This is Chris Garrod.
I’m guilty. I have my iPhone, I have Spotify, I start to type in “Car Sea” and immediately a window pops up which says “This is Car Seat Headrest”. I go to the page, and I’ll steam the music. I’ll also download it to my iPhone to listen to it offline.
OK, fine. I love their music. The man behind the band, Will Toledo, is a musical genius in my view. Spotify gives me easy access to a lot of their best songs.
But am I doing the right thing?
Twin Fantasy. Will Toledo’s album first released in 2011 and then re-released in 2018. I was a Car Seat Headrest fan before the 2018 re-release but only actually found out about the 2011 recording after the 2018 re-release (ok, I guess I was a pretty crap fan).
There are a lot of great individual songs on Twin Fantasy, the highlights being “Bodys” and “Beach Life-in-Death”. But in my view, you are really missing out when listening to those songs without listening to them in the context of the full album, a story about an extremely romantic, homosexual relationship, but one also full of angst, between a very depressed undergraduate student and an older man.
It is a concept album. There are loads and loads of concept albums, of course, which have been released over time, and this is just an example. I think some bands have only actually issued concept albums (hello, Pink Floyd?).
So, Spotify. Apple Music. Deezer. Whatever…
I’m in my mid-40’s and I was chatting with one of my work colleagues who is in her early 30’s about the music she listens to. OK…. so a lot of those were band/artists I had never heard of, but a few I had. Ariana Grande for instance.
So I asked. “What did you think of her album last year”? The response. “I didn’t listen to it. I only downloaded three songs I liked from it. Why should I stream and waste my time listening to songs I may not like?”
Yes. Stream. Not even buy, but stream.
So, I took this away and out of curiosity asked a slightly younger work colleague the same question. And yes, the same response.
I was kind of shocked. Even more surprised that my older colleague didn’t even know who Neil Young was and said “Oh yes, I’ve heard of David Bowie” when questioned. Heard of?
I used to buy cassettes and CDs. I used to make mixtapes and ripped mixed CDs. Yes, I used to stream stuff off Napster, LimeWire etc, etc. But they were always full albums. I’d always buy or download a full album. So I’d listen to the great songs, the lukewarm ones (which may or may not have grown on me) and the not so great ones.
Pretty much every artist makes a crappy-ish album (“Make Believe”… Weezer, I’m looking at you. Yes, Weezer.).
Should I care?
Ultimately, there are a lot of bands and artists who release albums and songs who really are ideal for a “THIS IS” playlist (I won’t name names). But I find some very difficult to do so in such a manner. Green Day. Tierra Whack. Radiohead. The Flaming Lips. And of course, Pink Floyd.
But saying that, the artificial intelligence behind Spotify’s “Just For You” and “Daily Mixes” has opened the door to loads of music I’d probably never find. The same applies to YouTube. Often, I will lie in bed, find a new music video trending on the Top 40 Indie playlist on YouTube, watch it, switch over to Spotify and add it to my “2019 Singles of the Year” playlist. So yes, call me guilty.
According to a recently released IFPI Global Music Report in 2019, streaming accounted for nearly half of music revenues worldwide in 2018 (growing 34% to nearly half of all revenue, driven by paid streaming). With such growth, can concept albums survive? Can albums or just physical media survive?
We should still care. As much as I love finding new music through these streaming services, I would hate the idea and purpose of the concept album- yet alone just any album — disappear. A concept album is a book. You are simply reading a book, except it’s a musical experience. Chapters cannot be mixed.
And just like great authors, the world needs to really make sure artists like Will Toledo don’t disappear.
Both photos: Car Seat Headrest, Feb 17th, 2019. Ram’s Head Live, Baltimore.
Chris Garrod – April 2019