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The final is the Intentional listener, somebody who chooses to hearken to music for the pleasure of it in and of itself. That is admittedly the tiniest class of individuals, a subset that spends a outstanding period of time listening to albums, mixtapes, DJ units, and playlists with out distraction. They’re purposeful about what they choose and why—for them, there’s a pleasure to be discovered within the move of listening to music and the emotional, mental, and biographical response that it creates untethered to something however the chemical responses within the mind. A few of these folks use medicine to reinforce this connection, however not all of them. Music, for these folks, is life.
It’s necessary to make these distinctions as a result of I consider that, for Passive and Auxiliary listeners—once more, the overwhelming majority of individuals on this planet—Spotify and the streaming period writ massive have achieved an excellent compromise. The expertise has made accessible what had beforehand been tough or stored behind the gates of report shops or music criticism. For an older technology, there’s a sudden and overwhelming pleasure in with the ability to hearken to all of the music out of your life immediately, retracing the many years by a digital library.
The cognitive dissonance happens when folks within the Intentional group—folks like me—attempt to inform folks within the Passive and Auxiliary teams hearken to music. I do know the worldwide monetary devaluation of music is irreversible, and there are solely a small proportion of complete music listeners for whom the phrases “purchase from brick-and-mortar shops” or “assist Bandcamp Fridays” means something. However what I worry is that the streaming period is definitely writing the identical listening histories for individuals who can’t be bothered with Intentional listening–all completely based mostly on proprietary algorithms that appear like a approach to uncover music however, in actual fact, act extra like a suggestions loop.
An in depth pal, an Auxiliary listener, lately despatched me a Spotify hyperlink to an album by traditional rock revivalists Greta Van Fleet, noting that it could be good music for the health club. This despatched me right into a little bit of a panic spiral for 3 causes. One is that I puzzled why I uncared for to share my skilled life with him: In 2018, my pan of their debut album drew the eye of these past Pitchfork’s typical purview, with Barstool Sports activities suggesting that the band will need to have “fucked my girlfriend,” and GVF followers threatening to “TP” my home through home made indicators they held up at concert events. The second is that I noticed I’m however a tiny little mud mite within the universe, and my very own opinion on Greta Van Fleet is essentially irrelevant past the scope of some thousand music snobs and choose GVF followers, and what’s truly necessary on this planet is the bond shut mates have regardless of these relationship glitches. Third is that Spotify is aware of me higher than my shut pal.
The extra time I spend on Spotify, the extra it pushes me away from the outer edges of the platform and towards the mushy center. That is the place everyone seems to be serviced the identical songs just because that’s what’s widespread. 4 years in the past, whereas the app’s algorithmic autoplay characteristic was on, I used to be served the Pavement track “Harness Your Hopes,” a wordy and melodic—and by all accounts obscure—B-side from the beloved indie band. As of this writing, the track has over 72 million streams, greater than twice as a lot as their precise school rock hit from the ’90s, “Reduce Your Hair,” the one Pavement track your common Gen X’er may truly acknowledge. How did this occur? In 2020, Stereogum investigated the thriller however got here up empty-handed from a technological perspective, although the reply appears apparent to me: Whereas many Pavement songs are indirect, rangy, and noisy, “Harness Your Hopes” is among the many most nice and inoffensive songs within the band’s catalog. It’s now, within the altered actuality of Spotify, the quintessential Pavement track. When frontman Stephen Malkmus was requested about this anomaly, he sounded blithely defeated: “At this level we take what we are able to get, even in a debased kind. As a result of what’s left?”
