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Musical Attention Deficit Disorder
At first I thought I was just tired of my music. I'd had an iPod for a year or so and increasily found myself skipping from song to song on shuffle mode, vetoing each one after about 5 seconds. Was I really tired of all 3,800 songs? Or was something else happening?
I dimly remembered using a CD player at one time and merrily rotating through maybe 10-20 CDs. I didn't have immediate access to seven Kinks albums and the entire recorded output of The Monochrome Set, but then again, I wasn't frantically changing CDs every ten seconds looking for the "right" song. I resigned myself to this being yet another symptom of my rapidly deteriorating attention span, like reloading Gawker every 3 minutes.
One day I saw a guy on the subway using his iPod in exactly the same way -- it bore as much resemblance to music listening as skimming a web page does to reading. I felt at once relief (it's not just me!) and dispair (our culture is going down the tubes!).
So, people, are you having this problem too? Do we need a "slow music" movement where we dig out our old cassette and CD walkmen so we can learn to listen to whole albums again instead of skimming? I ask this question knowing full well that they'll have to pry this $300 hunk of white plastic from my cold, dead fingers (cue appropriate song, whatever that is).
(Don't even get me started on podcasts. I've caught myself many times trying to listen to a radio program and simultaneously read a web page or something. That, I assure you, works really well.)
Posted by Damian on 08/03/2005 | Permalink
Comments
It's funny you should mention this as I have just started a project forcing myself to listening to all the music i've hoarded throughout the years...without diviation.
http://blog.davidsmind.com/index.php?p=71
Check it out.
Posted by: David Mattatall | Aug 3, 2005 4:37:10 PM
My wife is still toting her cassette walkman around and personal mixtapes, and I'm damn proud of her for it. The Thurston Moore book out on the art of the mix tape is pretty refreshing reading too, illustrating just how valuable the bestowing of a personal blueprint of one's tastes to another as a gift synching the tracklist in a set mode, is (was) an extremely cool thing that any shuffle mode cannot replicate.
Posted by: Brian Turner | Aug 3, 2005 4:45:27 PM
"It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times..."
I am one of those "guy[s] on the subway", or someone like him. I was also one of those guys who jokingly balked at getting an iPod because "I've already got one...in my head!" What can you do? My iPod didn't go to college, hang out on the Lower East Side, go through a particularly painful breakup, doesn't read Pitchfork, etc. Nor can it tell if I'm cleaning the house (not that I do), working out (not that I do), or typing mean things about it in someone's blog (not that I...oh). But even a random number generator can come up with a great song I haven't heard in a long time, or make an awesome segue, and all of the sudden the iPod is some kind of mash-up genius.
If I have to sit down and listen to every song I own to prove I like music...then maybe I don't really like music, but given that I can recognize a song in the first few bars and decide that it's not appropriate for the time, place, and mood, that should count for something.
Posted by: Jason | Aug 3, 2005 5:48:43 PM
I hear you Jason -- on my way home just now, my iPod wanted me to listen to a very sombre string-laden 12 minute classical piece and I just couldn't deal with it. I guess what I was getting at, though, is it's easy to get that "grass is greener" feeling, passing up song after song expecting something totally perfect. Sometimes what I'm passing up is not totally inappropriate, but might require a slight stretch, and it's easier to hit the forward button.
Posted by: Damian | Aug 3, 2005 6:40:34 PM
I think ipod favors some kind of music. me, i like usually german electro, but i do prefer to listen to kraut rock and minimal stuff... less talking (it doesn't go well overlapping with the physical world) and more gaps, so you can "fill it in" with your surroundings.
bear in mind you are not listening to music, but listening to music ALSO... it's more like background music, not a demanding anchor song...
Posted by: nicholas | Aug 3, 2005 10:24:13 PM
Yup, I've noticed the same thing. It's an unintended consequence of the iPod that users skip around, but it's not surprising. After all, the selling points of these things, and the attraction for many of us, is how many songs it can hold. I labored over the choice of a 5000 or 7500 song memory. So far, I have about 700 on it, and I skip around all the time. Those who have written here are right--sometimes you want to skip because the mood of the song is wrong, but iPod skipping is different because with a CD player you probably didn't have a thousand options if you didn't like the first song (unless you had one of those big "jukebox" CD players that holds 400).
I skip songs on my iPod because I can, and because I have more options.
Posted by: Paul | Aug 4, 2005 8:16:10 AM
I just joined the Pod People a few weeks ago. Since I drive all over town for work and don't need to carry music I have never had a Walkman, etc. But I got into digital jukebox back in the SoundJam/MacAmp days and just dedicated a Mac to my stereo system. Then I got a car with a plug for the Pod into the radio.
Now I do skip a lot, after building 5 playlists with over 3000 songs total, but the one I listen to the most is made up of stuff that I have either never heard, having gotten it from friends or Usenet. It's nice to hear 100 songs in a row that I have never heard before. Now THERE's a radio format for you.
Posted by: Michael | Aug 4, 2005 11:11:39 AM
Good heavens. I'm listening to a podcast of 7 Second Delay on WFMU as I'm reading/commenting on this. And I'm supposed to be writing a play that's due in a few hours. What is the iPod doing to us?
Though I am pretty good about leaving it in my pocket once it's going. But maybe that's just because I'm paranoid about losing it or breaking it.
Posted by: Jason Grote | Aug 4, 2005 1:05:10 PM
I do exactly the same thing, but I don't think it's a bad thing. My iPod lets me hear exactly what I want to hear, even if I have to skip through several songs or albums randomly to find it.
I don't think there's an 'attention deficit' here-- that would suggest that the music we don't want to hear deserves attention just because it's there. I think it's a whole new way of listening to music, and this is not a bad thing.
In the past, we only had music when someone played it live for us. Recorded music and radio brought music into our homes and cars for the first time, but it wasn't until the Walkman that we could engineer our own soundtrack. The sheer selection offered by the iPod has changed music once again, and I think we should be looking for opportunities rather than forcing ourselves to listen to things that we just aren't enjoying for whatever reason.
Posted by: Greg | Aug 5, 2005 3:39:22 PM
In response to Greg, there is either an over-accessibility issue or a deficit of attention here, because either the music is deserving of attention or you don't like it in the first place. I think the idea is that you combat having to skip by making playlists, especially on-the-go, but I can't be bothered. That's why I've taken it back to CD and Vinyl, I end up spending a few minutes at the start of the day picking out a few cds, and I never end up disappointed this way.
Posted by: Speak | Aug 5, 2005 7:08:20 PM
I'm with Damian. After six months of ipod (and years of MP3's on computer before that) I am shuffle-exhausted. I'm newly discovering the joy of LPs. It feels like a real ritual, like tea ceremony or something. Consequently, the music "sticks" more in the mind, hiss crackle & all.
Posted by: Chicago | Aug 6, 2005 11:01:22 PM
couldn't it also have something to do with the sampling rate and compression most people use w their ipods? a kind of synergy-deleting mode that makes everything less than the sum of its parts. i know that i don't get the same satisfaction out of some cd versions of analog stuff. praps this is just more of the same.
Posted by: mike | Aug 17, 2005 12:09:14 PM
I've been feeling this way myself, not so much because of the iPod but just because of the plethora of music in my computer. (4113 tracks, many of which are barely listened to.) I find I'm using music as background, but rarely sitting down and *listening* to it like I used to.
Oddly, a friend of mine posted something on the same topic recently, so it's obviously going around...
Posted by: Rick | Aug 17, 2005 12:21:19 PM
Is the medium the message? Back in the day when vinyl was the main option, you had to actually sit and listen to the music at home with your full attention; at roughly 20 minutes per side, this was an extremely pleasurable activity (I'm sure there's scientific research that explains how long it takes for brainwaves to get activated, etc). This explains the importance and reverence placed on all those "Classic Albums" released between 1965 and 1985. (Would YOU sit through an hour-long VH1 special about the making of "On The 6?" Me neither.)
Also: vinyl needs to be handled carefully (unlike those "indestructible" CD's), hence the extra respect garnered toward the music contained within the vinyl itself. Vinyl also must be played on a turntable, which needs to be placed on a stable, stationary surface; this precludes the possibility of using it in the car, on the train, etc.
We need to begin making the distinction between "music" and "recorded sound." One has been around since the beginning of time, the other has only been around since 1877. Let's face it, folks; recorded sound is simply not a very valuable commodity anymore. Notice that the people who are against file-sharing are those who earn their living off of royalties from recordings made years ago (unlike jazz musicians, who spend most of their lives touring and playing live, and from whom you will rarely ever hear a complaint against file-sharing).
Of course it bugs you to do the "ipod Shuffle!" There is something inherently unnatural about being out in public and hearing the first 5 seconds of 100 different songs. It's an easy way to kill time, yes, but it's no way to truly appreciate music. Next time you're about to sit through an entire episode of "Desperate Housewives," try sitting through side 2 of "Abbey Road" instead and see which is more fun. My guess is that you'll find that the ipod has not "changed music" whatsoever; rather, it has changed us.
Posted by: John Montagna | Aug 17, 2005 2:18:15 PM
Ipods suck
Posted by: podawg | Aug 29, 2005 1:38:12 AM
