Your Music Collection
Your Music Collection
Talk about your own collection of music.
How much music do you have? Do you have three and a half week's worth of music on iTunes? Do you have twenty crates full of vinyl records? Maybe you have one of those plastic suitcase things with the slots for cassette tapes. Or just maybe you're an IKEA Boalt sort of a guy.
How do you find new music? Do you get recommendations from someone specific, or a website? Do you like to spend time researching stuff online yourself? Do you listen to radio? Talk about the range of music you listen to. Thomas Tallis one day, Tupac Shakur the next?
This thread is also, if necessary, open to the classic predictable debate in which iPod owners to call vinyl collectors dorks, and vinyl collectors to call iPod owners superficial, and then somebody wades in with information about why one is better quality than the other even though nobody has brought that up.
How much music do you have? Do you have three and a half week's worth of music on iTunes? Do you have twenty crates full of vinyl records? Maybe you have one of those plastic suitcase things with the slots for cassette tapes. Or just maybe you're an IKEA Boalt sort of a guy.
How do you find new music? Do you get recommendations from someone specific, or a website? Do you like to spend time researching stuff online yourself? Do you listen to radio? Talk about the range of music you listen to. Thomas Tallis one day, Tupac Shakur the next?
This thread is also, if necessary, open to the classic predictable debate in which iPod owners to call vinyl collectors dorks, and vinyl collectors to call iPod owners superficial, and then somebody wades in with information about why one is better quality than the other even though nobody has brought that up.
- Colback's Orange Tufts
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Re: Your Music Collection
I've moved so much I went digital only, moving old cds into storage. It's about 4000 tracks, I deleted some albums I don't listen to anymore or grew out of
I used to listen to radio quite a bit and was really up with new music. Nowadays less so, buying less music and my collection is becoming stale. Youtube and twitter helps a bit, but ska aside I don't have strong genre tastes. Should really listen to 6 music more.
Actually the music threads here have probably made me buy more music than anything else in the past two years
I used to listen to radio quite a bit and was really up with new music. Nowadays less so, buying less music and my collection is becoming stale. Youtube and twitter helps a bit, but ska aside I don't have strong genre tastes. Should really listen to 6 music more.
Actually the music threads here have probably made me buy more music than anything else in the past two years
Sharing articles no-one reads since 2012
Re: Your Music Collection
I've got just over 100 albums on vinyl, about the same number on CD, and about 900 albums digitally over several computers (I need to sort out the mess into one place at some point). There's only a few dozen vinyls which I don't have digitally, so by and large my collection is digital.
I've sort of stopped exploring music at the rate I used to. At one point (about a decade ago) I'd be getting at least three or four albums a week mixed digital, CD and vinyl. Now it tends to be that if I don't have an album and I want a listen, I'll stick it on Youtube or something, which is a shame.
In the early-mid 2000's there was a good culture of music blogs online where rare out-of-print records were reviewed, digitised and uploaded so that people could actually hear them. I grew a massive collection of obscure jazz and rock through reading these sites. But this was wrecked by officious record labels who want a f*** Everybody scenario where they refuse to reprint the records because there isn't enough interest, but also refuse to let people download them for free, thereby only benefiting people who have old copies and want to extort those who want to actually listen to the record.
I've sort of stopped exploring music at the rate I used to. At one point (about a decade ago) I'd be getting at least three or four albums a week mixed digital, CD and vinyl. Now it tends to be that if I don't have an album and I want a listen, I'll stick it on Youtube or something, which is a shame.
In the early-mid 2000's there was a good culture of music blogs online where rare out-of-print records were reviewed, digitised and uploaded so that people could actually hear them. I grew a massive collection of obscure jazz and rock through reading these sites. But this was wrecked by officious record labels who want a f*** Everybody scenario where they refuse to reprint the records because there isn't enough interest, but also refuse to let people download them for free, thereby only benefiting people who have old copies and want to extort those who want to actually listen to the record.
Re: Your Music Collection
I don't even buy music really, I just pay £10 a month for Spotify. I can have a massive collection of music on my laptop and use it whenever I want, and I can put all that on my phone and listen to it anywhere I desire since you can listen to it without it digging into your data usage. If I want feel like you want to listen to something new, Spotify has related artists so they take care of that too.
In the future I would like to have a massive collection of albums to put on a shelf or something since my dad does that and replicating it would be entertaining. Want to get older for that first though.
In the future I would like to have a massive collection of albums to put on a shelf or something since my dad does that and replicating it would be entertaining. Want to get older for that first though.
RIP
Re: Your Music Collection
I've never used Spotify before. How comprehensive is its library? Can you find some pretty obscure stuff on there? And what about classical music? Are there well labelled different recordings of each individual piece?
Re: Your Music Collection
I have nearly 9000 songs uploaded to Google Play Music, which killed off my Winamp usage after what must have been 10 years of use. I'm kind of tempted to pay for "all access", which is the Spotify equivalent, but I've still got a backlog of stuff that I'm waiting to listen through.
I went through a phase of trying to collect CDs of my favourite albums, especially the rarer ones, but that went on hold when I had to move somewhere with no space for them. So now they just sit tucked away in boxes.
I don't buy digital, I want something tangible for my money, and I don't want to have to dance through hoops / strip DRM to use my purchases as I please (although things seem to have gotten better recently). The Amazon auto-rips when you buy a CD are handy though, saves me doing the work or finding a torrent for it if I'm feeling lazy.
The only vinyls and casette I own are from the Non Phixion - The Future Is Now limited edition re-release.
My two favourite CDs (as physical things, but the albums are up there too) in my collection are my pop-up edition Czarface:
And, Saving Seamus Ryan.
I went through a phase of trying to collect CDs of my favourite albums, especially the rarer ones, but that went on hold when I had to move somewhere with no space for them. So now they just sit tucked away in boxes.
I don't buy digital, I want something tangible for my money, and I don't want to have to dance through hoops / strip DRM to use my purchases as I please (although things seem to have gotten better recently). The Amazon auto-rips when you buy a CD are handy though, saves me doing the work or finding a torrent for it if I'm feeling lazy.
The only vinyls and casette I own are from the Non Phixion - The Future Is Now limited edition re-release.
My two favourite CDs (as physical things, but the albums are up there too) in my collection are my pop-up edition Czarface:
SpoilerShow
SpoilerShow
Re: Your Music Collection
That keyboard is filthy .
Re: Your Music Collection
It is weird, I always buy a physical book rather than a digital one, I will always buy a dvd/blu-ray rather than a digital copy; but with music I am almost exclusively digital rather than physical. I think one of the reasons is because a lot of the times I don't buy entire albums but just selected tracks. But I still buy entire albums and even then most of the time it is digital, not physical.
Re: Your Music Collection
I was building up a decent collection of CDs when I was at Uni then I just gave up and started using Spotify.
REQUIEM
Re: Your Music Collection
Yeah, CDs tend not to have much personality about them. There are obvious exceptions, such as shown in Cal's post, but on the whole the CD doesn't lend itself well to a collection of which you can be particularly proud. They're small and plastic and sort of sterile. The main reason I have a vinyl record collection is because I like the experience of listening to vinyl records. The CD is a s*** middle ground between digital and vinyl; it turns the enjoyable part of actively doing something with a physical object into a lifeless chore.
Re: Your Music Collection
Spotify is great because it doesn't take up any space (physical or digital) and I can access almost all the music I'd ever want to.
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- Micky Quim
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Re: Your Music Collection
Ive gone completely digital these days with 5011 tracks currently in iTunes. I don't normally buy albums, just the tracks I like. Ive retained a modest vinyl and CD collection too. Probably got around 500 discs of both combined, a variety of singles and albums.
Digital is the future
Digital is the future
Re: Your Music Collection
It's interesting that most artists are still sticking with the album form really. Why bother at all when so many people are buying or streaming individual tracks? Finite storage space for recorded sound created the concept of the album, but realistically we might as well now go back to the way music always used to be released; in ones or twos or threes of individual pieces in a catalogue ordered by number if the artist wishes.
Re: Your Music Collection
Most of my music is on Spotify. I still have casettes and CDs as well for the car but it's far easier to have Spotify on my phone for nearly every other occasion. That's where I get quite a lot of my new music from as well just from trawling through related artists, seeing what is said about each album and artist on allmusic.com as well. I find that I can just quickly look up a new album and then give it a listen then save it if I ever want to listen again or leave it if not. I've definitely found myself listening to a lot of different music since getting Spotify just cos it's so easy to dip in, I'll typically listen to all sorts of s*** in one day because of it.
Radio 2 and 6 Music are the main other place, a lot of new stuff I've found has been from listening to The Craig Charles Funk and Soul Show especially, it's so damn good
Re: Albums, I think they are the ideal format. I find it so much better to enjoy something as a cohesive experience than just the individual tracks, although obviously that depends on whether the album is trying to be that (eg Songs for the Deaf).
Radio 2 and 6 Music are the main other place, a lot of new stuff I've found has been from listening to The Craig Charles Funk and Soul Show especially, it's so damn good
Re: Albums, I think they are the ideal format. I find it so much better to enjoy something as a cohesive experience than just the individual tracks, although obviously that depends on whether the album is trying to be that (eg Songs for the Deaf).
If This Is How You Folks Make Art, Well That's f***ing Depressing
Get It On My Back You Slag!
Get It On My Back You Slag!
Re: Your Music Collection
Cassettes . I have one left, but no cassette player so I couldn't realistically check the box <ugh>.
I don't reckon the album should continue to be the standard release format. It seems unnatural and limiting on creative freedom to restrict yourself to 40min+ statements every so often. What if you've got twenty pieces of music, but they don't go with each other? This is both common and normal, and for most of history it was solved without a second thought; by releasing pieces of music in the size and grouping most suited to them. And if that meant individually then that was that. We've got that freedom again now; it'd be a shame if the album continued to dominate.
Concept Albums are basically just Suites fitted onto a disc, though. A string of movements thematically linked, tonally linked, or sometimes even literally linked. What makes a string of movements an "Album" if it is never released onto a format with finite storage space? Nothing but its name.CryMeARiviere wrote:Re: Albums, I think they are the ideal format. I find it so much better to enjoy something as a cohesive experience than just the individual tracks, although obviously that depends on whether the album is trying to be that (eg Songs for the Deaf).
I don't reckon the album should continue to be the standard release format. It seems unnatural and limiting on creative freedom to restrict yourself to 40min+ statements every so often. What if you've got twenty pieces of music, but they don't go with each other? This is both common and normal, and for most of history it was solved without a second thought; by releasing pieces of music in the size and grouping most suited to them. And if that meant individually then that was that. We've got that freedom again now; it'd be a shame if the album continued to dominate.
Re: Your Music Collection
I love cassettes Had to knick a load of my dad's old ones for something to listen to when doing deliveries so it's a bit dodgy - not sure what people think of Lindisfarne blasting out the car but it's all good fun.
I think for me it's more that because I tend to listen to albums as a whole they then fit together best in that way, songs flow off of one another so if you're expecting the next part to follow on then there's some gratification when it does. It's the same with playlists, when I've listened to them enough times they become like a new album in the way I just mentioned. I guess I only really continue to listen to albums because I like that expectation that comes once you've got to know it, as well as the fact that you can then be the 'deep cuts' guy
I don't think there should be any standard way to release music. People consume it in such varying degrees nowadays that I don't think it really matters. Personally I'd like albums to continue, but it's always better if they're cohesive so if people don't want to do that then they shouldn't have to, especially if to bring it up to an album's length they have to add some substandard pointless songs - Van Morrison I'm looking at you.
I think for me it's more that because I tend to listen to albums as a whole they then fit together best in that way, songs flow off of one another so if you're expecting the next part to follow on then there's some gratification when it does. It's the same with playlists, when I've listened to them enough times they become like a new album in the way I just mentioned. I guess I only really continue to listen to albums because I like that expectation that comes once you've got to know it, as well as the fact that you can then be the 'deep cuts' guy
I don't think there should be any standard way to release music. People consume it in such varying degrees nowadays that I don't think it really matters. Personally I'd like albums to continue, but it's always better if they're cohesive so if people don't want to do that then they shouldn't have to, especially if to bring it up to an album's length they have to add some substandard pointless songs - Van Morrison I'm looking at you.
If This Is How You Folks Make Art, Well That's f***ing Depressing
Get It On My Back You Slag!
Get It On My Back You Slag!
Re: Your Music Collection
Yeah I can definitely agree with that. Hopefully we'll see more music artists releasing pieces as they write them if they see fit to do it that way. There's no excuse any more for writing four great songs and then feeling compelled to pad them with a dozen fillers just so that you can actually release something that will be taken seriously. Just the four songs will be fine, thanks!
- Donkey Toon
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Re: Your Music Collection
I've got cd's, vinyl and digital. Vinyl (50 or so albums) even though I haven't owned a working record player in about twenty years.
Digital purely because I want my music in mp3 format for ease of listening and so I can take it with me wherever I go.
But most of my collection is in cd format. And it is massive. I had to catalogue it for insurance purposes years ago and found that I had more than 8,000 albums, ep's or cd singles. Ten years on I bet that figure is past 10,000 by now.
CD's were my habit for much of my life and I couldn't stop myself from buying them. Fortunately I seem to have broken it at last and buy no more than a couple a month.
I agree though that they are not the best format to listen to or for optimising the quality of content. Vinyl and cassettes were generally much better because the artist knew that the listener was going to have to listen to every track all the way through. The inception of the cd was also the beginning of the "skip age" of music and brought in the concept of album fillers.
I still prefer the idea of having music in physical form though. So I tend to buy an album, load it up to digital format and then store the disc in a box in my attic. Probably 99.9% of my digital collection is stuff I own in physical form and I only have a few tracks or albums which are only available in digital form that I have purchased in that format.
Digital purely because I want my music in mp3 format for ease of listening and so I can take it with me wherever I go.
But most of my collection is in cd format. And it is massive. I had to catalogue it for insurance purposes years ago and found that I had more than 8,000 albums, ep's or cd singles. Ten years on I bet that figure is past 10,000 by now.
CD's were my habit for much of my life and I couldn't stop myself from buying them. Fortunately I seem to have broken it at last and buy no more than a couple a month.
I agree though that they are not the best format to listen to or for optimising the quality of content. Vinyl and cassettes were generally much better because the artist knew that the listener was going to have to listen to every track all the way through. The inception of the cd was also the beginning of the "skip age" of music and brought in the concept of album fillers.
I still prefer the idea of having music in physical form though. So I tend to buy an album, load it up to digital format and then store the disc in a box in my attic. Probably 99.9% of my digital collection is stuff I own in physical form and I only have a few tracks or albums which are only available in digital form that I have purchased in that format.
Re: Your Music Collection
Mother of s***, that is a massive collection you have there. How is it stored? Does it have its own room?
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Re: Your Music Collection
Yes it's called the attic.skalpel wrote:Mother of s***, that is a massive collection you have there. How is it stored? Does it have its own room?
I'm gradually uploading them all onto disc storage but is taking ages. I have to buy a new remote disk storage drive every month or two, even though the last one I bought had 1TB of storage. I filled it without doing much more than dent the cd collection.