No One Wants To Discover New Music

[Magic]

Why Music Services Are Wasting Time Recommending New Music


Here’s a likely unpopular statement: No one wants to “discover” new music. We may say we want to discover new music, and certainly entrepreneurs/labels/music services…not to mention artists, have long tried to get consumers, to want new music, but the reality is we’re just not predisposed to do so. Companies — Spotify, Pandora, Beats, and others — that engage in this activity are fighting a losing battle.

This shouldn’t be surprising; we’re not really predisposed to want anything new.

Artists themselves are forced to use the schema of, “Well, we’re sort of like [X], but with a a bit of [Y].” With “X” being a band that is more well-known than they are, and “Y” being a distinguishing feature that makes them different (and, one would hope, more appealing than) than “X.”

But this is tough on the music consumer. If you’re constantly forced to contextualize new music via its relationship to music you are already familiar with, this new music is almost axiomatically going to fall short. Why bother with new music that approximates something you already like when you can just stick with something you know you like, and thus reduce any risk of being disappointed.

Couple this with something called the reminiscence bump, which states that we have stronger attachments to certain things depending upon the time in our lives during which we are exposed to those things, and it becomes even more clear that we fundamentally do not want new music. The reminiscence bump with respect to music seems to occur most prominently during the cognitive development maelstrom that is our teenage years.

None of this bodes terribly well for the “discovery” of new music after your teenage years. Arguably, it’s an entirely quixotic task embarked upon by any entity who tries to make music discovery a part of their business. There are exceptions, of course. Artists do break through and become favorites of people well beyond their teenage years, but they never replace those artists in terms of the affinity of the listener.


Read the full article at Forbes

 

[Johnny-Too-Good]

The part of that which puzzles me is mentioning Spotify in the summary of organisations etc making efforts to get people interested in new music. Maybe I am mistaken here, and I stand to be corrected, but Spotify appear to me to be the kind of outfit who don't give a shit about how new or old the music is. They would be quite happy with the millions of streams of Floyd etc. I understand they have to appeal to a younger audience, for business purposes, but they're not exactly pioneers?

On a separate note, I would be looking for the views of the younger members of this forum - I know there are a number in their teens and twenties. I like to think I'm Looking for new music, but I don't have the hunger I had 30-40 years ago :mad

 

[LG]

There are always going to be albums/artists that have a special meaning for everyone, you attach the music to a particular time in your life I could list dozens of albums that I love as much now as the first time I heard them back in the early 70's.

I had a period of over 10 years where I didn't follow new bands at all, during the 90's so believe it or not the Pixies, Nirvana, Pumpkins were basically unknown quantities up until about 8 years ago when I got a 'second wind' and started exploring all kinds of new bands, mostly hard rock/metal bands many of which I really enjoyed and got their entire discographies.

But the last 3 years I've switched to collecting old vinyl again and have pretty much lost the urge to check out a lot of newer bands. I only have so much time left to enjoy this passion we all seem to share and now I have to say I get more enjoyment listening to a vinyl copy of Leftoverture for example than bothering to make time to listen to whoever is up and coming.

The amount of music I have now is mind-boggling it would take years to listen to it all without replaying any of them along the way.

I suppose I have passed the torch to Sooty and Sunny and the other new artist experts that have the passion to keep adding new artists to their libraries, but I'm okay with that I'm satisfied to score the odd gem in the used vinyl shops and happily reminisce back to my younger days, which from my perspective were part of a better world than I see now.

 

[That 70s Guy]

I do like discovering new music and new bands,the problem is...what they recommend is crap!!

 

[mrJim]

Hmm I guess I'm the stupid one.

If I like it I'll listen to it... new or old I could care less. But I am not going to force myself to listen to something just because it's new or emerging or because I am supposed to like it.

A friend gave me some new progressive rock to listen to. I played it and thought it was very good music and the sound was rich etc. etc. In the end I gave it back to him and said thanks it has a really great sound but I won't listen to it. I seriously thought the sound of the music was good.

The bottom line was I hated it. I listened to the damn thing over three days. I would turn it off and come back to it the next day. turns out I listened to one friggin song over three days.. 18 minutes long. I couldn't get past that one.

what do I know.

Jim

 

[Riff Raff]

I do like discovering new music and new bands,the problem is...what they recommend is crap!!

Exactly. I don't rely on suggestions other than people's word of mouth. Sometimes its better to go hunt for the good new stuff because it does exist.

 

[Khor1255]

A bar is a good venue for new music. Unfortunately, an aspiring band must usually play some covers for the crowd to relate to them and playing covers costs a venue a ton of money these days thanks to ASCAP and friends who are (of course) 'protecting the interests of the artists'.

 

[Aktivator]

Why Music Services Are Wasting Time Recommending New Music

Well luckly they have old farts like me who still want a few hours each day to listen to new music. I love that today I can put on spotify and spend a few hours listening and discovering new music. I get the oh I'm not excited like a little puppy dog like I was 20 or 30 ears ago. However, it doesn't stop me from listening and finding very good to excellent new music. I got a rebirth in music in the 90's and haven't stopped since. There are always bands to be found and I've got a nice list of bands that have only been around for less than 10 years that I'm still getting happy to hear new music from. Hell new antlers song came out today!!

Yeah I'm a rare bird!!! blah blah blah!

 

[Musikwala]

I often wonder about this. It's a good topic for discussion.

Why bother with new music that approximates something you already like when you can just stick with something you know you like, and thus reduce any risk of being disappointed.

Well, because... you cannot keep listening to band X forever. You'd get bored with the same songs.

But in general, I totally get what this article is talking about. I was 13 in 1991 and 19 in 1997. The 90s are still my absolute favourite decade for music, though the 60s comes close. In my experience the formative teenage years really become the magical era that we nostalgically (is that a word? ) long for.

The thing is, by our mid 20s or so we already have a well formed music taste of our own. Mine includes bands like U2, R.E.M., Pearl Jam, The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Radiohead etc. So we subconsciously search for qualities of these bands in new music. I still discover new artists once in a while but the frequency has gone down a lot. And even the ones I discover like Tame Impala or Keane have qualities of classic rock/pop in them. Not that I won't listen to an artist with an open mind and a clean slate. I will. But the curiosity that I had during the growing up years is fading.

 

[Lynch]

I do like discovering new music and new bands,the problem is...what they recommend is crap!!