stemming from the uncertainty of what the year would bring. The Smile's Wall of Eyes is much more than a Radiohead fix: it's a fractured reflection of modernity, it's a complication of art situated in a saturated world, it's an abolition of our desire to experiment, as much as it's about the reconstructed hypothesis. Because of Wall of Eye's artistic quality and tucked-away Yorke-ness, it stands as 3rd on this list.

4. Vince Staples: Dark Times

I don't always have my radar tuned to the hottest drops from rap, but this year, Vince Staple's Dark Times tugged my ear. The album is very well produced; Staple's flow is like a lighter-flick over a gas line of lowriding night-on-the-rooftop type beats. As a whole vehicle, the album feels toned-down, more ethereal and less bombastic than a majority of mainstream rap, an invitation to take a step back and assess while still wearing the vibe. "Étouffée" stands out as an especially star-sighted single, in the way tracks off Outkast's ATLiens can sometimes sound, and it slaps. In fact, because of its laid back nature, I am more prone to the emotional frequencies Staples is expressing through his unique shade of lyrical and tonal textures. Dark Times strikes me as sincere, trying to be something different in a competitive industry while remaining listenable, and as my favorite rap album of 2024, it earns a spot at #4.

5. Junior Varisty: My Star (EP)

One of the best gifts the Spotify algo-rhythm brought me this year was this EP treat from LA alt-rock indie trio Junior Varsity, called My Star. After being introduced by the single, "Cross the Street," I was like, WHAT? YES, TURN THAT SH** UP! It's giving Broken Social Scene and Two Door Cinema Club rallies for us youth on the joint athletic-alternative and hyperactive Flash-kid block. I'm right there with that female vocalist's cheer squad shout-singing, peaking at the register of a punk brattiness once-removed, retrofitted over distorted 2000s alt-rock guitar chords as the two star singers team up on the mic. Accompanied on workouts and short runs, it provides the right amount of blitz to keep me going at a strong stride. And with its touch of high-achiever's melancholy, My Star jumps in as an album worth top 5.

6. Cindy Lee: Diamond Jubilee

I've already used the word "jubilee" once in this post, but whereas the first time referred to my 25th year of birth, here it's reserved for talking about Cindy Lee's opus Diamond Jubilee. This one is more of a time and place pick for me; I was listening to it on a family road trip travelling out west to California in the car as we wound up and around mountain passes in the Sierra Nevadas. The album is long, spanning 2 hours, ergo>> great for listening in my pair of over-ear cans to fare those far stretches of highway with my parents at the wheel. Diamond Jubilee has been covered broadly by music journalists for its anachronistic, classic jukebox, 70s hippie appeal, and for the artist's choice to opt out of streaming, instead releasing the album exclusively to download as FLACs gratis on their DIY GeoCities site. Cindy Lee's sound is raw, incensed, and a little bone dry, bearing shrill falsettos, rough-cut independent production, and a lonesome sense of artistic responsibility, the cumulative pressure of which distills the album down to the thrill of a diamond #6.

7. Haley Heynderickx: Seed of a Seed

The sophomore album Seed of a Seed by Haley Heynderickx was a release I had burned into my calendar. Her debut LP I Need to Start a Garden had been in steady rotation since I first heard it on record in 2019; when her latest dropped this year in November, it did not disappoint. Heynderickx's acoustic harmonies are like gateways to arboreal mysteries, and the wonders of being human in a perfectly disharmonious world: to be Dasein. It's as if she employs music to point to the moon while understanding the pointing cannot replace the moon in-itself, to paraphrase Alan Watts. "Sorry Fahey" is my favorite track, for the sheepish lyrical humor, forlorn horns, and implicit references to Fahey as she speaks his native language of spiritual guitar plucking. I took the chance to see Heynderickx perform Seed of a Seed at The Vivarium in Milwaukee on her tour with harpist Lily Breshear. The pointing was even clearer in a live setting, in a crowd full of people whose presence could bloom together like the bell-shaped plumes of a foxglove under the moon in its #7th phase.

8. Frail Talk: Microspirit

Frail Talk's Microspirit was another welcome surprise from the discovery algorithm gods. It is gentle and cozy, but not lacking a certain shape(shifting). The root of its power lies in a sense of comfort amidst insecurity, at home knitting a sweater, amplifying the more existential stripes; simple, like a child's playroom, imbued with a charm that makes you appreciate the feeling of being small, earning Microspirit #8 of 10.

9. Dominic Fike: 14 minutes

Dominic Fike bestows us with 14 ,,euphoric" minutes of indie-leaning pop bangers. Perfunctory, like this review. 14 minus 5 is #9. What more needs to be said?

10. Four Tet: Three

This year has brought me deeper into the techno sphere, given my frequent excursions to Golfshoe Music's bimonthly synth-meet events, where I got to connect a bunch of fella/fellow audio tech enthusiasts and acquire a richer taste in electronic music. Four Tet has been one of my strongest nodes of connection to this scene; I've always liked Four Tet, but I really got into them when New Energy dropped during my freshman year of college in 2017. In the interim albums between then and now, I have sneakily become a consistent fan of Kieran Hebden's projects, catching up on live concert videos and listening to remix playlists, which accounts for the fact that they made number one on my Wrapped this year. While nothing has induced me quite as substantially as New Energy, Three is certainly an above-adequate '24 electronic record with transcendental melodic flavors and a broad appeal to electronic listeners of all walks. In total, Four Tet's Three plus 7 makes #10.

Honorable Mentions:

Here is an achronological list of 2024 albums that I have listened to throughout the year:

-Kid Cudi: INSANO
-OMA: Bread ‘n’ Butter
-Kota: Lyrics to GO, Vol. 5
-Helado Negro: Phasor
-Real Estate: Daniel
-Vampire Weekend: Only God Was Above Us
-Woods: Five More Flowers EP
-Hovvdy: Hovvdy
-Blockhead: Luminous Rubble
-Andrew Bird (Trio): Sunday Morning Put-On
-Good Morning: Good Morning 7
-Good Looks: Lived Here For A While
-This is Lorelei: Box For Buddy, Box For Star
-Beak>: >>>>
-Clairo: Charm
-Jake Xerxes Fussell: When I’m Called
-Dr. Dog: Dr. Dog
-Zach Schimpf: Figure Flourescent
-Lupe Fiasco: Samurai
-Jack White: No Name
-BBNG: Mid-Spiral
-No Hands: JVB
-Duster: In Dreams
-Toro y Moi: Hole Erth
-Dayglow: Dayglow
-Floating Points: Cascade
-Jamie xx: In Waves
-The Alchemist: The Genuine Articulate
-Skinshape: Another Side of Skinshape
-Pony Baby: Pony Baby
-Leon Bridges: Leon
-American Football (Covers)
-Pixies: The Night the Zombies Came
-Tyler the Creator: CHROMAKOPIA
-Radical Face: Mixtape
-JW Francis: Sunshine
-Blockhead: Mortality is Lit!
-Peel Dream Magazine: Rose Main Reading Room
-The Academy: Lutalo
-Kendrick Lamar: GNX
-Apollo Brown: This, Is Not That
-TV Girl & George Clanton: Fauxllenium
-Kota: Once in a Blue Moon
-Good Morning: The Accident
-Orchid Mantis: i only remember the good parts
-Tycho: Infinite Health
-Caribou: Honey
-Khruanghbin: A La Sala
-Goth Babe: Lola
-Loving: Any Light
-Crumb: AMAMA
-Still Woozy: Loveseat
-CASTLEBEAT: Stereo
-Horse Jumper of Love: Disaster Trick
-Bnny: One Million Love Songs

Best Albums Discovered 2024:

For fun, I also kept an inventory of albums I discovered released before 2024 that I listened to and enjoyed. Anything with an astericks by it means it was a favorite.

*-The Durutti Column: Return of the Durutti Column
-Spin the Globe: Connor Price
-The Symposium: self-titled
-Riton Kah-Lo: Foreign Ororo
*-Frank Dukes: Way of Ging
-Yesway: Yesway
-This is Lorelei: Move Around
*-Floating Points: Vacwm EP
-Sentridoh: Forever Instant
*-Sounds From the Thievery Hi-Fi
-Seriously, Eric? #1
*-Kid Loco: A Grand Love Story
*-Pete Rock: Center of Attention
-Shakarchi & Stranéus: Steal Chickens From Men and thr Future From God
-Photek: Modus Operandi
-Coriky: Coriky (2020)
-Black Heart Procession: 2
-Dutch Interior: Blinded by Fame (‘23)
-Magic Al: Good Grief (‘23)
*-Penguin Cafe Orchestra: self-titled (1981)

That's all I have. There's an infinity of great music out there. Keep a lookout and support the artists you like the most. Thanks for reading and continue to tune into (In)Sitze for more updates!

• Solely for business or commercial purposes, although there may later be monetary features for supporting my creative work via some donation or Patreon link.

• Purely a blog for updates and weekly newsletter send-outs, although there may be blog-like elements, including updates and long-running thematic writing.

• A social forum space or community for sharing ideas and petitioning requests, although there may be similar features like a comment section, the ability to share across the web, and personal contact info.

• Providing an online service or product for a strict function, such as a streaming site like SoundCloud, a flash game, or a file converter tool, to name some examples.

Ultimately, what I would like it to be:

Being a personal website, the focus is, simply enough, a personalized space on the web that showcases particular aspects of myself I like to share, as well as a system to host, unify, and syndicate my creative projects, many of which have already been scattered around different virtual venues. It is much like a home on the web. Coupled with the content, things like aesthetics and design can act as a way to dress up my digital identity, which is both as fun as it is therapeutic and rewarding.

In terms of the past decade or so and the advent of social media, a personal website could offer a healthy substitute for many of the ailments caused by the constrictions of commercial social-networking enterprises (read more on: silos), thereby lessening dependence on the need to juggle several online presences and relaxing the limits made by algorithms which prevent control of what one can see/share.

From a producer’s point of view, taking back creative control of the kind of content one chooses to display, down to choosing different design elements, offers a remarkable advantage. From a consumer’s standpoint, one may still participate and have access across these exclusive spaces, engaging with groups, pages, and followers, for instance, but there is no longer a forced retreat into being a tenant of these larger silos. Instead, with a personal site, one may upload whichever content they desire to publish to their central hub, a majority of which can then be easily shared back to any social media spoke on one’s digital wheel. Essentially, everything comes back to You, very much like it does when You have a reachable and retraceable physical home address.

I am aware to some extent of larger discussions being had over the future of the web in its current state and the legal argument concerning data ownership, with technological advancements like LLMs and conceptual networks like the Fediverse arising to supplant many of the present paradigms by restoring a somewhat revised version of the earlier internet. While such discourse is not the focus of this particular website, seeing as I cannot separate myself from the rest of the growing wave, I do hold a diffident interest in the development and direction of these and related efforts. 

There is potential for building a home on the web to accept the role of an architect, especially given the vast volume of resources for educating oneself about the coding tools needed to accomplish one’s vision and an overall smoothing out of the difficulty curve with assistance from AI. Site building has far-reaching benefits; a majority of the web is built on common cornerstones like HTML, CSS, and server networking, so like with any public utility, whether in learning to be a DIY plumber or fixer-upper handyman, uncovering the inner workings of websites for oneself can help one to remain serviceable not only to themselves but also the broader community of web builders and their exchange of information. In tandem, it helps to remain alert in an age where most of this stuff has the potential to be taken for granted and increase the risk of learned helplessness.

One activity of the so-called 'Web 3.0' in particular that I'm enjoying pulling the thread on is with Webring hopping: an exercise in appreciating how other individuals have decided to roll their own (websites). Incidentally, I am part of the IndieWeb Webring, which you can also explore by clicking the ring and web icon at the page footer (def recommend stumbling through by clicking on the random site hyperlink). I think it's a neat way to discover cool content on the web and an excellent way to organize personal websites with a common ethos.

At the bottom of it, this entry is mostly meant as an overview: something that I can look back on or follow up on later with my thoughts surrounding this topic. There are many (sub)jects in this post that can be discussed more as they develop and begin to feel more cohesive. To clarify, I am not necessarily making a case for or against a personal website, although I advocate for one. In other words, these are merely current considerations I am keeping for myself as I move forward and expand the site—not as much an appeal, manifesto, argument, philosophy, or constitution. It's also not a case against using social media—merely an alternative solution for those who feel pigeonholed by it and care to express greater virtual independence.

That being said, if you are reading this and are compelled by the points I've laid out to grow your own personal website, I strongly encourage you to do so! There's a wonderful post made on another personal site I found through the IndieWeb Webring called, "Oh Hello Ana," which elaborates on some reasons why it's simpler than you might imagine and a good idea even if you're a novice in web design or development.

This year, I planted a personal website seed. That seed will continue to reflect change as it grows dynamically through different forms and formats; yet as time goes on, I hope to establish a lasting habitat for these wild tendrils of digital foliage. So welcome!

Hey, folks!

After a month or so of traveling with family, standing as a groomsman at my cousin Tyler’s wedding in Sacramento, CA,

(new skin unlocked)

and settling back into my ass groove,

here in the 414, I’m happy to share some recent positive online attention towards this summer’s treks in the world of live music performance. For a bit of context—in the past, being a music creator has been mainly domesticated to my DIY studio space, reserved for recording, production, and the search for new material. Of course, I’ve had some experience playing in front of an audience before, like in high school function jazz/ensemble bands and the occasional odd rock outfit, but this year especially has turned out to be more of a take-off in bringing my solo craft further into the world of live music than I originally set out for— in a good way.

Part of the reason is due to the unceasing support from friends, family, peers, and hosts of the arts, whose presence, engagement, and encouragement enable me to continue perceiving live performance as a worthwhile musical endeavor, whereas before it has seemed 1) too intimidating to play in public (I’ll always have nerves) and/or 2) unfeasible for my act with present equipment and gear. With both of these being satisfied in recent years, I now feel prepared and in a better position to welcome opportunities to share music in a live setting.

For example, one of several sets I’ve performed this year was at Beercat Fest outside of Byron, IL: a bash of mutual friends with extended invitations and a lineup of musicians who helped enchant a bucolic evening on the farm property of the hosts, friends of the family Molly McNett and Dan Libman, who organized festivities.

It was here, following Chi-based psych-rock outfit, 8-bit crEEps, where I played my set out of a barn to a broad and attentive audience. As it happens, there weren’t any full video recordings of my performance, though that was easily compensated by another family friend and rock n’ roll literary in the crowd, , who delighted me when he published his Substack essay entitled, “I dream a dream for you,” which I have embedded and encourage you to read in length here:

No Such Thing As Was

I dream a dream for you

I barely endured Probability and Statistics class in high school. And so I don’t have a feel for the likelihood that an artist who’s released thirty-two albums and a combination of forty singles and EPs in fewer than twenty years could have a signature song. Is it more or less likely given such a prolific output…

Read more

2 years ago · 7 likes · Joe Bonomo

TLDR; Bonomo dissects, distills, and appreciates the song, “Sleeper,” by garage-rocker Ty Segall, elaborating in-depth on the emotional impression it has made on him over the years. Also nested as an aside in the article, he dispenses a little writeup treat from his listening experience at Beercat with a spotlight on my performance.

It was pleasant to be on the receiving end as a reader, with thought-provoking reflections from a listener’s ears and a lens to gauge how my sound may come across subjectively when I have never found a way to define it before, let alone describe it. His writing is perceptive yet gentle with a clear personality (“In the lovely, charged haze I don’t know if the melody’s soothing the sleeper, or if the sleeper’s inspiring the melody“), evoking me to view live music in a different light—something with a little more value than in its performativity: the intrinsic benefit of having given something that evening.

Besides the shout-out, the breakdown of Ty Segall and “Sleeper” was fascinating and also very cool. I hadn’t heard the song before reading it, at which point I gave “Sleeper” three consecutive spins just to get the juice. One point that grabbed me in Bonomo’s essay is Segall’s interest in dreams, which I relate to at a creative level and continued philosophical point of interest. Maybe in another post, I’ll go off on some ideas and theories I have on them; I would be curious to have a genuine conversation on dreams with Segall if I ever get the chance to meet him. In lieu of that timeline, listening to the song itself can suffice as the conversation, which resonates in the quote Bonomo cites from Segall’s NPR interview: “I’ve always been really interested in dreams. It’s something me and my dad talked about a lot. I was actually having a lot of nightmares [during the making of Sleeper] about stuff. I mean, who doesn’t have nightmares. It’s not anything special.”

Another tidbit I took from “Sleeper” was its transformation from the original acoustical recording to the current rocked-up live version. Admittedly, I’ve been a little hung up on the fact that live music does not always bend to studio work and vice versa, something I’ve come more to terms with and even respect now. Artists have always had clever ways of presenting their work live so that it doesn’t feel so alienated and dependent on the form of its exhibition…unless they do in fact seek that sense of difference as an artistic choice. This is the approach I think Segall takes and one I would favor as a compromise to being limited to playing certain songs live for fear they might sound “too different” from the version everyone is familiar with.

All things considered, looking back at my recent growth in live music with clear feedback that connects to other art is such a neat way to continue inspiring myself down this road. For readers interested in reading more incisive and elegant rock n’ roll criticism, please consider subscribing to Joe’s Substack, “No Such Thing As Was,” or following his socials. This has been an appreciation post for the appreciation post that motivated it alongside many great experiences from the last couple of months.

Thanks for reading, and be sure to stay tuned to (In)Sitze for more updates!

So far-out was this sound for the time, it was described as nothing short of "unleashing the Northern Lights" and "invoking extra-terrestrials" into the air by a generation of witnesses to Hendrix's unbridled mastery. Even with a greatly enriched understanding of acoustics today, the magic is not lost on Hendrix's radical contribution to rock and roll in the way of combining unintented electrical effects and musical expression.

Meanwhile, half a century later in the upper part of a duplex apartment in Riverwest, Milwaukee, a musician (me) searching for new ways of combining guitar technology and musical expression, stumbles on something quite strange...

The discovery slips in through a recently-acquired piece of gear: a Seymour Duncan Mag Mic active acoustic guitar pickup, installation courtesy of Wade's Guitar Shop on N Oakland Ave.

It happens when I go to practice a new song, engage my Behringer Compressor/Sustainer pedal, and hear more than the usual feedback coming into my headphones from the PA; there is music, like, fully-produced HQ DJ beats coming out of my guitar...but I'm not playing it!

Ok either 1., I'm tripping (um, were those really Shiitake mushrooms in my omelet this morning?), or 2., Ant Man started a band in my guitar. I hit record on my PA system via USB thumbdrive, and also on my OBS webcam to document the Experience. The following upload is what took place (*cue creepy paranormal found-footage cut):

Is it aurora borealis? Aliens?? Drugs??? Paul Rudd???? Thankfully, none of the above. But then what is that infernal racket? Well, if you watch me sway to and fro, looking like I’ve completely lost any concept of what a guitar even is, and listen to the sound, you'll notice what I'm talking about:

Incidentally, the tunes jumping out of the static like a car radio are...basically that! In fact, the battery-powered active guitar pickup is somehow catching FM radio waves bouncing in the air from "103.7 Kiss.fm," a local station, and amplifying them like an antenna through the magnetic pickup/pedal boost. The video and audio here capture me moving around, calibrating the relative angle of the pickup as it governs the clarity of response to the FM signal. #Weird. #Science. #Paul Rudd.

While the technical science is beyond me at the moment, I consider my curiosity piqued and remain somewhat baffled by the physical reality of our environment. How long have I been in this room, not knowing the inaudible contact I'm making with airborne waves scattering about this musique? It makes sense, and in an urban setting, it's likely they’re doing that everywhere.

Discovering this by accident has certainly amplified my awareness of the physical environment and how “dirty” the air really is. Granted, I'm only a baby step from sputtering tinfoil-hat conclusions about what else is invisible but happening all the time, like neutrinos, or the neighbor's wailing cat. It makes me less doubtful that people with something like an electromagnetic hypersensitivity diagnosis, or people who hear "things that aren't there," are truly tuned into their environment more than other observers can perceive. Paranormal speculation aside, the message shouldn't go unmentioned that it is almost always worth pursuing things that make you feel inane at first by others or by yourself, because oftentimes they only lead to more exciting and important discoveries.

As for the musician and his discovery—can we entertain the possibility of a revolution in what Hendrix ushered in when capitalizing on amp feedback? What would it take for a guitarist skilled in the art of finessing FM radio waves via guitar pickup to achieve musical brilliance? Don't ask me, I've only just arrived.

Today's coffee + Facebook scroll + Spotify listening sesh spit me out in a 2022 Pitchfork op-ed titled, "The Woes of Being Addicted to Streaming." The article tracks the burgeoning streaming industry, following its decade-long development, ballooning from start-up origins to the most accessible modern means for personal music listening. It's an interesting take, written from the perspective of pro music journalist Jeremy Larson, who holds years of experience as an active listener, appreciator, and seeker of artists existing in the corner pockets of the cultural ecosystem. In it, Larson describes his particular relationship to streaming as characteristically unhealthy, not only for participants of the ecosystem, but also within the nature of the relationship itself—addictive, stimulating, dilutive, destructive, and habit-forming. Read the article to get the whole effect.

I'm not going to bite down too hard on the arguments; I thought the writer did a good job conveying his concerns or "woes" about the overlooked potential consequences of streaming. It's an opinion that resonates with me, one which prompted me to reflect on the woes of my own relationship to streaming and questions about technology, dependence, access, privilege, and abundance. In this post, I want to examine the feelings underneath which drive me toward these questions.

I've had Spotify and other streaming options like YouTube for almost a decade. Before that, all my digital songs were stored as downloaded files on iTunes (~1,000 albums in total). Over the last three or four years, Spotify has gradually supplanted iTunes for its convenience and availability of content. At the same time, daily listening has gradually stretched to occupy more and more activities. No longer confined to study time, relaxing, or chores, earbuds will often accompany me on brief walks to the grocery store, shopping at grocery stores, reading, gaming, bike rides to work, working at work, and (it's happened before) even listening to other music. According to my 2022 Wrapped, I listened to 99,310 minutes, or 68 days, worth of songs on Spotify for that year alone.

It might sound like I'm leaning into a diss, but it's not my intent to say that listening to music more often or during other tasks is inherently negative. Especially if you enjoy it, there is no apparent reason not to continuously immerse yourself in vibes wherever you go or whatever you're doing. However, it's not really the effect of greater usage that's under question here, but more so streaming's effect on the relationship between listener and creator, community and industry, labor and leisure.

The article recognizes patterns in how folks nowadays tend to form their relationship to music in the world of streaming. Larson proposes three distinguishable categories of streaming audiences: Passive, Auxiliary, and Intentional listeners. Passive listeners are very casual, not minding what is on, as long as it is generally agreeable to mingle over. Auxiliary listeners play music mainly for utility, or as a conventional background stimulant for certain activities, there to dip into like a tasty party hummus—lo-fi beats and the like. Intentional listeners are the most devoted group, giving themselves up to the understanding of music intelligently, at a deep, personal, and emotional frequency. In streaming, Passive and Auxiliary types comprise the majority, those to whom the algorithm is primarily tailored for, while Intentional listeners tend to be reduced to more niche scraggly hipsters and prickly audiophiles.

I would describe myself as an Intentional listener (and part-time scraggly hipster). As a music creator, looking for inspiration by listening to an obscure vinyl in holistic abandon really helps for generating new ideas. However, with streaming, I feel differently. Rather than burrowing deep into the grooves of an underground artist, I see myself pulled into more Auxiliary and sometimes Passive roles. In fact, it is due to the format that discovery of new artists and interesting sounds comes with buttery ease. Most Mondays, I like to check out an updated Discover Weekly playlist to see what the Spotify fairy has selected for me, a basket of trailheads that I can pursue at my leisure. Sometimes I like to follow the rabbit hole of suggested artists until I slide into a group I could really dig, and then put them on repeat for the next week or so. And, to its credit, sifting and surfing this way has led me to some great artists who I really enjoy, prompting me to intentionally support them outside the platform. Yet at the same time, I feel something is missing, a kind of authentic connection, what was perhaps the prize of the iTunes days and prior.

To me, the issue is embedded somewhat in the merit of discovery, the journey versus the telos. We need to look at streaming as a shortcut which circumvents an analogue process, and ask if these shortcuts fundamentally undermine the merit altogether. Is surfing the algorithm to find unrecognized artists really a rewarding process? All it takes is skipping through songs that don't present some immediate appeal, hopping from radio recs to song suggests, occasionally lingering on a bio to fill out context. There is so much content, I feel overwhelmed by the hunger to keep track, pick out, and recognize all the good work pouring through, in a way filtering the filter. But in that game, there's not much of a story to tell. That's a stark difference from going to look through crates of used vinyl with a friend for hidden gems, or more impactfully, talking with a member of a local band over a beer as they share personal histories from their experience—geographies, biographies, scenes.

It's partly a problem of dilution. The seamless nature of auto-play can remove space needed for fully digesting a song, obtaining familiarity with the artist who made it, or opportunities to bond with friends and their developed feelings toward an artist's work. Over time, filtered and curated streams water down the power of what music does best, which is to bring intimacy to the artist and to other appreciators. Instead, as we are increasingly bubbled by personalized algorithms, it becomes difficult to form genuine sensibilities at the individual level, or cultivate enduring followings at the scale of community.

I believe music has always held a sacred status in history. What do I mean by sacred? Something my Tai Chi instructor taught me is that the meaning of sacred is "to be set aside." That is, something you devote space to without any distractions, so that when you reside there, you are capable of receiving the full raw spectrum of what it has to offer. I can see how streaming could be profane in this sense. Streaming music itself has become a distraction for many of us, preventing access to higher realities. Music is not meant to be used like a drug, but a mirror of the divine, and this is something we can only receive when lending our purest pair of ears.

I'm not sure how much I've already derailed this first blog post (since graduating college, I have a residual compulsion to elaborate at length), but I want to finish by saying that after tasting the abundance of its Babelesque catalogue, it is hard to imagine quitting Spotify. Then again, exposing the subtle effects through writing about it makes me long for what I've been missing since before that initial taste. If I end the subscription, cease renting massive libraries from the algorithm, what would I do then? Would I reclaim a sense of sincere devotion to the artists I've established connections with in years past, or would I contract some kind of FOMO and end up giving into the woes of my addiction? Is this all simply a practice in the lesson of impermanence, the fleeting, fluid reality of music itself being amplified to the level of a roaring river? Who knows, maybe a detox is the solution I need to refresh my long-diluted affections.

What do you think? What is your relationship to streaming and music accessibility like for you? How do you engage with it? Drop a reply below, I'd love to listen!