Music and these rectangles

some downloads after reading Liz Pelly's book Mood Machine

Recorded music is the most ubiquitous its ever been in the history of humankind. It’s something special to have captured a feeling, a moment, an energy, a spirit, or an instance through a technology that records the music and then later listen to it playback. Lightning in a bottle! We can get that feeling again and again.

Over some time, we’ve as a species engineered music both acoustically and artistically to do what we need it to do. We figured out form and technique enough to make the music, and then how to connect it to whatever message, idea, feeling, we need it to carry and transmit… We did dat. Or rather some people have figured that out for us. (Stevie wonder figured it out the best imo but no one is asking). We humans figured out how to get these recordings to each other (distribute) and reproduce (playback) these feelings, messages, ideas, etc. Anyway somehow over time we’ve lost the plot. We made it into a commodity. We made it into a thing to sell. No judgment, I geddit because I literally sell music and if we have to play this game of capitalism, and time is money, then I wanna have most of my time around music, so money’s gotta be there too.

Andso, skipping over some many years and marquee moments of recorded music: Louis armstrong, copyright law, prince , hip hop, napster, pharell and dat blurred lines case with growing pains son blah blah blah… we ended up here.

Spotify has helped make music become more about the idea of the music than the music itself. Kinda like how mango La Croix sparkling water doesn’t really taste like an actual mango but the remnants of mango are somewhere wayyy back there, and some of you freaks like dat shit.

Through intentional conditioning they have engineered a new kinda of listener or consumer of music. They groomed people to become what (I read in Liz Pelly’s book Mood Machine)

they call a lean back listener. A passive listener. Just put on a playlist thats more about a vibe, or a mood, or an idea of a vibe or mood. Lofi beats to do homework to. So that people can just have this idea or mood faintly in the room juuust enough but not too much to stop what ever the fuck they are scrolling through.

It almost feels like Spotify made music come from thin air … and the listener doesn’t even have to have a connection to the artist anymore. Just how ground beef in a grocery store looks nothing like a cow; people don’t associate the product to its origin. Thats on purpose. If you abstract it enough then you can put filler in it and then use less of the actual product, but they (the consumer) won’t notice the difference . They will pay the same. You just made more money from the same cow, or sound/idea/mood. This is the same with political information/news. That shit gets stepped on and people dunno whats actually pure. Time = money and if you just spend more time on this app they can get more data from you across all your other apps etc. and thats more money.

In this case, music then is devalued to the point that the substitute filler matter suffices. The approximation of the idea of the music works just as well. Like Stevia or splenda to raw sugar cane. It does just enough to occupy enough space physically or in your mind. Sitback listening is normalized and they just want you there, but not really there enough to decide on anything. Now they got you confused to where you don’t even know this music could be medicine. They have you thinking this is just sonic wallpaper (im pretty sure that term is from Liz Pelly’s book).

The more passive you can consume and exist the better for them. Then they can dictate your whole world and shape your understanding of it if you just keep your eyes and ears on these little rectangles (screens). From these little rectangles you can get your music, you can learn dances, you can get the culture from these little rectangles. you dont necessarily have to be outside to get the culture now. or so they’d have you believe. you can now “know” a culture without leaving your bedroom. you now can know “the best restaurants” in nyc, and the funny sub counterculture shit without even stepping foot in it. you can know the best clubs and djs from these rectangles. you can get food to you, you can get groceries, you can get laundry, therapy, furniture, your next house, your clothes, sex, friends, news, etc.. and with these rectangles they helped make the public less curious about the origins.

Now looking through a music lens, if all your music and info about music is coming from this little rectangle they can just package it in a way that benefits them. They make playlist where so many people get their music from. The playlist can dictate wether this is whats hot right now, or this is what you have to hear that just came out this week, or THESE ARE THE CLASSICS. For example, if you are a young person that doesn’t know about house music just as a genre (nevermind the culture) they make a playlist titled “this is house” and whatever is on that list is now the bible. That defines a whole genre. A whole narrative. A whole culture. A whole people without you ever knowing any better. They can erase important people and scenes along the way if we aren’t careful. If you aren’t there to tell your story somebody else will tell it for you. And they would have you thanking them for their good grace that you even exist on that rectangle.

Playlist editors stopped curating actual playlists for people and started pairing tracks to match the algorithm or mood playlist better. Spotify decided to cut down on the different options you have on playlists and moods. They dumbed down or flattened your mood choices and packaged your own taste (or what they’ve gathered is your own taste from the many data points) and sold it back to you. Creating an echo chamber of mid ass music bouncing off your walls. This music that is spread by an algorithm only spreads what gets “repeat listens” and works against actual unique music getting to you. This is the same with the distillation news/information.

For me I found that being more literally outside is a good start to combat that. Going to these spaces with other humans. Interacting and connecting. Going to the actual movie theater to watch a movie. Going to the park for the thing or for no thing at all. Going to the record store to get your music. To have the physical record in your hand is an act of combat toward the indoctrination of passive consumption in my microcosm. Record stores are a form of controlling current history. Current narratives. Its a rebellion against musical misinformation. Just as gathering outside can potentially combat political misinformation. Going to a record store and physically buying music is a way of saying Im awake, Im not a robot, I choose this, you aren’t going to choose this for me.

So with all of this I’ve realized its important to collectively gather together outside and not stay individually isolated inside cuz that makes us susceptible to control. They need to divide to conquer. I believe another great Cesar said dat.

As a musician I’ve understood music is my calling and have been fortunate to find Music expresses itself in many different forms with me. Wether its djing a party, or Public Service, or playing drums live, or playing in my project Conclave, or recording and writing music, or putting out that music, or presenting music at a loft party, or at Sala Sessions. I realize the responsibility I have and the importance and power music has. I personally know the healing music can bring to an individual and especially to a community. I only want to be of use and in service to that.

In his book The Life Energy In music John Diamond wrote “It is rare to find a total surrender to the glory of the music. These are the performers who are committed to the uplifting of the audience through the music. Such a musician sees himself as a humble servant of music, and sees his role the communication of love. This musician is free of the usual stresses of performance. He transmits the pulse of the music and we are all enriched by the experience.”

I’ve experienced first hand within in myself how music carries with it a feeling, a moment, an energy, a spirit and with it, it can create a transformation. This transformation starts first within and then throughout: Within your innerself and then throughout your external self and through a whole crowd, collective, scene, narrative, lineage. How permanent and profound this transformation is depends on multiple factors but thats for a whole other conversation… until then…