[Moshe]

In the old days music used to be a collective experience. People would gather together and experience it together in the same space and same time. Some of this collective experience got lost with the invention of recorded music. Everyone could listen to the music in his own space and time.
But not all of it got lost. I know that thanks to rigid release dates may of us heard the same music in the same time of the year.
I'll bet that most of can imagine spring time when they hear Murray Street just because we heard it together for the first time when it was spring.
Now when new music is being leaked we are losing even this aspect of collective experience. I think it is too bad what are your thoughts?

[atsonicpark]

I dunno, but i've long had the theory of the internet kind of ruining many experiences.. as lovely as the internet is, ALMOST any film/video game/albume/etc can be watched/played/listened to in a few clicks.. no longer do you take chances on bands based on a review in a zine or something.. and actually, yeah, no longer do you have to go out and meet people. just get on myspace! stuff like that.

[screamingskull]

i still invite friends over to hear an album i've just bought. and i do download stuff, but i make sure i buy the actual thing when it comes out.

[atsonicpark]

actually, when you put it that way, i think we have all been exposed to a much wider variety of music than ever thought possible. which is also an exciting prospect. i mean, our minds are definitely able to get more expanded than ever.. music may not be a big event anymore, but it's fun to share music with your loves on, music that none of us outside of japan or something probably wouldn't have heard otherwise.

what am i saying? i have a robo hangover.

[Everyneurotic]

i never went to some guy's house to listen to the whoever album, most of the time, i was the only one excited about a release and, chances were, i found about an album (especially if they were good, different and underground) like a year or two afterwards.

also, back in the day, radio stations used to broadcast entire albums as they were or just before they were released; i listened to the fat of the land by prodigy on the radio like a month before it came out.

my job kinda prevents me from having to wait until i get the album and can listen to it, but that's not so bad. recently, when i downloaded excellent italian greyhound i kinda thought "well, it took them 7 years, would it kill me to wait until i got the album from mailorder?" but i gave in and listened to the leaked version; then, weeks later, i got the vinyl on the mail, then got my turntable fixed and i listened to it and it was just as awesome as hearing it for the first time, it was like if i had listened to a radio broadcast and now i finally had it and i paid more attention to it than before...hell!! i had been listening to my mp3s of mirrored for like 2 months but it was an amazing experience to finally listen to it on vinyl, it sounded more of it and more like it.

also, leaked albums have helped me a lot, if i hadn't heard the leaked version of flaming lips' at war with the mystics and heard it a bunch of time to finally get it, i would have bought it and toss it into the garbage.

albums i bought the day they came out:

pantera - the great southern trendkill
metallica - load
nine inch nails - the day the world went away single (wanted to buy the fragile the day it came out but since it was a double it was ultra expensive)

i think that's all.

[atsonicpark]

i think the only album i bought the day it came out in stores was white pony. and director's cut.. yeah.

[Everyneurotic]

oh and that's why you have concerts and festivals re: music as collective experience; what better than seeing a band recreating their music in front of a bunch of people...oh, that's right, people suck anyway.

[pbradley]

People will survive.

[Cardinal Rob]

I've never brought friends around to listen to an album with me for the first time. My local friends would most likely be disturbed by what I listen to. In this age of musical ability in talent and creation being perverted so much by the mainstream and so on, music being a personal experience is all too relevant.

[whorefrost]

Originally Posted by Everyneurotic

also, leaked albums have helped me a lot, if i hadn't heard the leaked version of flaming lips' at war with the mystics and heard it a bunch of time to finally get it, i would have bought it and toss it into the garbage.

why would you not listen to the CD a bunch of times to get into it?

[Everyneurotic]

i really really really hated at war with the mystics the first time i heard it, the second time didn't improve, got to listen to it again like two weeks afterwards, if i had bought it, and i'm like that, i would have just thrown it away and not listen to it again.

[nicfit]

Beware, this whole post is not really "on topic", but I don't feel like deleting all the stuff I wrote.


Being "the guy that listen to the "strangest" music and initiates other people to "strange" music, I never really felt the "collective" experience feeling... I remember the day NYC G&F came out, I think I was the first guy to buy it in the whole city, and I straight away put it in my discman (retro music playing, yeah!) and walked around the city center feeling kinda "different", almost special, nobody else could have that music in his head. It was a great feeling. Not that I felt "superior" to other people, I just felt good. I didn't even have internet back then, but actually nowadays things haven't changed much. I still eagerly wait and buy all the albums I really care for. Damn, I even like the smell of recycled paper in the Red Sparowes' booklets, reading the "thank you" lists and stuff. But for the collective experience the only thing that matters nowadays is the live concert. I'd feel quite embarassed to listen to an album for the first time with other people around, I like it to be a really personal, kidna intimate thing. Leaked music (this has been said already) has pros/cons, but to be honest I think that what really "killed" the collective experience kind of thing is the unbearable amount of recordings released all over the world and, to an extent, the "recording at home" tools that makes it really easy for even the dumbest fu*k to release something, make that amount rise exponentially in numbers. Internet has become fundamental even just to keep track of the "bigger" things you like ( sy side projects... heh) , the "underground" world is soooo intricated and complex that the fragmentation of tastes/interests is inevitable.

[nicfit]

In short, back on topic, leaking has become part of the businness. Couldn't labels just don't give away promos before the actual release date? I mean, ok, is nice to read a review of a record the same month/ the month before an album is released, so you' ll read something about it before spending money, but since promo copies and stuff are the things that, most of the times, "spawn" the leaked files, what are the chances that people will actually base their decision on the review read/the single aired on radio rather than on the leaked files floating around the net? I think labels (especially for non-mass market products) should think about a different kind of promotion...don't ask me what should they do, coz I know nuthin' bout the music market's insides, but I think you'll all agree that the situation is pretty twisted.

HA HA , that's not "on topic". OK.
COLLECTIVE EXPERIENCE = NO WAY NOWADAYS (except for live gigs, I feel a sort of stronger "connection" between people on the board for this last tour, both for the ddn dates and the non ddn ones)

but that's not leaked music's fault. IT's just that people who listen to the leaked files will talk about a record when they download it, and people who will wait will talk about it later. I expect several "trees outside the academy" trheads in september, and my pleasure won't be ruined at all.

ha ha.