November 20, 2009
By Carrie Brownstein
As Bob Boilen, host of All Songs Considered , put it in a text message to me this afternoon, "The [end of the decade] series has been great. Overwhelming, but great."
When we at Monitor Mix and NPR Music began our end-of-the-decade endeavor two weeks ago, I don't think any of us knew that we'd basically be publishing an online magazine. But, hey, we did! We put up 72 posts in 10 days! And we're very proud of it!
So I'd like to personally thank the following people for their time, ideas, input, writing, editing, tech-savvy, dedication, overall contribution, hard work and unending enthusiasm on this project:
Mike Katzif | Lars Gotrich | Patrick Jarenwattananon | Omar Gallega | Meg Biallis
Special thanks to: Anya Grundmann
And a heartfelt, I-want-to-buy-you-a-drink-and-raise-a-glass-in-your-honor, this-couldn't-have-happened-without-you to:Frannie Kelley, Amy Schriefer, Robin Hilton and Stephen Thompson
See you after Thanksgiving. I think there is plenty here to read, watch and listen to in the meantime...
6:34 PM ET
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11-20-2009
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By Frannie Kelley
This is our gift to you: All of them. Alphabetically. By first name. Band names beginning in 'The' may be found with the T's. If a link isn't working or something holler and we'll fix it.
If you miss the piece on Weekend Edition Saturday morning, the audio for the radio segment will archive at this link .
Now go out and celebrate! You deserve it!
6:30 PM ET
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11-20-2009
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By Frannie Kelley
Can you hear it? (amalthya/flickr
SO MANY JAMS!!!!! Part one is here , part two is here , part three is here and part four is here .
CONGRATULATIONS!
6:17 PM ET
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11-20-2009
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By Frannie Kelley
How many of these songs were made with Ableton? (oliverchesler/flickr
And it don't stop. Part one is here , part two is here and part three is here .
Little preview for you -- tomorrow morning Weekend Edition is airing a short segment about your songs! One lucky musician is going to talk to Scott Simon about the process and another person's song will play out the segment.
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11-20-2009
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By Carrie Brownstein
And it's naptime. (courtesy of The Patton Veterinary Hospital
It's hard to believe that we've reached the end. For the past two weeks, all of us -- the NPR Music Team, a handful of outside contributors and myself -- have explored the last 10 years in music. Did we cover everything? No. Did we try? Gleefully.
I feel immensely proud of the sheer amount of writing that we've put out there. So many newspapers and print publications have cut their music sections and critics, and so many music magazines have resorted to the only plausible life raft, which is to ape the Internet (or at least its effect on the attention span) by churning out lists instead of articles, and gossip and news bytes instead of treatises. I can honestly say that it's been a long time since I've seen this much thought, polemic and discourse on a single Web site -- from a variety of voices -- dedicated solely to music and to the music industry.
On the other hand, I also got the sense that some people didn't exactly want to read about or dissect music; they wanted to listen to it. James Blur wrote in the comments section, "I want to hear great music, not the 'reviews' of what other people think is good or bad." Fair enough. I understand that any attempt to summarize a decade in music is cause for unease. Perhaps that's because we each have our own version of the events, and the impact of the events on each of our lives is wholly subjective. Therefore, one person's exploration of the decade might come across as singular, even unnecessary.
Matt Love commented: "I guess it's human nature, at the end of a decade, to try to figure out what the decade was about... well, it's just an arbitrary slice of time, and it wasn't about anything; it was just a bunch of stuff that happened. But I know one thing -- I didn't spend it listening to music I don't like, and nobody else has to, either. They don't need to listen to it; they don't need to worry or complain about it." On a similar note, Matthew Argalas wrote, "Stop worrying about everything! Music allows the listener to recognize or realize things within themselves! As long as the individual enjoys the music, why fret?"
Short of quoting the over-quoted Socrates -- you know, the one about the unexamined life -- I will say that I am a staunch defender of exploration, discussion and participation. For me, participation has always been visceral as much as it's been intellectual. And, while I do enjoy sitting back, letting go and tuning in to music, I have absolutely no desire to tune out . So when someone basically asks, "What's all the fuss about?" or "Why can't we all just get along?" -- while I appreciate their contribution to the discussion -- I disagree with their premise that this decade, in its tearing down of walls and barriers, somehow also ushered in an era of post-criticism. There is a fuss, we don't all agree, and it's in those uncomfortable crevices, the gray areas, that we get to grapple, to search for meaning, or to sit and revel in the unknown. But to simply want out unscathed, or to never get your hands dirty, is not only a privilege, but also a cop-out.
But just as I don't agree with the dismissals of our examinations of this decade ("Stop worrying about everything!"), it's unfair for me to dismiss the reactions to and critiques of our endeavor; reactions that seem, in and of themselves, to be byproducts of the changes that took place in the last 10 years. After all, what was this decade if not an invitation to compile 15,000 songs on our iPods and never have to take the headphones off to listen to anything other than what we wanted to hear, music or otherwise?
In fact, if there's one recurring theme to the end-of-decade coverage and the reader commentary surrounding it, it's that a sense of cohesion has eroded. And what exactly has atomized? The music industry as a whole. The ways we listen to, obtain and discover music. Bands themselves, as they've splintered off into side project after side project because it's so much easier to be in multiple bands, record an album with each member never having to leave his or her individual city, and then release the songs the very next day.
Albums themselves have been broken up into singles, remixed or iPod-shuffled into oblivion. Genres have disappeared, blended and multiplied. The location and context of artists are unknown or obsolete. Labels hardly matter, or so some say, while intention and politics are divorced from the music unless implicit in the lyrics. And, of course, there is more, more, MORE music than ever. For some of us, this unraveling of the structures and the means of exploration we had grown accustomed to is unsettling. For others, it's freeing. Some don't know it any other way. And for most of us, it's a mixture of awe, enthusiasm and at least a little bit of skepticism.
One topic wherein we managed to find common ground pertained to the ways technology contributes to greater accessibility. There are fewer gatekeepers or roadblocks standing in the way of those long-lost musical secrets and gems, and nearly anyone can track down hard-to-find records, singles and artists. Plus, newer musicians and bands -- including the unsigned and unheralded -- can get their music heard. Hooray, no doubt. Furthermore, recording equipment and software make the process of music-making that much easier.
Where we begin to disagree, however, is on whether unfiltered, uncurated, non-contextualized, genre-less, everyman, everywoman music is better. While some celebrate and insist that we're in a post-genre, post-record-label, post-gender, post-music-industry world, not everyone, including myself, thinks that you can keep a knife sharp when it has no edges. I don't want art, specifically music, to become a blunt tool, with no point or purpose other than to be held.
But, like many of you -- and I'm just basing my feeling on a hunch, though there's plenty of evidence on this blog within these past days to support it -- this might have been one of the best decades for music ever. One of my favorite parts of these past two weeks has involved receiving and listening to more than 150 songs that people recorded in a matter of hours, and for no other reason than them wanting to communicate a feeling or an idea. The willingness to share, to participate and to create was inspiring. And the comments people left in regard to the songs were full of generosity and encouragement. Thank you and bravo!
I also loved the fact that on these "pages," via the posts and the subsequent comments and discussion, we seemed to form a genuine -- if temporary -- community. We argued, we supported and we challenged one another. I was honored that so many friends, colleagues and readers contributed time and energy to the project. We talked some about what role community plays in music, now that the notion of community has been expanded to basically mean everywhere. It was reassuring to realize that "everywhere" isn't so diffuse as to render it "nowhere." And, while I prefer the actual and the real to the virtual, the coalescing of so many ideas, opinions and voices on this blog during our end-of-decade coverage felt hefty and tangible. Almost, I dare say, like a modern-day fanzine (minus Kinko's and glue).
So, what now? What's next? And what are my hopes for music in the next decade? They are no different than what I always want: for music to be surprising and unpredictable, and to knock me off my feet.
4:32 PM ET
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11-20-2009
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Here is the final installment of our unscientific, should-not-be-used-for-news-and-reporting-purposes survey results. As you probably know by now, the following answers were culled from a variety of people in the arts, music and entertainments communities.
The last question we asked them was:
How do you think we'll listen to music ten years from now?
Our respondents' answers ranged from silly to philosophical to downright Sci-Fi!
Douglas Wolk, writer:
Mirah, musician:
Jon Cohen, co-Founder FADER Media/Cornerstone:
Lucy Robinson, publicist, Jajaguwar/Secretly Canadian/Dead Oceans:
Isaac Bess, Business Development, IODA Alliance:
Continue reading "The Future of What? Looking Ahead in Music" »
4:03 PM ET
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11-20-2009
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By Jess Gitner
Past covers of Vibe . Chris Brown will be the cover boy for the relanuched Vibe 's first issue. (courtesy of Vibe
Len Burnett helped launch Vibe , a hip-hop music magazine, back in 1993, and he's just launched it again. NPR Music's Frannie Kelley recently spoke with the founder and Co-CEO of Uptown Media Group about Vibe 's dominance then -- and its relevance now -- in the changing landscape of the music industry.
In an exciting time for hip-hop and R&B, the major labels of 1993 were thriving while smaller labels like Bad Boy were just emerging. There was no shortage of hip-hop music and urban culture for Vibe to cover.
But by 1999, the landscape was beginning to change. In spite of hip-hop's popularity, Burnett saw labels cutting back on traditional black-music divisions.
"There was a continued deterioration in the willingness of labels to work artists," he says. "There was a deterioration in the diversity of music within the labels, and there was a sense of getting the most out of a little. Labels were quick to lean on the hardcore hip-hop, the stuff that sold immediately, instead of working the records that had a little more positive energy."
Burnett and Vibe tried to make the best of it, and they succeeded: Vibe held its own as one of the most popular hip-hop magazines on the market. But eventually, the Internet and digital media caught up with them. The traditional models that Vibe , and major record labels, counted on were no longer profitable.
"Record labels not adjusting to and embracing the way people were going to buy music was a signal to me that the industry was not getting it," Burnett says. "Those were signals to me that it was never going to be the same, and that we needed to find ways to adjust and to embrace it rather than fight it."
The job wouldn't be easy, and Vibe experienced some hiccups. Burnett left and returned to Vibe several times before departing for Uptown Media in 2007. In July 2009, the magazine announced that it was closing its doors. News arrived just before what would be Vibe 's 16th anniversary. But Burnett and his company, Uptown Media Group, would not let the Vibe brand die. Instead, they revitalized the product with a new focus on digital media.
"We're looking at our business not like there's a magazine and a Web site. They're one together," he says. "In years past, there were folks that worked on the magazine and folks that worked on the Web site. And rarely did those two meet. We've stripped all those barriers down."
Vibe is back. The first issue will hit newsstands in December. It's been reduced to bi-monthly publication, but Burnett says he isn't worried about the change, and that he's confident the site and magazine will complement one another.
"Let the magazine do what the Web can't do," he says.
Through all the ups and downs, Burnett maintains that Vibe is the one of the most urgent brands in hip-hop today. The music industry is changing, but hip-hop is here to stay. And so, apparently, is Vibe .
3:43 PM ET
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11-20-2009
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By Jace Clayton, a.k.a. DJ /rupture
Jace Clayton, a.k.a. DJ /rupture
(Stefano Giovaninni
A new mix album of mine was released this week. I'm told it is in stores, Google reveals sites in Romania and the Netherlands who've pirated it already, and you can purchase it online, legally, in a variety of digital formats. We've got options. Ethics -- or is that ease-of-use? -- guide music consumers in the 21st century. Full disclosure: The last CD I bought was in Mexico City. It cost me 25 cents and contained about five hours of music as low-quality MP3s.
I grew up in the '90s. Toward the end of that decade, I upgraded to a PC with a CD burner -- amazing! But, as a DJ, I still coveted vinyl LPs, not because they sounded "warmer" or "better" to my ears, but because I could literally get hands-on with them and use the slabs of wax as raw material in a mix session. Pre-MP3 smorgasbord, I would haunt the record shops and tape the radio, getting cassettes via mail order. I learned obscure paths through music -- pre-Google, pre-Blogosphere, before Ms. Internet and Mr. MP3 got married and made us all their children.
A decade, in music, is a terrifyingly long time. Long enough for genres you love to drift out of fashion; for innovative groups to bloom and then wilt into facsimiles of their younger, brighter selves -- if they survive that long. A night at the club may now require babysitters and earplugs. Music is the province of the young. And, due to the increasingly viral nature of music production and idea dissemination, it's constantly speeding up.
Especially this decade, when everything went haywire: More of everything! More musical memory, more forgetting. More rigorous public discussion, MORE ALL-CAPS SHOUTING MATCHES!!! Music found itself simultaneously compressed and dispersed, zipping around digital networks with unprecedented shareability and access. Sounds now move faster than the speed of context. Value imploded; distribution bottlenecks melted into YouTube streams and file-sharing pools. You like late-1970s vinyl from Central Africa, as hoarded by European obsessives? Chances are, a few bloggers out there do, too.
Continue reading "'Free' Music And The Unbuyable Sublime" »
1:40 PM ET
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11-20-2009
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By Frannie Kelley
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11-20-2009
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By Laura Sydell
This is all Americans get of Spotify. (courtesy of Spotify
Back in 2001, I sat in a San Francisco federal courtroom and watched a judge order Napster to shut down. The record companies won their battle against the world's first peer-to-peer file sharing service. But, as everyone now knows, it was a Pyrrhic victory; to reference another Greek myth, Napster turned out to be a Hydra. File-sharing services are a multi-headed beast, so every time the record companies cut one off, two more pop up to take its place. Now, 10 years since Napster's peak, the number of songs traded illegally over the Internet amounts to more than 15 billion tracks a year, according to the online media tracking company Big Champagne.
Arguably, the mistake the industry made back then was being tone-deaf to the needs of its customers. Fans wanted singles and were sick of paying $16 to $20 for a CD with one good song. Instead of finding a way to work with the new technology, the industry tried to stick its head in the sand and sue its customers. It took the labels a long time to offer music in a way that fans were willing to pay for, and even then, it took outsider Steve Jobs to get the ball rolling via iTunes.
One of the most chatted-about models comes from Spotify, a Swedish company offering access to six million songs from major and independent labels. You can listen for free as long as you're willing to put up with a few ads. It caught on quickly in Europe and now claims to have more than six million users. The company has been trying to make money with a higher-level subscription membership that grants access to the music without the ads and gives access on iPhones and Android phones.
But if you visit Spotify's Web site from any computer in the U.S., a message pops up: "Why is Spotify not available in my country?" If you click on the questionm the answer is that you can't get the service because of "licensing restrictions."
Garland says the labels gave Spotify a shot in Europe as an experiment, but that they were wary of a launch in the much more lucrative U.S. market. Spotify, he says, predicted that it would be able to lure a large percentage of its users into paying for higher-level ad-free service. But that hasn't been the case: The company won't reveal the numbers, but fewer than 10 percent subscribe. Unfortunately, the ad model doesn't generate enough revenue to satisfy the labels.
Spotify executives say they're likely to launch in the U.S. early next year. But Garland says they probably won't offer the free ad-based service. Instead, in all likelihood, only the subscription model will be available, downgrading Spotify to just another Rhapsody or revamped Napster.
Even if the ad-sponsored Spotify were to make it to the U.S., many people -- including this reporter -- might find it unsatisfying. I want to own my music, not rent it. I want to store it online and access it from wherever I am, whether I'm in China, France or Cleveland. But the labels don't like his model; they want to charge customers for both purchasing the MP3 file and storing it in the cloud.
Back in 1999, during the height of the dot.com boom, a company called MP3.com tried to offer that service. But, the record labels sued and won. They said that allowing people to listen to their music from anywhere amounted to letting them broadcast it for free. Essentially owning a MP3 file doesn't mean you have the right to play it over any device.
We have been slowly creeping toward a world in which there are easy options to legally download music. But the emphasis is on the word "creeping." When will we have the ability to buy music, store it online and access it from anywhere? "At the rate we're going," Garland says, "I'd predict 2020 or 2025." The last decade has brought a world of change, but it's sounding like the next one is going to move pretty slowly, at least for new music technology.
11:39 AM ET
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11-20-2009
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Look, it's the new version of Conan doing the new version of In The Year 2000! (courtesy of NBC
We want to know what you think about music during the '00s, so we're posing a question every weekday from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20. Then, we'll post and discuss some of the interesting, fun and ridiculous responses.
Nov. 20: How will we listen to music in the next decade? How will we acquire it? What will it sound like?
11:19 AM ET
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11-20-2009
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November 19, 2009
By Michael Katzif
It's never easy to map out an entire decade in music. So, in constructing the "Decade in Music" interactive timeline , we sought to shape it with some of the bigger tent-pole trends, news (Elton John performing with Eminem) and groundbreaking changes in the industry, business and technology (Napster, the iPod). We also wanted to highlight albums (Britney Spears, Danger Mouse, Radiohead) that took a snapshot of the era, as well as deaths (Ray Charles, Johnny Cash) that affected everyone. And, of course, we wanted to include the occasional "wardrobe malfunction" controversy or bizarre curiosity ("Trapped in the Closet") that simply served as a funny bit to remember.
However, it was just the tip of the iceberg; a conversation starter. As soon as we posted the timeline, we started to remember more and more that we should have included. Over these past two weeks of discourse about the decade here at Monitor Mix , countless others have continued to come to mind.
We knew we couldn't fill in every news event, musician's death or notable release (sorry, Modest Mouse, Alan Jackson and Whitney Houston's comeback album), so we asked you for help in filling in the blanks.
Here are some other suggestions we received from the comments here at NPR Music and on Facebook:
-- While we briefly touched upon the musical impact of Sept. 11 tragedy with the Concert for New York City (and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan by mentioning the Dixie Chicks controversy), there were plenty of other songs we could expand to include. Bruce Springsteen's The Rising was a stunning record that encapsulated the feeling of living in a post-Sept. 11 world, as well as composer John Adams' fitting response to Sept. 11 with his piece On the Transmigration of Souls . Then there was Green Day's rock opera American Idiot , which served as a fiery statement about the United States' status in the world, not to mention the spoof musical Team America: World Police and its tongue-in-cheek "America, F--- Yeah!"
Continue reading "The Decade In Music Timeline: What Did We Miss?" »
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11-19-2009
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By Patrick Jarenwattananon
Spectacular flop #3: Kevin Federline. (Mark Davis/Getty Images )
Schadenfreude never seems as sweet as it does when it's directed at the music industry. We fans understand, of course, that the vast majority of those employed by said industry are passionate about what they do. Which makes it all the more fun to see the boneheads among us flounder in the public embarrassment of their worst decisions.
The chief failure of the recording industry this decade, some have written , was its initial decision to treat digital music as an enemy. Rather than find a way to embrace Napster and its 26 million users, the Recording Industry Association of America took legal action against the company, thus only diffusing and intensifying the methods and rate of piracy. With the genie freed from the bottle, the music business is still reeling.
In the shadow of said genie, many attempts have been made to stuff him back in or deal with his power. Some have changed the way we listen, while others have changed employment situations at record labels. With apologies to Perez Hilton Presents, Carly Hennessey (who? ) and dropping the ball on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot , here are four of the top music-industry FAILs of the '00s. Please send us more in the comments below.
1. The Sony BMG Rootkit CDs
The copy-prevention software of Sony BMG, now just Sony Music Entertainment, was eventually classified as spyware by Microsoft. (courtesy of Sony )
Limiting the usage of music files with Digital Rights Management proved to be a FAIL at large for the industry -- iTunes, for one, is entirely free of protected music now. But the most infamous of these failures was the copy protection based on "rootkit" technology on more than 100 CD releases. A rootkit is a software program which messes with the basic code in your computer's operating system, thus allowing viruses or spyware to infect your computer undetected. So not only was Sony's bid at DRM short-sighted, but it was also opening up security vulnerabilities in computers worldwide. (And it was hypocritical: Sony's rootkit developers illegally stole code from the LAME MP3-encoding technology.) When programmers discovered this, it led to several class-action lawsuits, not to mention the exact wrong kind of public attention.
Continue reading "Industry FAIL: Four Musical Mistakes Of The Decade" »
6:03 PM ET
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11-19-2009
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By Frannie Kelley
The writing's on the wall . . . (c r i s/flickr
OK! Here you will find more songs recorded last weekend, in accordance with a very strict set of rules , namely, that each song must include one of these words: Japan, dog, firecracker, NPR or lampshade. This batch includes some that were mistakenly left out of earlier posts. If you're just joining us, part one is here and part two is here .
You're awesome.
5:26 PM ET
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11-19-2009
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By Julie Cafritz (song and essay) & Carrie Brownstein (introduction)
Julie Cafrtiz (right) with bandmate Kim Gordon. (courtesy of Ecstatic Peace )
I asked my friend Julie Cafritz (of Pussy Galore, STP and Free Kitten) if she wanted to write something for our End of the Decade coverage. Her "assignment" was due over the weekend, and when I didn't hear back from her, I figured her work as a teacher, or her kids, or life in general had gotten in the way. Then, today, she sent me this note:
"I decided to take a different tack, intrigued as I was by your song-in-a-day contest. So I recorded a song; actually, Ollie [Julie's son] engineered my session. He decided he didn't like Mommy's music, so he spent most of the time recording me using my iPhone from another room. I then took his recording and recorded my essay over it -- what fit, anyway. It cuts off three-quarters of the way through."
Before I share Julie's song, I wanted to include something else she sent me when I asked her how much time she spends listening to music:
"I have never spent as much time listening to as much music in my entire life as I have in the past six years. I can chalk this up to several factors: 1) Having moved from NYC, I now am part of car culture, which has always been pretty much to my mind the perfect vehicle for listening. I have a good stereo in what is essentially a private soundproof booth on wheels in which to listen to music at ear-splitting volume in a small space -- my preferred listening environment. 2) Yes, music is more available through the Internet; not just to illegally or legally download, which of course I do liberally, but also, I can track down stuff like never before. (I try to patronize my locals, but much of the stuff I'm looking for is early- to mid-'70s English stuff.)
"And, most importantly, although I don't want to minimize the importance of 1 & 2, which are huge, 3) is that, since having my children, I have effectively been under house arrest for the past 11 years, and don't even come up for parole for another 12. As my freedom of movement has been severely limited by the realities of motherhood, I look to music to lift me out of my ennui, connect me to my old life and self, define my identity and generally let me rebel like a bratty teenager locked in her room and listening to her stereo loud. Unlike reading or watching a movie, I can listen to music while doing other stuff. And, yes, I do listen to music with my children. My music, not theirs; well, my music is theirs. They are like Gitmo detainees forced to listen to music all day long, repeated over and over again for months at a time (seriously) at loud volumes. They can take it up with their shrinks later."
And now, for Julie's song essay, "This Is England." As she mentioned, it gets cut off toward the end, so the words at the bottom function as the rest of the essay, in written form.
...after one live show, sometime even before they played their first gig. The NME , Sounds and Melody Maker could hype a different band on a weekly basis, and hype they did. They threw bands big and small at you; so many, you couldn't keep track, and then they would all -- big and small -- disappear, and it didn't matter. After the English press machine were done with you; after everybody owned your record, saw your gig, your face, your T-shirt, they were sick of you, and rightfully so. And it made it almost entirely impossible for a band to remain unscathed, to stay cool.
I still get excited when I get my "hands" on a new record. But I can tell, even while I'm listening and enjoying it that first time, what fatal flaw will relegate it to the dust heap in a week, a month, a year. Things do move quicker now. And it is because of the thing you are listening and reading this on. That computer, this is England.
3:27 PM ET
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11-19-2009
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By Tobi Vail, musician, influential DIY punk zinester, activist and feminist theorist from Olympia, Wash.
Beth Ditto on the cover of NME. (courtesy of NME )
Like countless others, I watched Britney Spears' meltdown in early 2007 with an obsessive eye. What did it mean that her decline had been allowed to get to this point? Princess Diana-style paparazzi filmed her cracking up, and we watched it on YouTube. Clearly, she was losing her grip on reality, and there was a lot of money invested in her career , but maybe something else was happening beyond substance abuse and mental illness.
I found it particularly intriguing that her freak-out was so tied to her image; we watched, glued to our screens, as she said, "I don't want anyone touching me. I'm tired of everyone touching me" and demanded to be allowed to tear out her own hair extensions, bit by bit. When no one would help her, she took clippers and shaved her own head. Obviously, she wasn't in a good frame of mind to be making any kind of decision. But isn't it interesting that, as a female performer, what she wanted control over was her own body; her image?
Beth Ditto, lead singer from queer indie-disco group The Gossip, read this as an act of defiance, saying, "I'm loving it. If you think what her hair meant to her and what it meant to a generation of little girls -- she really did turn out a generation of little Britneys." Ditto concluded, "For this to happen is one of the most radical things ever." She went on to acknowledge that Spears was not in a healthy place, but noted that "it can be amazing and empowering" to get to that point. Any girl who has ever felt tempted to shave her head , or gone for a year or a lifetime without wearing makeup, knows how liberating this can feel, especially when you're young.
All of this brings up the question of how women, and especially female performers, are judged on the basis of looks; how our bodies are mediated by the marketplace. This is true even in indie and underground bands, and is definitely the case in pop music. If the mainstreaming of porn has meant more stripper-dancing in music videos -- starting with heavy metal, moving to hip-hop and and settling in Top 40 --it has also meant that female artists are pressured to become those naked ladies in their own videos. Madonna and Lady Gaga seem to be the rare exception to this rule by opting to comment on objectification as a part of the performance.
While some female performers may experience sexual objectification as empowering, it may not be that simple. As long as we live in a society that uses sex to sell things, this is going to be tricky for women. It might make you feel powerful to look hot in your video, but it also sets a precedent that other female artists will feel a need to live up to (diet, plastic surgery), and it encourages music fans to think of you in terms of your body rather than your work.
While I agree that music is sexual, especially when you can dance to it, I also think that women are in a tough place when it comes to this stuff. A lot of double-standards are at work. As an older female-musician friend of mine pointed out, it isn't necessarily liberating or radical to see women in music using their bodies to sell records. I think this becomes clearer as we get older and are no longer considered attractive. Does this mean that our music is no longer good? No, but it does make it harder to sell.
As long as the music industry focuses on image, women are going to find themselves in a double-bind. Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon recently said, "The idea of women empowering themselves by becoming sexual objects is backward. It seemed brilliant at one point, but it had really bad ramifications. Things lose their context so quickly."
I agree, but what are we supposed to do about it? I tend to think that our best bet is to insist that we are sexy, regardless of whether or not our bodies fit into the narrow, limited ideal for feminine beauty in our culture -- young, tall, thin, light-skinned, European nose, straight hair and so on. This is why it's so awesome to see Beth Ditto (a self-proclaimed fat-positive, queer woman) gain success on her own terms, without dieting or altering the way she looks to cater to a mainstream ideal.
By insisting that she's sexy just the way she is, Ditto demands we acknowledge that there are more kinds of female bodies than just the skinny, weak-looking, classically feminine type. She is strong and curvy and confident. She is powerful and beautiful. On top of that, she isn't interested in men and couldn't care less if they find her attractive. For this -- and because she sings like a punk-rock Aaliyah -- Beth Ditto is my hero. I just hope she's able to make friends with Britney before it's too late.
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11-19-2009
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By Amy Schriefer
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11-19-2009
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by Linda Holmes, NPR blogger for Monkey See
Kelly Clarkson performs on American Idol in 2002. (Kevin Winter/Getty Images
If you've been watching things over at NPR Music, you know that they've just posted their list of The Decade's 50 Most Important Recordings. I recently referred to this feature elsewhere as "NPR Music Whacks The Beehive With A Broom Handle." Because nothing makes people angry quite like lists, and trying to pick 50 recordings over 10 years -- five per year, for non-mathematicians -- leads to unavoidable incompleteness and so forth and so on, and then everybody is mad.
But really, what's most interesting about the discussion they're having in the comments is the entire concept of "importance."
Read the rest of the essay at Monkey See >>
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11-19-2009
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We want to know what you think about music during the '00s, so we're posing a question every weekday from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20. Then, we'll post and discuss some of the interesting, fun and ridiculous responses.
Nov. 19: If the decade could have one theme song for its montage of memorable moments, what would it be?
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11-19-2009
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What is the one song, movement or artist that sums up the decade for you, and why?
Our respondents had a variety of answers, from Kanye West to M.I.A. to Beirut. Please add your own answers in the comments section.
Hutch Harris, musician, The Thermals: The Strokes, Is This It? Really, this is supposed to be the future we're living in? It's pretty fun, but still a little disappointing. Is this it?
James Canty, musician, French Toast, Make Up, Nation of Ulysses:
Jim McGuinn, Program Director, KCMP, The Current, Minnesota Public Radio: In Rainbows project, where this former "major label" band put out its new music virally with virtually no set-up time... Millions heard and had the record in days, and the band made more money than it would have two years earlier. While the music reflected the mash-up culture of post-rock we live in today, combining musical DNA from 40 years of genre-hopping, the business side of the equation showed a new direction and approach that we'll see more of in the future.
Chris Sutton, musician, The Gossip:
Continue reading "Memorable Songs, Artists And Moments: 2000-09" »
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11-19-2009
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November 18, 2009
By Frannie Kelley
How many of these songs were written on a piano? How many on a laptop? (izzyb412/flickr
And the hits keep coming . . . 32 more songs recorded last weekend! The first 30 are here , but if you're not seeing yours, fear not. I've got a few stragglers beginning with A and E coming through tomorrow and all the bands with names beginning with "The" are in parts 4 and 5.
Keep on discussing the songs and the process in the comments. It's heart-warming and encouraging how kind y'all are being to each other.
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11-18-2009
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By Michaelangelo Matos
Indie isn't a genre any more than alternative was, but it denotes something important about the music in its tent -- where it came from, where it might go. (iStockPhoto
In a sense, the word "indie" crept up on the '00s. It didn't stage a hostile takeover on American rock fans the way its kissing cousin, "alternative," did in the '90s. There was no one moment you could point to -- such as 1991, when Lollapalooza and Nirvana ushered in scruffy guitar bands as a legitimate pop phenomenon -- where it staked a claim. Indie was simply always there as a term, as an idea, as an ideal, however nebulous. As the decade churned on, it became even more so.
That's partly because the word it trumped became so heavily identified with its time that it couldn't escape. When you hear "alternative rock," or even "modern rock," you think of the '90s, right? By the '00s, the aesthetic center of modern-rock radio, the format that pushed the post-Lollapalooza sensibility outside of college-radio circles, had slid from Nirvana and Soundgarden all the way down to Creed and Staind. For that reason alone, there's little wonder that those terms eventually exhausted their relevance: More and more, alternative denoted lumbering self-importance, without even tunes to compensate. Indie, by contrast, offers something conceptually fleeter and more flexible, and a lot less prone to macho overproduction, even if a whole lot of it is just as boring.
Continue reading "What's In An Indie?" »
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11-18-2009
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By Oliver Wang
Mainstream R&B radio, retail and video industries never had cause to pay retro-soul much mind until Amy Winehouse demonstrated its commercial potential. (Sean Gallup / Getty Images Entertainment
In the early 1990s, two brothers and some friends in Munich formed the Poets of Rhythm, a band inspired by the "deep funk" sound of late-1960s James Brown, The Meters and similar groups. The Poets wanted to re-create that style so precisely, their 7" singles were often mistaken for being "vintage." The Poets are now recognized as one of the first "retro-soul" groups -- contemporary artists who based their sound around classic R&B styles of the '60s and '70s. Over the next 15 years, a small but global community followed, including Breakestra (L.A.), The Bamboos (Melbourne) and Quantic Soul Orchestra (London), among many others.
To be sure, "retro-soul" is an ill-fitting term (and, notably, very few artists embrace it as a descriptive label), since it refers less to a particular sound than it does a gesture. In other words, retro-soul is partially about bridging past styles into the present; when Sharon Jones shouts, you can hear the lineage of Marva Whitney and Lyn Collins while Helsinki's Nicole Willis and the Soul Investigators capture the verve and spirit of Martha and the Vandellas. Either way, for most of its history, retro-soul was a niche style with a cult following to match. Then came Amy Winehouse.
Continue reading "Soul's Past Stays Present" »
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11-18-2009
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Though reggaeton didn't start in the 2000's, it certainly took over this decade. Tego Calderon is among the genre's best known performers. (courtesy of the artist
We want to know what you think about music during the '00s, so we're posing a question every weekday from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20. Then, we'll post and discuss some of the interesting, fun and ridiculous responses.
Nov. 18: What's your favorite new genre of the decade? Of all the brand-new styles, be they occasionally awkward combinations of influences or wholly-formed means of expression, or genres that hit the mainstream in the past ten years (see this for examples ), which produced the best music?
Tell us in the comments below.
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11-18-2009
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By Lars Gotrich
As soon as a musical movement gets a name, someone is already declaring it dead. Sometimes you wonder about the people who coin the terms; whether they regret the mass categorization of a tight-knit group's creative output. It's almost baffling how quickly "hot new thing" status gets doled out, only to receive backlash, inspire an academic write-up in The New Yorker , experience backlash against the backlash, become loved ironically, and then wind up staunchly defended by those who've been there since the beginning. Because, you know, it's just rock 'n' roll, man.
In terms of mainstream impact, reggaeton crossed over in a major way, while screamo was the clear "new" rock genre of choice (yes, screamo has been around since the '90s; hear me out below), but, dare I say, the decade belonged to a few boroughs in London. An endlessly creative group of producers and MCs constantly looked forward at 140 beats per minute, rethinking electronic music and expanding the definition of street sound.
Below is a dictionary-style introduction to the 10 genres which were either born or blossomed in this decade. If we missed any, let us know in the comments.
Crabcore: Crabcore is defined more by its physical movement than its ironic metal-riff-filled screamo, often punctuated by the occasional techno breakdown. The band members crouch extraordinarily low like crabs, and sway from side to side in rhythm to their crushing failure. Sometimes the band simply runs in place. As a quickly pulled Wikipedia article succinctly put it, "No one understands this move. No one." Key artists: Attack! Attack!, This Romantic Tragedy, Remember Thy Name. See also: Crunkcore.
Example: Attack! Attack!, "Stick Stickley."
Continue reading "Genre Dictionary, 2000-09: From Crabcore To S---gaze" »
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11-18-2009
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By Amy Schriefer
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11-18-2009
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As part of our ongoing end-of-the-decade coverage, we sent out a survey to various people in the music, arts and entertainment communities. Here is another question we asked:
What does "indie" mean to you?
Discuss our respondents' answers and leave your own in the comments section.
Douglas Wolk, writer:
Dorothy Hong, photographer:
Sam Coomes, musician, Quasi:
Megan Holmes, photographer:
David Lester, graphic artist; guitarist, Mecca Normal:
Andrew Kesin, co-owner, Ecstatic Peace Records:
Continue reading "What Does 'Indie' Mean To You? Even More Survey Answers!" »
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11-18-2009
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By Jean Smith, novelist and singer in the literary rock duo Mecca Normal
Rather than present a quasi-factual, semi-amusing trajectory through origins of the word "underground" -- complete with references to the Underground Railroad and the Weather Underground -- I want to open a window into how and why I do things. I invite everyone reading this to compare this to conventional objectives of mainstream bands.
Historically, artists have been put into categories invented by the media, defined by journalists who grapple with language to supply the general public with impressions. Naming groups and movements makes it easier for the media to chronicle versions of history in terms of beginnings, leaders, influences and demise. Beginning a group practically demands that it end, to make room for new groups, new terms, new fashions -- all required to keep selling product.
My band, Mecca Normal is an underground duo of voice and guitar that has never intended to be famous, rich or even liked. In 1985, I started a record label from my fanzine which was sub-titled "A How to Change the World Publication" -- amusing, yes, but I knew that individual voices were important to the process of positive social change. When we put out our first LP, it was promptly called the worst record ever made by a reviewer who added that my guitar player should kill me. Meanwhile, the same city's college-radio station had us at No. 1. Being disliked and appreciated have both contributed to our intensity and longevity.
Listen to "Strong White Male" by Mecca Normal (Oh Yes You Can! 7" on Smarten UP! Records, 1987, K Records CD 1995):
Continue reading "Surviving The Underground: On Making Art And Getting By" »
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11-18-2009
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November 17, 2009
By Lars Gotrich
We coded Web sites with primitive HTML buckets all night, fueled by dorm food and two liters of the latest green, caffeinated abomination. It was a simple Web presence, but it was ours .
And then there's you, Tofu Hut . You haven't changed a bit -- you even kept the Blogspot domain name. And I love that about you.
We've gone back through our catalog of broken images on the Wayback Machine : domain changes, splash pages, ridiculously long blogrolls and low-bitrate Real Players. These were the MP3 blogs, online zines, and other music ephemera that made up our digital scrapbook.
Link your own Wayback Machine memories of old music blog designs in the comments below.
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11-17-2009
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By Carrie Brownstein
Man writing music in the dark with his cell phone. Old school or new school? (blankdots/flickr
As we dissect, pour-over, analyze, celebrate, question, and generally try to make sense of the past decade in music, no matter how many words we read, no matter how many comments we put forth in hopes someone will finally understand our point of view, it all boils down to the music itself.
I truly believe it is our duty to participate in culture, not merely to act as tourists. And while we have spent some amount of time on this blog discussing what forms of active participation are up or down -- and whether this decade has lent itself to one or the other -- I feel confident that when asked, when invited, and when encouraged, people do and will participate.
Last week, in a nod to the increased accessibility and ease of home recording equipment and software, we asked people to record a song in a single weekend . For most, it took a lot less time than that . I am pleased to report that we received over 150 songs!
What I gleaned from the emails that accompanied the submissions was that people participated and engaged in this challenge not because of a monetary incentive, nor because it was a contest with an eventual winner, but because creating music makes them happy. Furthermore, writing and playing provides an opportunity to forge a connection, with one's collaborators, and hopefully, with whomever chooses to listen.
We at NPR Music chose to listen, and we hope you do as well. That's why we plan on unveiling around 30 songs a day until the end of the week. We'll go in alphabetical order (by first name).
Click on the musicians' names to hear the songs
Enjoy! And feel free to discuss them in the comments.
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11-17-2009
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By Lars Gotrich
Today in Song of the Day: Our two-week survey of the decade -- one popular song per year, per weekday -- continues with Gnarls Barkley's 2006 hit "Crazy." (photo courtesy of the artist )
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11-17-2009
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Would you trust a music review by this guy? (iStockPhoto
We want to know what you think about music during the '00s, so we're posing a question every weekday from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20. Then, we'll post and discuss some of the interesting, fun and ridiculous responses.
Nov. 17: What kind of music review do you trust the most? Who, what or where do you turn to for music criticism and recommendations?
Vote in our survey, and share your additional thoughts in the comments below.
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11-17-2009
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By Tom Huizenga
Conductor Marin Alsop (Tracey Brown )
Let's face it, the world of classical music is fairly far off the radar screen for most people in this country. Still, there are huge numbers of passionate classical fans, posting on dozens and dozens of classical blogs and chat rooms, downloading everything from Beethoven to Bang on a Can, and attending operas, symphonies and chamber music concerts.
I asked Anne Midgette, the classical music critic of the Washington Post , to join me for a glance back at the last ten years, to remember the bumps in the road, a few milestone events and the trends that emerged out of a flurry of changes. Here are 10 questions on the state of classical music in the past decade (listen right here and read more after the jump). Let us know what you think, and what we missed...
1) The Recording Industry Implodes: What Happened?
2) Wait A Minute! I'm Marketing My Own Compositions: How Has the Internet Impacted Musicians?
3) Can the Internet Save the Soul of Classical Journalism?
4) The Sound of Music: Are Composers Writing Differently?
6) Pavarotti Is Dead: Does It Matter?
7) Exciting Youngsters: Can They Reignite The Classics?
8) Don't Touch That Dial! Will Classical Radio Survive?
9) A Decade In Transition: Is Classical Music In Better Shape Now?
10) A Classical Crystal Ball: What's In The Future?
Read Midgette's answers after the jump
Continue reading "Ten Questions For A Critic: The State Of Classical Music" »
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11-17-2009
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By Everett True
I'm a tastemaker critic. I lecture in music blogging. The title of my own blog is "The Life of Everett True as a Fading Music Critic," and within it, I feature a pleasingly random array of music discovered via social networks (Facebook, Twitter, MySpace) and the odd record-company freebie. There are plenty of links and shoutouts for others operating in similar networks. We're talking Town Bike, Las Kellies, Hello Cuca! , Super Wild Horses, Monster Women, Kitchen's Floor , Blank Realm, Pens . Don't feel bad if you don't recognize these names; that's what hypertext is for. The bands aren't there to prove my credentials. They're there because I like them. Much of the music featured on my blog is old, but new to me -- calypso and Cuban doo-wop, bluebeat, ska and rare female soul -- increasingly so, the more I distance myself from the mainstream (television and the U.S.).
On the blog, I mostly refuse to engage in dialogue with the music itself, because I feel blogging as a critical form does not lend itself to insight. Blogging feels more like a gateway, with immediacy, currency and discovery being the keywords. Also, I'm not being paid to write my blog. I write it because I still have the urge to dance and f--- the world whenever I hear new music I love , and I've never enjoyed embarking on discussion to the detriment of music.
Simon Reynolds recently wrote , "A lot of talk on the blogs, forums, etc., involves trading information, pointing out pleasures, the mutual burble of delight. It's in the spirit of Everett True's remark, 'I don't need to know why something is good; I just need to be told what is good and where it is.' And that is totally fine, a useful activity for fans who share tastes and assumptions; I engage in it myself. I would call it sub-critical, not as a dis but as an accurate description."
Simon is correct. I'm a sub-critic. I constantly refuse to step up to the plate and treat the mainstream with anything like the respect it thinks it deserves . Constantly . I prefer to choose my own paths, my own friends, my own Ways Of Listening. The music industry is only interesting to me as a model of How Not To Behave. That quote Simon references, it's taken from a fanzine I wrote 25 years ago, but it still holds true. You need to be careful not to be overly seduced by the power of your own words. (Although you should always believe in the power of your own words.) You need to remember why people read you -- for the voyage of discovery, for the music itself.
I'm not an author. I'm not a journalist.
I'm Everett True, and in certain parts of the world, I'm considered an institution.
Here's a link to the most powerful blog entry I've written . Within 24 hours, it had spawned 740 online news stories, and forced all camps concerned to issue furious denials (mendacious, in one notable case ). I also had the bonus of a warning letter from Dave Grohl's management. Did this have anything to do with music criticism or tastemaking? No. It was just a few well-chosen words in the right place (Twitter). It was a good example of the power of social networks, but not of the individual in Web 2.0 environments. And therein lies the rub...
Can a critic without a power base (a magazine, a "recognized" Web site), and hence without an audience, call himself a tastemaker? Some academics argue that music criticism is a dialogue between writer and reader, a performance. Is a performance still valid if there is no one there to witness it?
Does what I write have any impact upon an industry that has long since shed the need for dependency upon indeterminate outside factors such as quality? What need is there for tastemaker critics -- they'd be called "experts" in other trades -- when you can aggregate opinions from a thousand enthusiastic voices (bloggers)? What need is there for a music critic when you can log on to Amazon and read a thousand user-generated reviews?
Right now, from where I'm sitting: none whatsoever. Other critics might argue otherwise. But then, they're being paid to.
Everett True is a former editor of Melody Maker, VOX, Careless Talks Costs Lives and Plan B in the U.K. He has written for more rock publications than most people can name. He is the author of several books on rock music featuring Nirvana, Ramones, White Stripes and others, and was a key writer covering the rise of Nirvana and the Seattle scene in the early '90s. Nick Cave described one of his live performances as "more entertaining than Nina Simone," while Karen O from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs called him "the coolest man in England." The Gossip's members say he's the most important music critic of their generation. Everett True is currently a Ph.D. student at Queensland University of Technology, where he also teaches music blogging.
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11-17-2009
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November 16, 2009
By Eric Garland, founder and CEO of BigChampagne Media Measurement
In 2007, Radiohead no longer had a contract with its record company, EMI, and was about to release its seventh full-length album, In Rainbows . For its first new release in four years, one of the world's biggest bands would have no major-label representation.
In Rainbows was first released on Oct. 10, 2007, as a digital download from the band's Web site. Fans were encouraged to "pay what you wish" -- even nothing -- and a "digital tip jar" was set up to collect voluntary payments. On Dec. 4 of that same year, an $80 deluxe box set was made available to order online; finally, on Jan. 1, the physical CD and digital album hit retailers.
Those are the facts. But what did "the Radiohead experiment," as it would come to be known, mean?
Continue reading "The 'In Rainbows' Experiment: Did It Work?" »
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11-16-2009
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By Omar L. Gallaga, NPR's All Tech Considered Blog
Remember how amazing it was, way back in 1999, to type the name of a song or artist into Napster and have instant access to a song? Remember how un-amazing it was to wait for it to download over a poky dial-up connection?
It makes sense that music was the first chunk of traditional media to really tumble down in the face of online digital distribution. Songs, already broken down into 1s and 0s for CDs, were easy to digitize (unlike books), small enough in file size to distribute widely and quickly (unlike movies) and just expensive enough to make it worth the trouble. (Remember $18.99 CDs? Dark days.)
In 10 short years, though, we've gone from illegal, fleeting online files to robust, well-populated music services like iTunes, Amazon MP3 and Rhapsody. Even Napster, defanged, fell in line and still survives with a monthly subscription service. Along the way, hundreds of start-ups have tried to tame the online music world, either by corralling it into a social-media site, making music search easier or appealing directly to fans and artists. Most have had little success; there's a long trail of interesting ideas that were shut down over licensing issues, or that couldn't translate musical notes into dollar bills.
Think you've heard of them all? Test your online music-business knowledge with our quiz. It features a mix of past and present digital music services and some fakes we concocted (although they may be already in development--who knows?).
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11-16-2009
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The folks over at All Songs Considered have posted their list for the 50 most important recordings of the decade . A lot of people helped put it all together. And while we didn't agree on all the picks, we did agree it was one of the best decades ever for music. Check it out and tell us what you think.
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11-16-2009
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The survey continues!
Here's another question we sent out to various people in the music, arts and entertainment communities:
What is the most effective thing a band or label can do to make you listen to their music?
Whether it's word of mouth, seeing a band live or stumbling upon an artist's YouTube video, most everyone agrees that the best way to be heard is to be good . Read what our respondents said and feel free to share what gets you to check out new music.
Chris Lyons, musician, The Carrots: Isaac Bess, Business Development, IODA Alliance:
Douglas Wolk, writer:
Andrew Leland, managing editor, Believer Magazine:
Continue reading "What Gets Us Out The Door, Onto The Floor, And To The Record Store?" »
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11-16-2009
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By Stephen Thompson
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11-16-2009
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By Carrie Brownstein
Visual representation of our illustrious roundtable participants today.
Last week, I had the opportunity to chat -- and, by chat, I mean "chat via the Internet" -- with a handful of independent record labels' owners and managers. I wanted to discuss the role of the label in a time when fewer people seem to know or care what labels their favorite musicians or bands are on. Furthermore, and perhaps this has always been true, we may not even know what exactly a label does .
At the beginning of this decade, record labels were still a way of indexing artists; of positioning them within a community, a scene and a movement. Throughout our end-of-the-decade coverage, one reccurring theme is whether context still matters. After all, one of the most glorious (if not overwhelming) changes to take place in the last 10 years is how much music is available to us, and from everywhere.
So, while the notion of community has been broadened and redefined -- we may no longer see record labels as megaphones for towns and the bands therein -- perhaps we still need someone to help curate and make sense of the music out there. Personally, I still turn to certain labels as a means of filtration.
And, while plenty of musicians have acrimonious relationships with their labels, just as many do not. Musicians still choose to work with specific labels because they are aware of their history and want to be part of a tangible community of people and supporters.
While music fans have reaped endless and copious rewards in the last 10 years -- in the form of non-stop music, almost too much from which to choose -- labels have struggled to keep up with ever-changing technologies, attitudes and means of communication. Fortunately, many indie labels have thrived because their bottom line, though still reliant upon monetary solvency, has been about bucking the fleeting musical trends and instead putting out music that's lasting and exciting. Most importantly, these labels put out music that they love, in the hopes that at least a few of us will catch on.
This conversation about labels includes the following people, whom I thank for their participation:
Maggie Vail and Portia Sabin from Kill Rock Stars Matador Merge Saddle Creek Jagjaguwar /Secretly Canadian /Dead Oceans
Unfortunately, Laura Ballance from Merge and Jonathan Poneman from Sub Pop were not able to participate in the discussion, which continues below:
Continue reading "Roundtable Discussion: The Role Of The Record Label" »
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11-16-2009
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What can the music business do for this kid? iStock
We want to know what you think about music during the '00s, so we're posing a question every weekday from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20. Then, we'll post and discuss some of the interesting, fun and ridiculous responses.
Nov. 16: What advice do you have for the music business? What can they do to get you to discover and buy more music?
Share your thoughts below.
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11-16-2009
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Sadly, the weekend is over.
With hopes that everyone who wanted to turn in a song was able to, we are no longer accepting entries for the Record A Song This Weekend extravaganza. We already extended the deadline for those of you who had trouble sending in submissions on account of an over-full email inbox.
The amazing news is: We received over 150 songs! We can't wait to share them all.
Soon...
Lastly, thank you!
(If you missed the deadline but you still have a song you'd like to share, please put a link to it in the comments section once we put up the MP3s.)
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11-16-2009
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November 13, 2009
By Carrie Brownstein
As beardy indie-folk takes over, is rock losing its edge? (Getty/Fergus McDonald)
In terms of rock music, the first half of the '00s was marked by mostly gutless post-punk new-wave rip-offs (like The Bravery and The Killers), who borrowed the sound of the late '70s and early '80s but none of the fire, angularity, discord, ingenuity or politics. Some of the tunes bordered on danceable -- and a few were catchy, for sure -- but most listeners found nothing revelatory or lasting in those songs. Personally, I was insulted by the idea that these bands thought an audience wouldn't know any better, that some eyeliner and a flange pedal could make up for passion.
My own band was still playing music during this time. I remember going to Coachella and playing songs from our album The Woods . The tunes on that record were abrasive and scary, full of imbalance and uncertainty. But instead playing rock that day, I felt like we were throwing them. Rock music should be unapologetic, but looking out at the audience, I wanted to hand out earplugs and say, "I'm so sorry."
Then I saw Sufjan Stevens. I had yet to hear his album, Illinois , but I knew change was in the air. I saw Stevens at the Aladdin Theatre in Portland. The show was sold out; the crowd hung on his very word, laughed, held hands, felt okay about the world. His songs were literary, beautiful and melodic. He filled the stage with costumes, kitsch, cuteness and warmth. There was a lot of wit and heart to Stevens' music, but no bite. Yet toothlessness was where we seemed to be headed in indie rock; a soft, safe gumminess.
What followed -- at least in the world of indie music (and I use the term "indie" loosely and for lack of a better term) -- was the rise in popularity of mostly bearded men making very sensitive music: Fleet Foxes, Andrew Bird, Bon Iver, Devendra Banhart, Beirut, Girls, Grizzly Bear, The Dodos, Iron & Wine, and so forth and so on.
Women in indie rock were for the most part right there with them. Though beardless, from Feist to Regina Spektor, the trend was to assuage.
Though I enjoyed many a song by all of the aforementioned artists, the terms I'd use to describe their music are ones I wouldn't wish on my enemies: pleasant and nice.
So how and why did we go the way of the figurative beard? I'll be the first to admit that I, too, like many others, went that way. Actually, I went the way of Bon Iver. Here's what I wrote about Bon Iver on this very blog: "[His] songs are delicate but they are not soft; the comfort in them is fleeting, their beauty uneven. In the live setting the songs are wilder, they screech and veer towards chaos before closing in on themselves. [Justin] Vernon's voice is part songbird, part howl, and it is fearless."
Just so you know, I don't think heaviness is reliant upon volume. (In addition to Bon Iver, listen to Anne Briggs or Judee Sill for more evidence of that.) And, for certain, there were signs of fierceness in music this past decade; I just don't think it was in rock music. (Read Tobi Vail's excellent essay for the standouts in punk, rap and R&B -- and, most importantly, from artists who defied categorization.)
Yes, there was Andrew W.K., Jay Reatard, The Gossip, The Thermals, The White Stripes and The Black Keys -- and plenty of awesome, more obscure bands that still tore into their guitars, unearthing exciting and misshapen sounds, from Deerhunter to Explode into Colors to Black Mountain.
But there was also The Darkness, which was perhaps the last sad gasp of pseudo-mainstream rock 'n' roll. Lambasting us with full-blown irony, it gutted nostalgia for all it was worth; strangely, people seemed to like it. What they also inadvertently did -- and perhaps this isn't a bad thing -- was glorify and expose all of the ridiculous, alienating and sexist elements to rock music. No wonder we needed a break, both from bands like The Darkness and from the insincere miming of those late-'70s/'80s throwback bands. What we needed was a gentle sonic hand to hold.
Yet while indie music and its protectors and cheerleaders were touting all that didn't rock this past decade, a whole new slew of kids -- including tons of girls -- were learning how to play it. Whether at the Rock 'n' Roll Camp For Girls or Paul Green's School of Rock, tweens and teens were given a free pass to shred and rip it up. They weren't afraid of volume, ugliness or bombast. They learned songs -- or wrote their own original songs -- that embodied and spoke to our fears, to the unknown; songs that weren't just about making us feel better. I, for one, can't wait for the next wave of bands.
What we need is more contemporary rock music that addresses or mirrors the chaos, the gray areas and the uneasiness. Just go listen to The Stooges or Bikini Kill for a second to remember what that sounds like. I enjoy sweet songs as much as the next person, but I'm tired of passive music that allows us to merely sit back. I want music that makes me sit up. Personally, I think it's time to shave the beard and risk getting a cut or two.
5:10 PM ET
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11-13-2009
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By Amy Schriefer
Today in Song of the Day: Our two-week survey of the decade -- one popular song per year, per weekday -- continues with Britney Spears' 2004 hit "Toxic." (photo courtesy of the artist )
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11-13-2009
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Stevie at age 13. Can you do better than him? (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
While we may not agree as to whether new recording technology makes music better or worse (see Douglas Wolk's fantastic essay ), I think we'd all be willing to admit that technology has made making music a whole lot easier, cheaper and more accessible. We can be more agile, impulsive, nimble, reactionary and spontaneous than ever before. Right? Well, that's the idea anyway.
So let's try!
Here at NPR Music, we could have given you a mere 24 hours to do this, but we'll be generous and allow you the entire weekend in which to record an original song.
Here are the rules:
Your song needs to include one of the following words:
dog
Your song can be any genre or length.
Please include the name of the song and how you'd like to be credited. Send your songs to:
monitormix@npr.org
All songs are due by this Sunday, Nov. 15, at 8 p.m. ET.
We'll feature the songs next week as part of our continuing Decade In Music coverage.
Thanks, and have fun!
11:50 AM ET
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11-13-2009
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Thurston Moore. (Andrew Kesin)
Thurston Moore is a musician who, aside from being in the legendary band Sonic Youth, has collaborated with everyone from Glenn Branca to Lydia Lunch to Mike Watt. Moore is also a writer, poet, ardent supporter of bold weirdos and fiery rockers, and owner of Ecstatic Peace Records . It was announced recently that an offshoot of the label -- Ecstatic Peace Library -- will begin publishing art books in 2010.
Sonic Youth became one of my favorite bands in 1991. I saw the group play in Seattle, with Nirvana and STP opening. The whole time I watched Thurston play, I kept thinking: A guitar is the weapon, a guitar is the quill. That same year, on a family trip to Maine, my aunt was so impressed by the cover of SY's record Goo that she bizarrely faxed the artwork to a handful of friends. Sonic Youth had broken through to my relatives, and its music made me feel audacious enough to begin my own process of breaking away.
The dozen or so times that I've been fortunate enough to see Moore play music -- either with SY or solo -- it's been all angles and attack, beauty and restlessness. I always leave feeling inspired.
This interview took place over email.
CARRIE BROWNSTEIN : Does the end of this decade feel important, or like nothing at all? If it does feel different, how does it feel different than the culmination of other decades?
THURSTON MOORE : I don't even think of the 2000s or whatever it's called as a specific decade, really. The decades of the last century each had such significant cultural developments, I feel like there's some kind of worldwide exhaustion to event-charged identity. But regardless of that, I do feel like this past decade was really the birth of Internet culture, as lousy as that sounds. Everything everyone does in communication, music, art, literature and activism is part and parcel to the Internet. That's undeniably big. I think the overall sense is that it is still nascent, and that the forthcoming decades are going to look at this time as "quaint."
CARRIE BROWNSTEIN : What was there before YouTube?
THURSTON MOORE : What was there before eBay? The effect these instant-gratification systems have on our daily life as consumptive animals is one where the hunter stays home and gets fat so the punk-rock hordes can roll him/her over and make way for killer rock 'n' roll.
Thurston Moore "The Shape Is In A Trance" from Trees Outside The Academy (Ecstatic Peace):
Continue reading "Interview: Thurston Moore Of Sonic Youth" »
9:24 AM ET
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11-13-2009
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By Linda Holmes & Stephen Thompson
The signs of Idolatry. (Getty/Scott Gries)
All week, and all next week, NPR Music is opening a fire hydrant of trenchant analysis covering the last decade in music. So here are NPR's two most devoted viewers of American Idol -- Monkey See blogger Linda Holmes and NPR Music editor Stephen Thompson -- as they carry on a 90-minute chat via Instant Messenger about the show, its rosters of future superstars and forgotten also-rans, and the way Idol both dominated the marketplace and remained utterly subservient to it. (Amazingly, in 3,000-plus words, the name "Simon Cowell" is never uttered.) Once it's over, we promise to return to your regularly scheduled coverage of art and whatnot.
STEPHEN : To get us started, I want to refer back to something Carrie Brownstein said in the All Songs Considered roundtable discussion of the decade in music . We were talking about trends and major moments, and Carrie launched into an indictment of American Idol -- as artless and tasteless and crass -- before offering the show a bit of backhanded praise. She essentially said that it's given musicians something to react to; something to push against.
While that may or may not be true -- I don't entirely agree that the show has had that effect on a mass scale -- I'd focus on a different side of her point. In all of popular culture, the last 25 or so years have brought about a kind of Big Bang, wherein a handful of entertainment options have exploded into a zillion ways in which we enjoy music or watch TV or read opinions or whatever. And one thing we've lost in that boom -- for example, going from three networks to many dozens, counting cable, plus the Internet -- is a sense of broadly shared pop-cultural experience; a sense that if you go to work in the morning, you and your coworkers have all experienced the same entertainment the night before.
I'm just not compelled to judge American Idol as some sort of machine against which we should all rage. I love the fact that I'm watching it at the same time as tens of millions of other people, and that we're all taking sides, forming rooting interests, critiquing every note, rolling our eyes, and speculating (wildly and unfairly) about which weapons-grade pharmaceuticals a certain judge seemed to have ingested earlier in the evening. We're not always on American Idol 's side -- for many, the sport lies in exposing the fakery; in untangling what often appears to be a web of greedy and underhanded conspiracies for or against certain contestants -- and that, too, is part of the fun.
So... I'm not getting any closer to a question to get this thing started, am I? Linda, please expound on your crackpot American Idol theories. I hear you're still smarting from the early ouster of season one crooner Charles Grigsby.
LINDA : It was pretty hard on me, yes. First of all, I entirely share your sense that it works best as a giant common conversation, even if it is a giant common conversation about something rather silly. Honestly, that's much of what sports fandom is to me, if you will forgive the comparison.
STEPHEN : No, I think that's fair. It's like... okay, when I lived in Wisconsin, most of the people I worked with loved the Green Bay Packers, as did/do I. The morning after the game, there was sort of a sense that everyone in the office could, at any time, strike up a conversation about how the game went. American Idol is like that, a little bit, and I find that very comforting as someone who likes a little banter in my life.
LINDA : Absolutely. There's something to be said for everybody having the same dweebs in their living room.
STEPHEN : And if the music is bad, and it usually is, that's totally fine. I mean, if there's one thing that's a quicker conversation-starter than rooting for a winning team, it's rooting for a losing team, if we may extend and further batter this metaphor.
LINDA : I also think it's a tiny bit unfair to sum up Idol by playing Taylor Hicks, who is its giant, looming miserable failure.
STEPHEN : Well, exactly. CARRIE BROWNSTEIN IS UNFAIR. And, if I may even go so far as to defend poor Taylor Hicks, he was woefully mismanaged in the aftermath of his season five victory. When your persona revolves around being the zany guy who yelps and jumps around, don't scowl on your first album cover as if you've just guzzled two-month-old milk.
LINDA : Oh, Lord. Well, and again, it's an interesting conversation to have, whether or not Taylor Hicks is interesting. He was probably the most juggernaut-y contestant they ever had during the season who actually went on to win. There's a disconnect there as far as enthusiasm translating into record sales, and just from a cynical standpoint, that's interesting.
Continue reading "And Now, For A Long Discussion Of 'American Idol'" »
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11-13-2009
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November 12, 2009
By Douglas Wolk
Want to hear a really sloppy record? It's a good song, but the recording's a mess. The drums consistently drag the rhythm; the bass player isn't quite sure how his part is supposed to go. If you listen carefully to the end of the second verse (around the 48-second mark in this video), the whole band gets lost for a moment and ends up adding an extra beat by accident.
It is, of course, The Beatles' "Rain," as great a rock recording as anyone's ever made. And it's full of mistakes, accidents and inconsistencies that would be utterly unacceptable by the pop-music standards of 2009.
Continue reading "The Death Of Mistakes Means The Death Of Rock" »
5:37 PM ET
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11-12-2009
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By Frannie Kelley
Today in Song of the Day: Our two-week survey of the decade -- one popular song per year, per weekday -- continues with 50 Cent's 2003 hit "In Da Club." (photo courtesy of the artist )
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11-12-2009
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By Tobi Vail, musician , influential DIY punk zinester, activist and feminist theorist from Olympia, Wash. To read more of her writing, check out Jigsaw Underground.
Tobi Vail. ((photo by Joaquin de la Puente))
At the end of the '90s, I got excited when I realized that young girls no longer needed to hang out with creepy record-collector guys in order to find out about cool music. Information was out there for everyone to access equally via the Internet. Knowledge about obscure records could no longer be hoarded and used as power. Previously out-of-print gems in the punk-girl canon -- such as Dolly Mixture's Demonstration Tapes , The Raincoats' first record and the Teenage Jesus and the Jerks discography -- had all been reissued on CD. Maybe we could stop flirting for mix tapes and just go to the record store without having to make nice to the know-it-all guy behind the counter who didn't treat us with respect.
Dolly Mixture "Step Close Now"
I asked a younger friend of mine if he thought the Internet had eliminated the hierarchy of "cool," and he said, "Instead of hanging out with annoying record-collector guys, kids today just read that guy's blog, but the same guys still get to decide what's considered cool." I think he's right regarding hipster culture, where there does seem to be a handful of male-dominated music sites that exert a disproportionate influence over what's trendy. But women have thrived in the past 10 years, and our history is being documented and preserved like never before.
Continue reading "Swagger Like Us: Thoughts on Women in Music, 2000-09" »
11:49 AM ET
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11-12-2009
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Holding up an iPhone at a show? Not cool.
We want to know what you think about music during the '00s, so we're posing a question every weekday from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20. Then, we'll post and discuss some of the interesting, fun and ridiculous responses.
Nov. 12: How has the decade made fans more obnoxious at concerts? Share your horror stories of viewing an entire show through someone's cell phone screen, getting yelled at for crashing the taper section, or being guilted into buying merch because you downloaded the album for free.
Share your stories below.
10:02 AM ET
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11-12-2009
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A very excited fan. (Flickr, The Advanced Guard)
More results from the survey we sent out to a variety of folks in the music, arts and entertainment communities!
Here was the question: How much physical evidence of your music fandom have you shed in the past decade? How much have you collected?
Lance Bangs, filmmaker, director:
David Scheid, tour manager:
Slim Moon, Shotclock Management; founder, Kill Rockstars:
Kathy Foster, musician, The Thermals: I don't collect or display posters so much anymore. I don't buy band shirts so much, but then, I usually get a lot for free from my friends' bands. But I still buy vinyl and CDs -- not quite so much as I used to, but a fair amount.
Isaac Bess, Business Development, IODA Alliance :
James Canty, musician, French Toast, Make Up, Nation of Ulysses:
Continue reading "Signs Of Music Fandom: Shrinking Or Growing?" »
9:43 AM ET
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11-12-2009
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November 11, 2009
By Linda Holmes, blogger, NPR's Monkey See
There's no way to sum up the musical culture of the decade without touching upon the fact that musicians are turning themselves into brands more aggressively than ever before. It's no longer enough to be a singer. You must make dresses. You must make perfume. You must make hats and booze.
So here, in no particular order, are a dozen of the most notable celebrity products that have been launched or have blossomed in the last 10 years. Just in time for holiday shopping!
1. Reba McEntire's Studded Pants (line launched 2005) brown cords , which may be more easily identifiable as Country Pants Of The '70s, would not be the right product for many musicians. They are, however, perfectly acceptable for Reba McEntire, who sells her line of clothing at Dillard's stores across the land. If you are thinking that there might be leather involved, and thus complicated care instructions, read the fine print: "Of polyester."
2. Sean Combs' Earflap Hat (Sean John line launched 1998) earflap hat is available right now . It's safe to say that this will make you the envy of your entire cartoon hunting party.
3. Mariah Carey's "Forever" Fragrance (launched 2009) Forever is the most sensual. How can you tell? Because the word "sensual"/"sensuality" appears twice in the fragrance's two-sentence description, while not appearing at all in the descriptions of her "M By Mariah" and "Luscious Pink" brands. (Though, in fairness, the description of the "M By Mariah" fragrance states that it "opens with an indulgent, creamy accord," and while we are not sure what that an "indulgent, creamy accord" is, it certainly sounds sensual, unless it is something that would be reached at an unusually friendly round of peace talks.)
4. Scott Weiland's Blue Shirt With Embroidered Flowers (launched 2009) blue shirt . If you have blue-shirt needs, this blue shirt is sure to satisfy them as only a blue shirt can, and if your blue-shirt needs include embroidered flowers "derived from rock decadence," look no further. If you do not have blue-shirt needs, but you do have being-beaten-up needs, consider this vest .
Continue reading "A Tour Of Musician-Endorsed Products" »
4:18 PM ET
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11-11-2009
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By Lars Gotrich
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11-11-2009
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In December 2008, Diddy and CIROC Vodka distributed thousands of debit cards, valued up to $15, in NYC taxi cabs. Did you get one?
We want to know what you think about music during the '00s, so we're posing a question every weekday from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20. Then, we'll post and discuss some of the interesting, fun and ridiculous responses.
Nov. 11: If most musicians and composers are struggling to just pay the bills these days, is anyone a sellout anymore? Where's the line now? Read Carrie's essay on the topic . It may change your answer.
Share your thoughts in the comments below.
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11-11-2009
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by Carrie Brownstein
Britney Spears and the tightrope artists walk between surviving and selling out. OK, so maybe Spears doesn't actually walk this metaphorical tightrope..." (courtesy of the artist )
Is it even possible for an artist to sell out anymore? Before you answer "No!" -- or mention that the last five bands you discovered were from commercials -- read on.
I'm going to begin this essay with a note that Jean Smith sent me. Jean Smith is a novelist and singer in the literary rock duo Mecca Normal . I asked her about the notion of an underground, what the term "indie" means, and about the state of music in general. Here is her reply:
"Underground" refers to music that has a different purpose and orientation than mainstream bands. Keeping underground as an ongoing description illuminates that there is an under to the over -- a distinction that implies motivations other than money and fame. To reduce underground to a description of current trends diminishes its potential power. I guess there are now indie bands on major labels, diluting the reason there were indie bands. Indie is now a genre, where previously it was a stance. Maybe we'll have "undie" bands in the mainstream, and the history of underground culture will fade like the history of the word indie continues to fade. People who hear it and use it forget that it meant independent from major labels. Now, indie is mostly a description of a sound, like alternative is a description of a sound rather than an alternative to how the music industry operates.
Alternative was a description of the way bands operated: putting on shows, working with a label to get your music out as opposed to being a rock star on a major label with staff to handle such details. Both these terms -- indie and alternative -- have been assigned new meanings that relate to the descriptions of the sounds associated with them. I'm sure if there were "undie" bands, it would almost immediately turn into something to do with underwear. Bands would play in their underwear. Calvin Klein would start making music videos in its newly formed record-label division. The history and meaning of underground culture would no longer be there when the word "undie" is used. I don't believe people think about independent culture, independent from major labels and corporate concerns, when they hear the word indie. Grunge is a sound and a look -- perhaps a city and a handful of bands. Indie is a political stance whose history is being replaced by a sound, a look and an era.
MySpace is like the poster, the newspaper article, the radio. When this tool appeared, it was not a corporate enterprise, and that is perhaps more significant than whether using it compromises any perceived indie or underground status. The speed with which independently created tools are absorbed to function as corporate methods is disturbing.
I was recently at a music festival modeled on indie ethics, presenting my lecture "How Art & Music Can Change the World," and I stopped to talk to two young guys in suits. The guys informed me that licensing my music for use in ads and movies no longer had a negative stigma. They told me that it was all okay now to be doing business with corporate America -- evidently, all was forgiven; everything had changed. I was being brought up to speed as if no one had told Old Lady Smith that it was okay to shill for Coke or Nike. It is arrogant to be that ignorant of the intentions of work done by past generations, to deem constructive content as consumer-available entertainment, denuding it of its original power by willfully ignoring its most important component: intention.
Why is intentionality being ignored? I would imagine it has something to do with the fact that music has been largely stripped of its context. As exciting, democratizing and demystifying as a more global and decentralized music industry is, this bottomless sonic stew also means that we've largely divorced artists from place, history and physicality.
Furthermore, the very notions of bottomless, endless, everywhere and everything have no accountability. Why? Because as music fans -- as consumers -- there is nothing more appealing than something that is boundless. Therefore, we don't really care what an artist's intention is as long as his or her product is accessible to us. And corporations and their commercials are often the ones bringing the songs to us, curating our experience and our means of exposure, or giving our favorite musicians the most money, so that they can continue making the music that we love.
And even when this whole process does begin to sound incredibly sad and crass, it again boils down to the way technology can flatten and desensitize our experiences. I love my iPod and iTunes as much as the next person -- I am floored that I can listen to a Betty Davis track followed by The Damned, which is then followed by Alemayehu Ashete -- but while those devices might cohere all of my varied musical tastes, they also render context invisible.
So, while we might be irked that our favorite band has sold a song to VW or McDonald's, we can instantly decontextualize and remove that song from its annoying commercial counterpart. When we don't buy full albums anyway, when we don't care about album sequence (which is all about intention) or look at the band's artwork or the label they're on (again, all intentional decisions), and when all of the songs we want are free-floating in the ether untethered, then advertisements aren't a source or means of "selling out." Instead, they're the new radio.
So, is it possible for a musician or band to sell out anymore? Probably. I think the bigger question is, why do we no longer care?
10:39 AM ET
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11-11-2009
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November 10, 2009
Seriously, we're so excited. (Getty Images )
Here's another end-of-the-decade question that we sent out to a varied list of people in the arts, music and entertainment communities.
WHAT MAKES YOU FEEL RELIEVED, CONTENT OR EXCITED ABOUT THE CURRENT STATE OF MUSIC?
But don't just take their word for it, what are you excited about? Please leave your thoughts in the comments section below.
Alex Cohen, host, All Things Considered on KPCC; contributor, NPR's Song of the Day:
Rachel Blumberg, drummer extraordinaire:
Jon Cohen, co-founder, FADER Media/Cornerstone:
Dorothy Hong, photographer:
Continue reading "We're So Excited! More Music Survey Answers!" »
9:36 PM ET
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11-10-2009
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Maybe this is the easiest way to make sure your cash goes straight to the person who made it. (Getty Images, Lew Robertson )
Last week, Eliot Van Buskirk, columnist and blogger at Wired , and Jay Sweet, Paste magazine's editor at large, got together in a chat room (so '90s!) to talk about paying for music now. After a technological stumble involving the revelation of exactly two embarrassing AIM names, they proceeded to drop bombs on the majors (they are the only industry I can think of that openly scorns, disrespects and tries to fleece their audience at every turn ; in many ways, artists would be better off getting a straight loan from a bank ), dispense friendly financial advice to musicians (smart bands have great management; great managers have even better accountants ) and argue that a true and loyal fan is far better for a band than any kind of deal (I once flew 12,000 miles round-trip on my own dime to see The Fall ).
Get all the dirt, let us know what you think of the conversation and, please, pose more questions to Jay and Eliot, after the jump.
Continue reading "To Pay Or Not To Pay: Q + A With Eliot Van Buskirk And Jay Sweet" »
5:08 PM ET
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11-10-2009
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The last song I downloaded for free was "It Might Be You" (The Theme From Tootsie) by Stephen Bishop. It's a decent song, but it sounds better in the movie than it does on my stereo. Therefore, I'd say it's value is equal to a medium iced coffee. --Carrie Brownstein
Tell us what you think the last song you bought or downloaded for free was actually worth by sending us a picture of what you would have traded for it. (We're hoping for some new baby pictures here.) Oh, and don't forget to tell us what the song was.
Tag your photos on Flickr to NPR2000 or TwitPic #NPR2000. We'll collect our favorites in slideshows on the blog later in the series.
2:42 PM ET
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11-10-2009
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That's it, circa 2009. At my other house, I've got literally shelves of records and CDs, but right now, in my little studio apartment close to my school, this is all I've got. And it works out just fine. --Oboe panda, via Flickr
Thank you to everyone who has been uploading images of the state of their current music collections at the end of this decade. While some of you have condensed a collection to a small laptop, others are still supporting shelves of vinyl and CDs. Some of you have even found ways for them to co-exist. Check out the slideshow below. Keep tagging your photos on Flickr to NPR2000 or Twitpic #NPR2000. We'll keep featuring them here.
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11-10-2009
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By Michael Katzif
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11-10-2009
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These coins will buy you three songs on iTunes. (Flickr, speedeye )
We want to know what you think about music during the '00s, so we're posing a question every weekday from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20. Then, we'll post and discuss some of the interesting, fun and ridiculous responses.
Nov. 10: What is your excuse for not paying for music?
Share your thoughts below. We'll list our favorite excuses later this week.
9:50 AM ET
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11-10-2009
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November 9, 2009
By Carrie Brownstein
Last week, the NPR Music team, including myself, sent out a series of questions to people in the music, arts and entertainment communities. We wanted to get a sense of people's thoughts and feelings pertaining to the last decade in music, and what their thoughts were about the future.
We'll roll out the questions and a sampling of the answers over the next two weeks.
And, of course, we encourage you to answer these questions yourselves in the comments section below.
3) Since technology has allowed music to be more accessible than ever -- no matter what city or country it stems from -- how do context, community and origin play a role in music?
Continue reading "Listening Survey, Part II" »
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11- 9-2009
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Today, as NPR Music began our exploration of the past 10 years in music, there were more posts on Monitor Mix than ever before. We rolled out a timeline , a slideshow of MP3 players, put up the latest All Songs Considered show , played some 'N Sync (oh, yes, we did!), shared survey results , and got things started with my essay about how we might go about making sense of the past 10 years.
Most of the comments from readers came from our question of the day: Have The Past Decade's Changes In Technology Made The Music Better?
While many agreed that the increased accessibility and availability of music has been a boon for listeners and fans, there was less enthusiasm for what the MP3 has done for sound.
Chris Seigl wrote:
"You can argue for or against the idea that technology has made music more abundant or accessible, but there can be no argument that the MP3 has absolutely made the music SOUND much worse, and could possibly mark the death of hi-fi stereo. You can not cram 2,000 hours of music onto a device the size of a deck of cards and not expect that a few "details" are going to disappear: things like a crisp high-hat cymbal, a sustained bass note, or a whispered vocal. The MP3 cares not for these details, and the EXPERIENCE of listening to music, really listening, is that much poorer for it."
Jack Worthing added:
"I think improvements in technology have definitely made music better, primarily in the way it has enabled the creation and mass distribution of music for many artists that would previously have gone mostly unheard.
"From a listener's perspective, access to music is much easier and more convenient. I find that I'm exposed to a lot of different kinds of music that I'd probably not have otherwise heard.
"The quality of the sound, however, has taken a big hit."
Others commented on how more is not necessarily better.
Nikki Karam:
"I don't know about making the music itself better, but I would have to concede that making the switch from Discman-user to iPod-user in 2002 or so really changed my listening experience for the worse.
"When I traveled or worked all day with my Discman, I had to pre-select all of my music for the day, and that took some thought and consideration. And listening to the same CD or two all day allowed me to absorb what I was hearing to a much higher degree than I did after getting my iPod.
"At first, being an iPod-user turned me into an overloaded, impatient, attention-depleting monster. The freedom of carrying my entire music collection with me wasn't as liberating as I thought it would be. I became obsessed with shuffling: Even when I was enjoying one song, I would often not even wait until it was over before moving to the next song, just to see what would come up next! The quantity of music ended up totally overwhelming the quality of the experience."
Thanks to everyone who shared their thoughts with us today. We'll have a lot more to talk about tomorrow, so please check back. And don't forget to send in photos of what your music collection currently looks like.
6:16 PM ET
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11- 9-2009
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By Carrie Brownstein
Last week, the NPR Music team, including myself, sent out a series of questions to people in the music, arts and entertainment communities. We wanted to get a sense of people's thoughts and feelings pertaining to the last decade in music, and what their thoughts were about the future.
We'll roll out the questions and a sampling of the answers over the next two weeks.
And, of course, we encourage you to answer these questions yourselves in the comments section below.
1) How often do you sit around and listen to recorded music with friends or family? Is it more or less often than you did around the beginning of the decade? On what device or equipment do you listen to most of your music? Do you go to shows more or less often than you did 10 years ago?
Continue reading "Listening Survey, Part I" »
5:01 PM ET
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11- 9-2009
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By Meg Biallas, NPR's All Tech Considered
I grew up in an Apple household during the Great iPod Expansion Era. I remember riding the bus with a friend who played her music on a Rio MP3 player. It looked so foreign to me. It was round, with a soft rubbery layer. I could hardly see the name of song playing on her screen. And where were the white earbuds?
But as the first decade of the 21st century comes to a close, it's important to remember that Apple hasn't been the only game in town. Even before the very first iPod, electronics and audio companies exercised ingenuity to develop handheld audio players, but they didn't always have the smooth, chic look that players have now. We've moved from batteries to USB chargers. Players now feature WiFi access and phone integration. And now, thankfully, we don't have to lug around that case of CDs.
For nostalgia's sake, let's a take a look back at what MP3 players used to look like. Back then, bulk was in, space was small and the price was high.
3:45 PM ET
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11- 9-2009
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If you're like me, you can't remember everything that happened in music over the last 10 years. Was Sisqo's "The Thong Song" really in the same decade as Arcade Fire? The answer to that is yes!
Thankfully, some tech-savvy folks at NPR have made the task of remembering 2000 to '09 a whole lot easier. Click the image below to check out the timeline :
1:32 PM ET
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11- 9-2009
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The latest episode of All Songs Considered features a discussion about the memorable moments, trends, artists, songs and albums that defined the past 10 years in music. Listen to our picks and tell us what you think.
All Songs Considered : The Decade Defined
1:17 PM ET
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11- 9-2009
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Don't the innards of this hard drive look familiar? (iStock )
What does your music collection look like on this day? Is it a single hard drive? Walls of shelving? A garage full of boxes? A stack of freshly pressed vinyl? A pile of dusty, scratched CDs used as coasters?
We want to see your music, so send us a photo.
Tag your photos on Flickr to NPR2000 or TwitPic #NPR2000. We'll collect our favorites in slideshows on the blog later in the series.
12:05 PM ET
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11- 9-2009
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By Stephen Thompson
It's technically a part of this decade, but 'N Sync feels like the product of another era. (courtesy of the artist )
The decades never break as cleanly as the calendar might suggest. The time period people regard as "the '60s" often stretches well into the early '70s, culturally speaking, while the music, fashion and politics of the '80s run from roughly 1982 until the election of Bill Clinton 10 years later. Revisiting 'N Sync's ubiquitous 2000 hit "Bye Bye Bye," it's hard to imagine the song coming from this decade at all: It exists in a shadowy pre-Sept. 11 world in which telegenic boys perform elaborate G-rated dance moves in unison while selling honkloads of CDs to fans who also collect -- and perhaps even play with -- the action figures inspired by those boys' videos.
[Read the rest of this story here , and keep coming back to Song of the Day each weekday between Nov. 9 and Nov. 20. We'll survey the past decade, one year (and one song) at a time, with an emphasis on America's most popular music. The picks don't exactly qualify as musical discoveries, but they do have something to say about the 10 years we're about to leave behind. Song of the Day will return to new music on Monday, Nov. 23.]
11:45 AM ET
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11- 9-2009
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Is this a better music experience? (Courtesy of Apple )
We want to know what you think about music during the '00s, so we're posing a question every weekday from Nov. 9 to Nov. 20. Then, we'll post and discuss some of the interesting, fun and ridiculous responses.
Nov. 9: Today, we're surveying how we listen to music now and exploring how we got here. So we want to know: Have all the changes in technology in the past decade made the music better?
Share your thoughts below.
10:51 AM ET
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11- 9-2009
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By Carrie Brownstein
Jay-Z and Kelly Clarkson (Getty Images )
(Can't remember what actually happened this decade? Relive some of the defining moments with our timeline . It's far from comprehensive, so feel free to tell us what we missed and we'll discuss your suggestions throughout the series.)
When I think of the passing of a decade, I always think of "Do You Remember Rock n' Roll Radio" by the Ramones: "It's the end, the end of the '70s / It's the end, the end of the century," they sang. The words conjure both a yearning for the past and the triumph of completion, as in, "We made it."
Of course, 1980 was technically 20 years away from the end of the 20th century. Perhaps the Ramones were just looking at the big picture, or maybe they knew that the first wave of punk was on its way out (or already over), or maybe they were merely trying to sum up that remarkable decade; how amazing it must have been to reside inside the fiery musical center that was New York City. Yet most of us, the Ramones included, can't be aware of what it is we're inside of, part of or even participating in while it's happening. It's not until we have a few years of perspective that we can make sense of it all.
If there's one major difference between assessing the music of past decades and taking stock of this one -- 2000 to '09 -- it's that we've been assessing, proclaiming, analyzing and chattering about it all along. The discourse surrounding each musical moment has been multitudinous and loud, sometimes louder than the moment itself. Not a single occurrence in music went undocumented or unexplored. Whether on message boards, on blogs and Web sites, via Twitter and Facebook, on YouTube and MySpace, or on digital cameras and cell-phone videos, we saw it all and talked about it. We may have just lived through the most witnessed decade in music history.
We all saw, heard and partook of both the music and the discourse surrounding it. But what was it that we saw? What was it that we heard? And how did we go about hearing it?
Part of my struggle in writing a summation and codifying the past decade is that its moniker poses a linguistic stumbling block. What do we call the past 10 years? Were they the "aughts"? The "tens"? Without a unifying agreed-upon sobriquet, it feels harder to settle upon a cohesive semantic understanding. Or maybe we don't need to. After all, if nothing else, the last 10 years dismantled (or at least chipped away at) the monolithic. New technologies created and nurtured micro-niche and micro-genre tastes. As listeners, we could re-sequence, re-mix, easily download and then just as easily discard, glean knowledge with the touch of a button, collect, compile and explore like crazy.
So perhaps the lexical ambiguity of this decade is a metaphor for the decade itself. Largely nameless, at least for now, its music conflated past and present, messed with genres and identity, and made discovery constant, easy and ever-present. A band or musician could be from anywhere, yet feel like they were from everywhere -- and that's because they all existed in the same somewhere, namely the Internet.
And, of course, our music became ever more portable. But this was nothing like the Walkman or Discman of decades past. Instead, some of us carried our entire music libraries around with us -- in our pockets, purses and backpacks; on subways, on walks, in coffee shops, at school and at the office -- which means that much of our identities, our histories, our stories and our soundtracks were with us everywhere we went.
So, yes, a lot has changed -- for the better, it seems. But inevitably, there are also parts of music, of listening, of experience and of fandom that we've lost along the way. Most of us go to record stores a lot less often, if there's even a record store around. And what about the satisfaction that comes from hard-earned discovery? What happens when the tactile is replaced with the virtual?
Like many of you, I still don't entirely know what to make of the last 10 years in music. But I hope that in the next two weeks, as we explore the past decade, we'll at least gain a better understanding of what it means to have traveled the impossible, futuristic, head-scratching, CD-purging, everything-you-ever-dreamed-of-is-right-in-front-of-you leap between the years 2000 and 2009.
Each day, we'll feature multiple contributors, interviews, interactive features and more. But it's you that we want to hear from most, so please participate.
8:24 AM ET
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11- 9-2009
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