Controversial Music
I've been having a not so fun time recently trying to decide between new music streaming services since Spotify has become increasingly bad for artists.
The Politics of Music Delivery
Several months ago Spotify's CEO Daniel Eck decided to use his billions of dollars to gamble on a German AI powered weapons manufacturer called Helsing. See the full LA Times article here.
(LA Times Article quote)
This sounds good on paper, especially because I'm staunchly on the side of Ukrainian sovereignty, but this payout feels a bit like billionaire horse betting rather than providing actual aid based solely on empathy and care for the Ukrainian people. I'm in the camp of "anything that will help is good" but I'm also conflicted due to my belief that billionaires meddling in world conflicts can't be good. There's a lot of nuance here, and I don't see it as a strictly black and white issue.
(LA Times Article quote)
If what Helsing proposes in the quote above is true, great. At the end of the day I don't personally put a lot of faith in weapons manufacturers though.
Eck did recently step down after all of this. I think the damage was already done well before this whole AI drone thing anyways, unless they start paying artists better and reform the way the company conducts business it's hard to see why informed consumers would still support a company that pays it's real chief assets (artists) pennies on the dollar.
My Music Tastes Through The Eras
Anyways, the original point of this post was just simply to go into some of my music tastes over the years. My relationship with genres, specific artists and mediums of listening. All of which have changed many times and continue to evolve. At this point I'll just say - own your music, physical media will always be best. At the end of the day, you're not going to be buried with your $10,000 in Spotify Premium receipts or a gold plaque listing every top song from your Wrapped playlists.
My Own Personal Eras Tour (absolutely not a swifty)
- 2003-2006
- 2006-2010
- Foobar2000, EDM & Dubstep audiophile era
- EDM / Drum & Bass / Dubstep / Indie / Shoegaze / IDM era
- FLAC files, Pendulum & the Logitech Z Cinema era
- "I have good taste, but everyone thinks they do, never had a pop-punk / pop-rock phase" era
- 2008-2010
- Musigh / My first domain, Snap Clap Dance, the indie music blog era
- 2010-2012
- Soundcloud / Soundclown era
- 2012-2013
- Turntable.fm / Mord Fustang / Empire of the Sun / Sennheiser HDxx Headphones era
- 2013-2014
- Turntable.fm gets taken down due to copywrite infringement
- Paying an American for Spotify early access era
- 2012-2014
- Vinyl record rediscovery era
- 2014-2019
- Spotify era continues / late night scrolling on related artists / tap to preview was still a thing in Spotify
- 2020-2024
- TikTok killed the algorithm / slowed-reverb era / Spotify enshitification era
- Freddie Dredd, Enoch Light / Cha Cha era (the two are slightly related due to samples used)
- 2025+
- Spotify evil now, physical media is great, pay artists directly via Bandcamp, Old Records era
- Apple Music sucks but it's the only slightly better more ethical platform that has all the artists I listen to era
- Let's buy more physical media (records, CD's, Tapes) and give Deezer / Tidal a try, they have Linux ported apps and some community support (current era)
Honestly I could probably expand on this more but it would be a small novel.