The Beauty of The MP3

[dementio13]

(This is an excerpt from a longer blog I posted at Wordpress.com.)


I don’t buy CDs anymore.

Now, this could be seen as an attempt by me to say “Look how advanced I am technologically”, but far from it.

Its not that I don’t actually buy music anymore, I do. I just prefer to get it in convenient digital packages which take up no space in my living room, I can play immediately and I don’t have to spend hours ripping them onto my Mac in order to listen to them on my ipod.

So, its partly a practical solution.

Once you get over the sentimental and romantic idea that CDs and vinyl are objects to be cherished because you can touch them and look at them on the shelf and say to people (silently, smuggly) “This is my taste, look at my music collection”, it really isn’t a problem.
Of course, if you want to announce your musical taste (and we all do, really), you can do so on Last.fm where people can view your music collection in an instant. The problem with that is: when you secretly play that old Kajagoogoo album that you keep hidden behind all the Finnish Jazz, Swedish pop and Japanese HipHop albums; it isn’t a secret anymore. The Last.fm Big Brother sees all.

Anyway, I digress.

No, the really good thing about the digital music ‘revolution’ (old hat, I know, but it is revolutionary) is that it has enabled any musician with an internet connection to get their music heard. Music sites, MP3s, ipods and social networking have democratised music. Not completely, but mostly.
Labels and distributers still have vast resources to promote and distribute ’signed’ artists’ music, thus getting it played on radio, etc. But people are becoming more used to the idea that good music is good music, whether it be by a signed artist or an unsigned artist. And if its available for free, all the better.

Its at this point that I must confess that my staple listening involves signed, or established artists. But I’m trying to change my listening habits. Some people have already done that themselves. A look at people's (most of you here, actually) playlists on Last.fm attest to that.

Just a thought.......

[Adriana]

For me the attraction of mp3's is their availability. Right now I get to listen to a lot of stuff that isn't available in my country, it needs to be imported from the US or Europe and sometimes it costs more than what I can pay. I've read a lot about the loss of quality of mp3 files, but I agree with the post above: as long as the bitrate is high enough, it isn't that much of a problem for me.

[northcape]

I still like CDs... though I think my habits are slowly shifting, I still don't really trust the computer to keep my whole music collection safe so its nice to have a wall full of hard copies. What is really persuading me to buy more mp3s and less CDs than I have in the past is the environmental aspect rather than anything else, though I do miss CD artwork. I have to admit that the quality issue isn't so much of a factor as long as you listen to high enough bitrate mp3s. 192 or preferably higher is OK for me, anything less and I find the difference in quality easy to notice.
I just hope that the democratisation of music will continue, its still hard in most places for indies to get heard by anyone apart from other artists and the recent changes to last.fm reveal how fragile the opportunities that exist to get heard can be.

[Angus Maiden]

Rock on MP3 defcert! (that's short for definitely certain) man, everything has changed and I'm actually really glad to be part of the first generation to actually grow up with the net. Amazing, it just never ceases to amaze me how easy it is to connect, both socially and musically. I mean, people are, like, listening to my stuff! never would have been possible 20 years ago. Maybe even 10. I'm even studying sound engineering and I honestly don't give a toss about the minute loss of quality of the file format. I still mostly listen to signed artists too simply because they're more exposed, word of mouth about them gets around easier and it's generally easier to find their stuff, even free if you bit-torrent it. But I, too, am naturally changing my listening habits over time to incorporate more independent artists. Most notably the two people in this blog discussion right here: PG and D13!!! Also I recently discovered Suzie Zuzek as you guys will know from my recent last.fm reco. I think part of the reason why I still mostly listen to signed artists though is pure habit. Like, "I just woke up and I need some psy. What's some psy I normally listen to? Oh that's right, Infected Mushroom." Then bam it's on. Or "I need some Satanic theatrics with heavy riffs. What do I normally listen to. Oh that's right Cradle of Filth" Bam it's on. But yea inertia is a bad thing imo I need to be more of an active listener and reach out and discover more stuff, particularly independent stuff. Support the scene as much as the scene supports me. Having said that, on goes Suzie Zuzek. Great Blerg D, cheers :)

[Pixieguts]

Great to see this as I feel like the snotty kid on the block sometimes in discussions about the 'loss of quality' that the digital revolution entails.

Sure mp3 is not currently up to the elite audio standards of CD (I also remember people complaining about CD before there was mp3 to complain about) but, with the massive take up of mp3, it can only get technically better over time.

I also love mp3 for the democratisation you describe and for the way it has opened up music creation so that these days it seems much more of an expression of the lives of real people instead of just the artists who have been put up on pedestals by corporate entities.

On a more personal level, I love mp3 and the whole cyberspace music community for giving me access to an amazing journey with music that I've never previously been able to afford (always been the cliche of the poor artist I'm afraid, lol).

Rock on mp3 I say! :D