Music Curation by Television Show (by the artist formerly known as Beats by Dre)
So I was in Target grocery shopping earlier today when I heard some beautiful violin music. At first, I thought it was one of those isle-end displays where there’s a bunch of CDs its advertising and you select the album you want and you get like a 30 second sample. It turned out to be a television playing music-appropriately enough-above the music section.
What’s more, it was something from Lindsey Stirling’s album, Shatter Me. I immediately searched for it in the iTunes Music Store and added the album to my wish list for obvious reasons (i.e. I liked what I heard, wanted to add it to my collection and I wanted a device to do the job of remembering that idea for me.)
So earlier this evening, I loaded the album up in iTunes and decided to preview the album. While I like the artistry, I’m not sure that I would listen to any of those songs more than a handful of times. Of course, me being Tomas, I had to overthink this.
See, I want to support Stirling, but I don’t want to spend the $10 on something I’m not going to use. I’d be lying if I said that I haven’t spent more money on less and would be delusional to think that I won’t waste money in the future. But for some reason, this is coming down to a principle/ethical thing for me. I don’t know why I’m obsessed on this problem but I am.
It may have to do with a recent musical experience.
See, I never got the whole Pandora/Spotify/rdio/last.fm thing. I think (though I have no hard data and perhaps false memories to draw upon) those kinds of services are most suited to pop music. That’s not to say I don’t listen to pop music, but I’m not a modern man in this regard. And I’m more of an album kind-of-guy; I grew up with albums and don’t believe in buying individual tracks, except when it comes to pop music.
For example, when I was building my collection of “Oldies” music, I would remember a song or hear it in a film or what-have-you and then I would go look it up and add just that song to my collection. We’re talking about things like the Beetles, Rolling Stone, Elvis Presley, etc. Now, yes, I know the Beetles are famous for their albums, but I’m not aware of their albums being a continuous piece of work like say Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon (which, ironically, I’ve never listened to.)
It may also help to point out that I enjoy listening to scores and grew up listening to classical music. Both of these are meant to be consumed as a unit consisting of many parts, though it is true that some lend themselves to piecemeal more than others.
But I must confess that my main method of music discovery is through episodic television content. I’m sure there was a gaggle of people responsible for the needle-drop music in House; I am externally grateful to them and the masterminds behind Have Dog Will Travel: I have added many songs to my collection because of that show and website. I’ve picked up one or two songs thanks to Justified but not nearly as many as House.
Not surprisingly, I’ve picked up music from another show, though I’m ashamed that I haven’t done so long before now. Those that know me well will have, of course, guessed Top Gear. Apparently, there’s a site called Tune Find that has done for many TV shows what Have Dog Will Travel did for House. So it was that I was watching some episode of Top Gear (I forget which) when James was doing a piece. Experience from In a Time Lapse played and I was able to identify it along with a track from Snitch.
The premise of Snitch sounds interesting, though I’m sure it’s as predictable as Taken. (Also, note to self, watch The Counselor and The Next Three Days) But I’m disappointed in the $10 that I paid for the score. There’s really only one track worth listening to. I think it’s because of that recent purchase, I’m reticent to support Stirling’s album.
I thought about trying to explain all of this to a tweet directed to her, but I couldn't even make that work in my head, much less real life. "Dear Lindsey, I love your art, hate your work and but am too cheap to support it." Yeah.
So I went on Twitter to send Miss Stirling a link to this blog post only to find out that her grandmother died recently. Now I really do feel like a two-bit piece of shit.