So this week (as most weeks) we have another spate of articles saying "the album is dead" citing the number of people who just download one or two tracks from their Internet record emporium of choice. It seems that "the album" is another casualty of the ongoing and endlessly protracted death of CDs, vinyl and the "proper" music industry and lots of the usual commentators popped up to moan about how the net and the iPod is killing proper music and blah blah blah... Get with it grandma. Who uses iPods anymore? Tsk.
So I have done a very unscientific study and asked a couple of mates about this. Actually, this is no more unscientific than the reports online and in the press... Anyway, one person still buys CDs as well as downloading stuff and they said that they would buy a whole album from certain favourite artists but usually they just end up listening to a couple of tracks off that album. In this case you might as well say that the Skip Track button is killing proper music. Another friend just downloads stuff in iTunes and they also said that they would probably buy a whole album from a favourite artist but would usually end up making playlists with one or two tracks off that album. Both of them said that they frequently bought just one or two tracks from a release if they knew that was all they wanted.
So what has changed? Well, nothing much really. In the days of vinyl you would set aside some time to listen to an album. A chunk of the albums made in this misremembered golden age of music consumption were so called "concept" albums like Dark Side Of The Moon or Sgt. Pepper or some of that interminable prog-rock with 15 minute widdly synth solos and tonnes of key and time signature changes and endless references to Tolkien. Most albums, however, do no fit into this category and they never have. Most albums are little more than a collection of singles with some filler tracks chucked in to get the running time up.
I am not a fan of this idea. A lot of bands, Hot Donkey included, try to put together EPs and albums that have some kind of progression and cohesive vibe to them. But I don't really care if you download one or all of the songs on the release. I'm just grateful that you are prepared to buy anything at all, frankly. It would be nice to think that you would download a whole release and then sit back in your favourite chair with a massive pair of high quality headphones (not those shitty overrated Skullcandy things, please) and a mug of tea and you would let the music take you on a nice little journey for an hour. This isn't really realistic though. People did this in the 70's because they only had 3 channels of TV, no DVD collection, no Internet, no PlayStation, no Facebook etc etc. We now have so many distractions all clamouring for our attention that finding the time to listen to a whole album is about as easy as finding the time to have a really good wank without the cat wandering in and staring at your jiggling balls with playful glee and exposed claws.
Yet some people manage to do it (the music bit, not the wanking... Well, no, the wanking too) and these people are probably what you would class as fans. Most people use music as background noise when pootling round the house doing chores or when in the car or on a train. Most people have much larger music collections than in the olden days so picking and choosing favourite tunes is the only practical way to do it. This is why those awful Now That's What I Call Lining Simon Cowell's Pocket Volume 74 are still so popular. The people that buy this sort of stuff are not music fans. They are not fanatical about music. They don't actively seek out new stuff and then blather on about it online in forums specially set up by other people with no social skills. They just need some noise filling their ears so that the sound of their crushingly futile existence doesn't suddenly rush to the front of their minds and they end up committing Hara-Kiri with a Dyson and ruining the Axminster.
As a result of all of this, a lot of bands don't even seem to bother with a coherent running order. I think that is a shame. If you go to see a band live then you would get a set that has been thought about. It will have peaks and troughs and something approaching a climax. You have no option but to listen to a whole set when you're at a gig. It would be nice to think that the band would do the same on an album for those people who do like to listen to the whole thing but I understand why many don't bother.
So, no real conclusions to be drawn other than the bleeding obvious. Some people like albums, some don't care. Some people are fanatical about music, most people aren't. Everyone has different tastes, different amounts of free time, different distractions, different needs.
Maybe instead of filling column inches and airtime with endless complaints about how something or other has killed music, why not find something new and interesting to publicise? Why not point to all the amazing, interesting, creative music that is being made in back bedrooms all over the world? It might take you a bit more time to research and write your piece but you'd actually be doing something good and positive and constructive instead of adding to the already enormous pile of whinge guff that fills the media.
Right. Rant over. I'm off to start writing a 60 minute concept album about negative advertising. The first track will be called "Samsung have got a bloody cheek" and that will seamlessly flow into a 10 minute vocoder diatribe about Kerry Katona called "Fishy Volauvent Disappointment"
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