There was an interesting article on the BBC News website to celebrate the 30th Anniversary of the Sony Walkman, in which they gave a walkman to a 13-year-old boy who was tasked with comparing it to portable music systems of today. The 13yo, Scott Campbell, said “Another notable feature that the iPod has and the Walkman doesn’t is ‘shuffle’”. I found this point perhaps the most resounding of the article, and which was looked at a bit deeper by Lifehacker in their comments section. Lifehacker said that the ability to shuffle music is “…one of the main benefits of the digital music age”.
My first thought to that was “bullshit”. Sure, all mp3 players have the function. Apple even called their smallest iPod the “Shuffle”. But I, for one, do not use the ability at all. I know my personal mp3 player, a Song Walkman NWZ-E436F for anyone interested, would have a shuffle function. But not only have I never used it, I don’t even know where it is to turn it on. I have always, and will continue, to listen to music in album format, how the artist intended their music to be listened to.
Albums should be seen in their correct light, a way I fear is disappearing due to the growing digital distribution networks where people can pick and choose the tracks they want. An album needs to be seen like a visual artist’s exhibition in a gallery. They have chosen certain pieces and placed them next to each other to make a statement, and to give a certain flow to preceedings, as well as add a layer of context to each individual piece in comparison to those around it.
The use of CD albums as an artistic work has been around for more than twenty years, giving the musician eighty minutes of recording space to work with. Some fill it up completely, others leave it half empty. Before the time of CDs, musicians had a slight restriction to work with, that being the need to split tracks across two (and sometimes more) sides of vinyl. The artists aren’t simply recording songs and leaving it at that. They actively arrange the tracks in a specific way, for a multitude of various reasons.
The shuffle function completely and utterly destroys this. Not only does it create an incoherent listening experience, it totally ignores how the artist intended their music to be heard. Sure, some recordings have what seem at first glance to be “filler”, ambient tracks. But they are there for a reason, normally to create a huge impact when the artist’s normal sound returns.
By shuffling music all the time, to some extent the artists are being ignored, and the listening experience is deprived. I always listen to music as an entire album, and as a result I can become obsessed with a collection of songs. I’d argue that someone who doesn’t listen to entire albums can never develop a true appreciation for music, as they will listen to songs they know, and skip the songs the haven’t listened to or don’t like as much as others. Who loses out in the end?
But then I realised something. I don’t randomise my music, but I do listen to a lot of compilation albums, DJ mixes, and podcasts. On the surface of things, this doesn’t seem much different to shuffling a music collection. Each mix is a collection of music seemingly unrelated, except perhaps by their genre. I would argue fervently that this is completely different to shuffling music.
Perhaps the best way to explain mixes is to use Lego as a metaphor. An album is the Lego set of a fire station, a castle, or a submarine. A mix is created by someone using some of the blocks from the sets, and constructing a new vista, of which can sometimes be more interesting and engaging than the original construction. A mix is an artistic statement, plain and simple.
Compilations can be seen in a similar light. Someone has curated a number of tracks, removed them from their original context, and then given them a new context by putting them next to certain songs. Many compilations have a theme, for instance the record label Honest Jon’s recent The World is Shaking: Cubanismo From the Congo, 1954-55 compilation. Very specific, but the label have managed to provide a brilliant overview of the style of music by placing the tracks into the context of a certain time.
Podcasts are a totally different story, when they are not a “mix”. The best comparison for podcasts are radio shows. The presenter does select the songs they play, but they don’t so much as curate the tracks, as play new releases that highlight the focus of their podcast. The music shown is taken away from the artists’ intended context. But there is still an overriding theme, which the use of a shuffle function completely loses.
However, a lot of bands and artists record songs that are intended to be singles. They are designed to be a stand alone 4 minute artistic statement. In the context of an album of similar sounding music, they might not resonate as strongly than if they are played between “artistic statements” by other musicians. Sometimes, the running order of an album is not always perfect. A track can be placed in a bad position, and may end up getting overlooked.
In a review of Radiohead’s In Rainbows I read (and am unable to locate again), the writer said that their favourite track is “Videotape”, which closes the album. He also stated that it’s such a strong song, it should have been placed higher up in the tracklisting. I understand the point perfectly, but also disagree in this particular case. In Rainbows had been anticipated to almost a fever pitch by more than just Radiohead fans, due to the novel (or revolutionary, depending on how you look at it) distribution method involved. The last line of lyrics in “Videotape” is Thom Yorke singing “today has been the most perfect day”. I ask, for anyone that had been waiting for that album, is there a better last impression to take from it? If the song had been placed somewhere else in the tracklisting, or played separately from the remainder of the album, wouldn’t the sentiment have been completely lost?
So now, I’m going to leave it open. Do you use the shuffle function? Why? Why not? Has the album format been killed due to digital distribution and the existence of a shuffle function? Are mixes and compilations an artistic statement?
I know you mentioned it in the article (which I agree with for the most part) but you can’t discount singles in the grand scheme of things. Lets face it, most artists in mainstream music culture nowadays only have one song worth calling music anyway. This seems to be the trend in pop music, and has been growing for some time.
In a case of chicken or egg, are singles becoming more prominent because of the shuffle button, or is the shuffle button more useful because artists put all of their creative energy into a single song, at the expense of the rest of an album?
“Lets face it, most artists in mainstream music culture nowadays only have one song worth calling music anyway.”
Sorry, but i disagree on the most part to this statement. The age of one-hit-wonders seems to be over, now that the sale of PHYSICAL CD singles is decreasing rapidly, with some publisher’s stopping the production of them entirely. As a result, the sale of singles is becoming digital only. Most songs sold in this way on iTunes, and other distribution, as from users selecting specific tracks they are after. What then makes a certain song sell better than others? It’s not that the buyer walks into a CD store, and buys the single because it’s cheaper. They hear the song on the radio, online, or from the samples on the websites. It is now the consumer that chooses which song would make the best “single”.
Only a very small group of musicians, those that are in it for the money, would put all their effort and resources into one song. The old business model of singles and albums has virtually been made redundant.
Interestingly, and I was not aware of it when I wrote this post, while both the sale of digital singles and digital albums are growing (with the sale of singles still ahead of albums), it is interesting to note from 2007, the sale of albums is increasing more than the sale of singles.
http://www.riaj.or.jp/e/data/download/index.html