If you follow me on Twitter (you shouldn’t, it’s a terrible place), you may have seen me rant and ramble about various portable audio issues lately.
I’m not going to recap it all right now, I plan on a full-length blog post about it later, but my iPod Classic finally died and replacing it has been a nightmare. I absolutely abhor the iPod Touch, and I couldn’t get it to work right on my computer. Today, I got a nice high-end Sony Walkman. And it’s a really good music player, but for some damn reason the software that came with it won’t work on my computer. I have a feeling that that 110,000 song library scares it.
Wanted to do an informal poll here, although I can imagine that my audience isn’t really representative of mainstream musical consumption habits, how do you all listen to music these days? Do any of you actually buy music? I’ve felt like a relic for buying CDs for a few years now, but now I feel like a walking anachronism for buying music at all. It seems to me that everyone I know just streams it. And the very few I know that do buy music listen to it on their phone in lieu of a dedicated MP3 player.
So, am I really just that out of touch? I feel that there’s still a market for a good mid-level MP3 player with decent computer software. But literally every major corporation on earth seems to disagree with me. Is music ownership really dead?
Here’s a…not very good song to help you while you ponder these big questions.
Ice T
Superfly 1990 (Mantronix Remix)
Superfly 1990 (Fly Mix)
Superfly 1990 (New Jack Swing Remix)
Did you know that there was a sequel to Superfly? Shit, did you know that there were two sequels to Superfly? The first, Superfly T.N.T., came out in 1973, just a year after the release of the original. That movie is allegedly terrible. I say “allegedly” because I’ve never seen it, as it’s not exactly an easy film to track down. It was never released on DVD or Blu-ray, and I doubt it’s going to pop up on Netflix in the near future. I feel like whoever owns the rights to that one wants it to stay buried.
In 1990, Superfly returned with…Return Of Superfly. Although, not really. The original Superfly, Ron O’Neil passed on the flick, and the character was recast with soap opera actor Nathan Purdee…because yeah why the fuck not.
While Superfly T.N.T. has vanished off the face of the fucking earth, you can find Return Of Superfly on Amazon Prime right this minute. I imagine the rights holders of that one realized they could get a few views based on the recent Superfly remake. I haven’t seen Return Of Superfly, but based on that amazing trailer, it looks like the entire cast dies? Seriously, how many people get blown away in that trailer? Is Charles Bronson in that movie somehow?
The nearly forgotten Return Of Superfly also had a nearly forgotten soundtrack to go along with it, featuring new songs by Curtis Mayfield, who of course composed the legendary music for the original film. In an incredibly freakish coincidence, the soundtrack came out the same day Mayfield was paralyzed when a piece of stage equipment fell on him. Making this one of the last things he worked on before his accident. Damn.
I don’t have the soundtrack proper, just the 12″ single for the main theme, which features Mayfield alongside Ice-T (with Lenny Kravtiz on guitar and as a producer). It’s an odd number. The Mayfield parts are on point, and it has a real groove to it. But Ice-T really sounds like he’s phoning it in. He’s doing this more like a spoken word piece than a rap track. I really hated this track when I first heard it, and while I still don’t love it, I do have to say that it’s grown on me. Those Mayfield parts are great, and the bassline and overall feel of the track is solid. Honestly, I wish there was a remake that removed Ice-T and just turned the track into a Mayfield solo number with some extended instrumental bits.
Anyone see the new Superfly? Was it remotely good at all?
I still own a dedicated mp3 player, but I haven’t used it in years. I’m not a streamer. I use my phone to listen on the move, but at home I’m using Samsung’s multiroom to play my huge digital music library which is either ripped from my big vinyl and CD collection or downloaded from blogs like yours. I purchase a little online but it’s tiny compared to the other sources.
I wouldn’t recommend the multiroom. The speakers are pretty good but the player is buggy and struggles with my large library. None of the search options work so I’m only using the ‘browse by folder’ option to play stuff off a 4Tb WD mycloudmirror. For playlists I use Windows Media Player on my PC with one of the multiroom speakers connected via bluetooth, or just BT headphones.
I only use my turntable for ripping, and the only CD player is in my PC.
I’m not a good role model.
I use MediaMonkey, it can import your existing iTunes library, so you can have access to your music in the app, but not change where the music is located (mine being in the iTunes Media Library). Since I still use an iDevice, I still use iTunes to add songs, and sync to it, but I also make sure to reflect the changes by reimporting my iTunes library to MediaMonkey when I’m done. I haven’t used it to sync music to a device, so I don’t know how that works, but for the time being, I like the 2 media player setup. One that I use to sync my device, another to actually to listen to when I’m on the computer.
I still buy new CDs from record shops but then I know I am old relic. I also like to haunt charity shops and buy ridiculous numbers of them, even those really crap ones that came free with magazines and newspapers, just in the hope of the odd nugget. Sometimes I listen to them on my hi-fi but I usually listen to them on iTunes on my iMac and feel a bit guilty about it.
I am in my 40s. I arrived at a bar the other day and took out my iPod to turn it off. A girl turned to me and said, dryly, “Oh, I haven’t seen one of those for YEARS.” And I suddenly felt very self-conscious – like I was some hipster ironically using old technology – like a boombox – when, in truth, I’ve just never stopped using my iPod. I do have an iPhone but I don’t use it for music. I don’t even get emails on it. I think… I can’t cope with having everything in one place.
I have a whole wall full of CDs and all I can think of when I look at them now is… “landfill”. It’s a bit depressing. All that plastic. I used to have this fanciful idea that one day someone would be really excited to see my record and CD collection – loads of them signed and with hundreds of gig tickets tucked into the sleeves. Like a legacy. But, literally, no one I know is interested. And, of course, most of it is worth next to nothing because I’ve bought things I like rather than things that are collectable.
Nearly all the music I buy is new music. I do listen to stuff I bought in the past. But I tend not to go back and buy music by bands I wasn’t into at the time. If I hear about a band I like then I follow them on bandcamp and then go and see them live at the soonest opportunity. If I listen to something more than twice on bandcamp then I feel like I should pay for it. I’m not on Spotify. I feel like I should buy stuff from the artists I love to encourage them to keep doing the thing they do. I guess I’m lucky to be able to afford to do that.
I mainly listen to music at work – so in iTunes on my computer (although I have never actually downloaded any music from iTunes. I just use it as a player.) My car has a CD player. I have an iPod dock in my bedroom and in the kitchen. Which makes me feel hella out of date but… ahhh… who cares? I guess I’m not much of an audiophile. More of a play-that-song-over-and-over-and-over-on-any-crappy-little-device and then… on to the next thing!
And I’ve not seen the newer Superfly, either. Sorry! Although at least it means I’ll stop talking now –
I buy vinyl regularly and listen to it pretty often, but I listen to digital music enough that I get a little annoyed when no digital download is included. I have mostly stopped buying CDs, but since we bought a little $20 Jensen portable CD player a couple of years back, we’ve been listening to our CD library a whole lot.
I finally completely gave up on iTunes last year and started using Media Monkey. I’ve even been able to sync music from it to my iPhone! My old car still has a working CD player also. In the newer car we just do Pandora or Spotify (free versions) because it didn’t even come with a freaking aux jack.
We’re about to introduce a new member to our family and I’m looking at our wall of CD’s and there’s really not room for it anywhere. I’m not sure what to do about that.