How much is too much music?
Why does it feel like music comes and goes more quickly?
I’m in group chat called Pop Sanctuary. My friends Jason and Nick and I talk about music we love, music we hate, industry trends, introduce each other to artists - it’s genuinely a space of thorough discussion and healthy debate.
One music trend we’ve dissected is one within our own listening habits. I briefly mentioned how I used to listen to music when talking about the pandemic. Because there was less life while we were stuck at home, I invested more time and attention into deliberate music consumption. I scanned a playlist of songs I was listening to in 2020 and was surprised to still feel connected to most of them. When I compared the list to my 2021 and 2022 playlists, there was less of a connection and less familiarity with the songs I’d curated. Some I’d completely forgotten about.
I feel that trend continue in 2023 as I finish making my year end playlists. There were fantastic records released this year that remained on rotation and will compromise my favorites of 2023 - Chappel Roan, Slayyyyter, Amaarae, Sufjan Stevens, Caroline Polachek, to name a few. Still, compared to past years, its increasingly harder to come up with a longer list.
I spent so much of the year listening to past favorites. Yes, of course it makes sense that you want to listen to the music you’re mos tfamiliar. The songs and records and artists who left a deep impact on you, who yank you back to a hundred memories where they were the soundtrack - those are the feelings we chase, especially in the harder times in which we’re trapped. They leave marks on your younger mind and shape your worldviews.
Why is it harder to feel that for new music? Do we give records enough of a chance to grow on us? How much time did I used to spend investing in an album versus now? What did I enjoy but forgot to listen to again?
The Pop Sanctuary group chat wrestled with this question for years. In trying to solve it, my friend Jason sent us a post from Evan Ross Katz. The perfectly titled “There’s Too Much Damn TV” vocalized something we’ve all been experiencing in this so-called Golden Age of Television. The amount of conversations sounding like, “Oh have you seen X? You gotta see X.” To which your friend responds, “Oh yeah it’s on my list. But have you seen Y?” Of course you haven’t, you’re trying to finish A, B, and C. Thank you for making our crazy make a little sense, Evan.
We wondered if this applied to music. Could the amount of music be contributing to why we’re not connecting with albums as much as we used to?
I think it’s a perfect storm of a few elements. Let’s go back in time.
Phones
Everything, everywhere, all at once… you know the rest. Music on the go was handy, but limited. You usually couldn’t bring your book of 200 CDs with you wherever you went. You predicted what kind of mood you’d be in for a certain duration and bring carefully curated tapes or CDs with you to soundtrack it.
Enter MP3 players - your entire music collection, both legal and illegal, in your hands. I hadn’t reflected on what it was like to have an iPod. As soon as we started using them, we stopped. Once they merged with phones, MP3 players became another historic electronic. Not only was your existing music collection available in your hand, but you could add to it by buying music
Social Media
Your friend posts a story of them cooking with a song playing over it in her Instagram story. Someone else is posting a video of them at a concert. One of your favorite artists posts a snippet of a new song, while another favorite posts a live video. Again, the breadth and diversity of music content is welcomed. But there’s simply more of it. More music as content means there’s more opinions and perspectives on it. Suddenly it’s not you listening to an album in your room, deciding how you feel about it divorced of anyone else’s perspective or hot take. Now, you don’t have time to listen to everything before you read an opinion on it. You press play knowing your friend’s favorite tracks, your brother’s least favorites, and Pitchfork’s disappointing rating. That colors your listening experience and may impact your relationship with it.
Then there’s the question of mystery and how that influences your connection to the artists you love. I can’t tell you how many friends have told me they hate Madonna’s social media presence. Before, we saw and heard from Madonna when she wanted to say something, and when we wanted to hear it.
Streaming
Easier access to music means there’s more to listen to. Not only can you listen to your favorite records with a couple taps or a vocal command, but you can listen to all of them. Anytime. Anywhere. For the listener, this is everything you could want. Whatever mood you’re in, Jagged Little Pill is literal taps away. Before, your relationship with a record started with a purchase. You drove or were driven to a store that sold records, tapes, CDs. You had limited money, and these weren’t cheap. You came home, you spent 10 minutes trying to open that fucking CD, and you pressed play. You read the lyrics along with the songs, scanning the photos, reading the thank yous. A connection was born.
I’m willing to bet you know the lyrics to older songs compared to the ones you’ve learned in the last 5-10 years?
Streaming music also introduced algorithmic playlists. Instead of flipping through your CD book to figure out what you want to listen to, you simply click a daily generated buffet of selections. Sometimes, these are great! I’ve been pleasantly surprised to receive a recommendation for an album or artist I hadn’t listened to in a while. Even then, there are multiple playlists. There’s almost too many recommendations, so you end up sticking to what you know or curated playlists.
All of this contributes to why our relationship with music has changed. Artists are feeling this too… about their own work! Bethany Cosentino, a singer-songwriter best known for her work with a duo called Best Coast that makes addictive sunny guitar rock, shared how she felt about her new solo album’s performance.
But the industry now — it’s just, like, the amount of fucking selling yourself that you have to do, the amount of videos you have to make, the amount of promotion that you have to do. To then just be like, “Cool. My record came out, and it basically went away.” I mean, no, it didn’t go away, right? It exists forever. You can listen to it anytime. I can listen to it anytime. But when we look at it and evaluate it in terms of the commercial success lens, yeah, it kind of already went away.
As someone who chucked out a few singles over the years and is about to release my debut EP, this resonated. I’ve been writing and recording for almost a year. I’ve put thousands of dollars into it. This isn’t even a full album! It’s hard to predict what kind of impact your music will have, especially within the current music industry jungle we’re in, but the amount of music coming out each week means your release gets less algorithmic attention and you have to scream louder to make your music heard. It’s an exhausting part of the process and ultimately not why anyone should want to make music. Artists create for themselves, and for connection. Feeling a lack of connection isn’t because the music is bad, it’s because the window of connection is shorter and amongst a massive solar system of music that gets bigger daily.
So what do we do? I don’t think there’s a singular solution. But here are a few ideas.
Be intentional. Schedule time to listen to an album/song. No, I’m not saying create a Google Calendar event and stick to it. If I have an initial investment in the artist due to enjoying their previous work or a friend making a special recommendation, I think of when I’ll be able to listen uninterrupted with as few distractions as possible.
Document. Keep track of what you listen to, and what you plan to listen to. Every year I create a playlist for new music that’s either immediate, or something I’m intrigued to listen to again. I also maintain a Google Doc of albums I listen to. If this is too much work, try adding music to your library and using an auto-generated Recently Added playlist to remind yourself what you recently discovered.
Go retro. When’s the last time you listened to a record straight through without checking your phone? I do that with records I want to listen to untainted by opinions of my friends or the press. Alternatively, I save my first listen for a physical copy of an album on vinyl so it’s a more tactile experience and divorced from a hand held device.
Ask your friends. Some of my favorite albums are the ones a friend rushed to tell me about and pitched to me with passion. Sure, the algorithm has your quantitative data. Your friends have the qualitative data of your life to suggest music to you. You know which ones won’t let you down (and which will).
Any other suggestions? Have you tried any of the above? Am I wrong and there’s not enough music? Let me know.