i think genres come into play here. do most pop music fans care about full albums? no. do most metal music fans care about full albums? yes.....or at least in the circles I frequent
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Albums Are Dead - Ola Englund's Thoughts
- Thread starter monsterthompson
- Start date
Interesting, considering the OP video is from a metal artist. I do agree that many of my metal friends (not that there are many of them) still talk about albums.
It's not about distribution power, it's about promotion power. Specifically it's about targeted promotion with the goal to start viral sharing behavior.
Ironically I find out about most of my favorite music from forums and fileshares. Then as irony icing... I eventually stream them! I haven't owned a physical form of music in a very long time.
This is what the extreme isolation caused by complete connectivity has led me to do.
Yes and no. It is about distribution in the sense that people used to go to record stores. Small labels didn't have the distribution to get their records in stores across the country. They would have to make distribution deals with majors to do so. Now anybody can sell their music to you in your own home.
But it IS about promotion power to get themselves in front of you. BUT artists like Post Malone and all the big young pop/trap artist were able to do it WITHOUT major label promotion through social media. So they have the same promotion power as the majors.
oh I didn't recognize his name or his associated bands but that is interesting
Lest we forget, what makes something Pop, is at the core, popularity. If significant sales of music from any genre occur, that item becomes part of Pop culture, whatever that happens to be at the moment. The fact is that mainstream sales basically no longer exist in pop because pop makes money through collateral advertising and brand association. Pop doesn't have to sell albums, it's already everywhere.
I don't know. All the people I deem relevant to my musical interests are either dead or still making full albums.
Here's John Meyer talking about releasing his latest album in batches.
I teach college kids and it's depressing as hell. Two examples:
I was tired one morning because I went to a concert the night before. I thought I was bragging when I said that I went to Queens of the Stone Age. One kid was like: is that a museum or something?
I won tickets to Foo Fighters between classes. When I walked into my next class, bragging about it, only one dude knew who I was talking about. How is this even freakin possible?
When I was their age, I saved my nickels to go see a band play until they were a pile of sweat on the stage. What do they do? Pay twice as much to see some dude "spinning" from his laptop?
BTW, get off my lawn.
I agree with his basic premise. Albums are dead, and people do find new music primarily by YouTube videos. However I disagree that its inherently sad, or a mess. It's just different, in the same way the album era was different from the state fair tours of yesteryear.
The subtitle of the OP video is "tips for new bands" so I think the context was as a suggestion for artists without the existing foothold that would allow production of an album to be commercially meaningful.
14.3 million units *total* in 2017 is a drop in the bucket when you consider that Cracked Rear View, Hootie & The Blowfish's break through, sold 12 million units just by itself. DMB's biggest selling albums are around 8 million. That's just from one band! 14.3 million units for the whole year for all releases is positively dismal and certainly nothing to hang your hat on.
And I agree with another poster - the millenials I know don't listen to the vinyl they buy. They listen to Spotify. I was at the Kamasi Washington show and got a lot of grief for buying a CD while they were buying their vinyl. Each of them said the same thing: "It will make good art work". I bought a CD and they were all like, "Why did you buy that? Hahaha!" I told them my car has a CD player and I still even listen to CDs at home. They still felt superior buying vinyl as art, then listening to whatever 2 or 3 favorite songs from the album that made it on to their latest playlist. I floated the idea that you might find other songs you like if you listened to the whole album - a concept also met w/ derision.
But for one of my band's latest projects, I suggested not pressing CDs and only releasing the album electronically. My 50 and 60-something bandmates all soundly rejected that idea. It's a strange new world.
Meh, I still care about full albums regardless of format they are delivered on. I like a full artistic statement that represents a body of work. That's the approach I try and take with my releases as well. What one person calls "filler" I call "deep cuts". I will buy that full album with the one known single on it before I buy the greatest hits collection.
That said, I recognize in a practical sense yes the album is dead as a doornail. Still, I'm far more interested in releasing a cohesive set of tunes as a "thing" than I am at pushing social media awareness with constant single releases. I have no doubt that it would be the smarter strategy for building an audience in the current environment to release singles to a wide distribution every couple weeks, much like the 50's rockers did. So a mix of occasional special mixes or works in progress releases followed by full albums seems to work to keep fans engaged.
When I listen I like to listen to albums over singles almost every time, even when I've got my Zune (still working!) on shuffle it's shuffling albums not songs.
That said, I recognize in a practical sense yes the album is dead as a doornail. Still, I'm far more interested in releasing a cohesive set of tunes as a "thing" than I am at pushing social media awareness with constant single releases. I have no doubt that it would be the smarter strategy for building an audience in the current environment to release singles to a wide distribution every couple weeks, much like the 50's rockers did. So a mix of occasional special mixes or works in progress releases followed by full albums seems to work to keep fans engaged.
When I listen I like to listen to albums over singles almost every time, even when I've got my Zune (still working!) on shuffle it's shuffling albums not songs.
It's just the nature of an ever evolving market. Back 50 years ago, you didn't have much of a choice if you wanted to listen to music. What was available was just a tiny fraction of what we have today. Nowadays, more music is made every day than ever and all of it is competing with everything that came before.
Being weirded out that people don't want to listen to old music when there's more and more of new music which is tailored to newer generations - is kind of insane. I am sure more people in the 80s were listening to power metal than 20s jazz or old classical compositions.
The same thing applies nowadays.
Being weirded out that people don't want to listen to old music when there's more and more of new music which is tailored to newer generations - is kind of insane. I am sure more people in the 80s were listening to power metal than 20s jazz or old classical compositions.
The same thing applies nowadays.
I like vinyl because I like things I can fool with that have moving parts and knobs and motors, e.g the turntable.
Albums? You kids don't even know what a record album is! (says the 42 year old)
Before the LP was invented (and for some time after, until 33 rpm turntables finally achieved ubiquity) pretty much everything was released on a 45 or 78. You'd collect all of your singles, and put them in a book called an album - much like a photo album. I have one, full of old 45's.
And even after the advent of the LP, it was common for artists to primarily record and release singles, and the record companies would later assemble the material, often from multiple recording sessions, into albums. In some genres (Jamaican dancehall music comes to mind) it's always been driven by singles, many artists never make an album.
So, really, technology has just brought us full circle back to a point where artists just record and distribute music in small batches. Personally I'd rather record an EP of 4 or 5 great songs than an LP that's half garbage.
Before the LP was invented (and for some time after, until 33 rpm turntables finally achieved ubiquity) pretty much everything was released on a 45 or 78. You'd collect all of your singles, and put them in a book called an album - much like a photo album. I have one, full of old 45's.
And even after the advent of the LP, it was common for artists to primarily record and release singles, and the record companies would later assemble the material, often from multiple recording sessions, into albums. In some genres (Jamaican dancehall music comes to mind) it's always been driven by singles, many artists never make an album.
So, really, technology has just brought us full circle back to a point where artists just record and distribute music in small batches. Personally I'd rather record an EP of 4 or 5 great songs than an LP that's half garbage.
No more albums makes sense for a consumer population that has come to only expect to pay for what they need when they need it. Why own a car when I only need an uber to the bar? Why own a cabin on the lake when I only need an airbnb for a week a year? Why own an album when I only need one or two songs and there's ten or twenty ways I can get those songs right now wherever I am through my phone? Spending is rapidly shifting toward disposable services rather than goods which means that your grandkids are going to be hosed when it comes time to inherit their parent's sweet record collection or their place on the lake up north with the fishing boat.
And yes, get off my lawn. It's mine and I'm not renting it.
And yes, get off my lawn. It's mine and I'm not renting it.
Historical context is interesting. In the early years of recorded music, the available media didn't allow for a lengthy album of work to be released. As the technology allowed for longer recordings, that became "the new thing" and record companies developed and distributed those albums. Recorded music was scarce at that time; there were relatively few outlets and limited distribution options, so having a way to buy several songs at once was attractive. I'd argue that the rise in popularity of the album was a trend of the time.
I agree with this completely. As a prog fan, I have always seen "singles" as a gateway into the album. Anyone who is truly a deep fan of music knows that the really goods stuff from most bands are the album cuts that are not popular or never get airplay. The deep cuts. Singles in that particular genre are just the fluff that can survive on commercial radio to get notice for the album.
I disagree that albums are dead. I mean, what is an album, but a collection of songs in one package. Hmmm ... sounds a lot like the description of a playlist, too, doesn't it? Playlists are just the albums or mix tapes of the 21st century. They're not dead, they're just evolving, as blue4 suggested.
Consider the technical work and mastering that goes into making a full length 11 song album; all of the recording and mix balancing and track ordering. It's frankly just a waste of money at this point even before one tackles the problem of getting it into people's ears. As musicians we worry about gear value and gas prices for gigs, etc., but we miss the big picture sometimes. The basic strategy has to be driven by efficiency and economy if we want to have anything more than art for art's sake. Not that there's anything wrong with art for art's sake if someone can afford to make it.
You're right, but in an era when all forms of music sales are declining, you can't write off one sliver of sales growing 1000%. Is it going to save the record industry? Absolutely not. Is it putting money in the artists' pockets that they wouldn't have earned? You betchum, Redrider.
BTW a lot of vinyl these days comes with a free download code. So it's not like you have to choose a format.
