Whatcha Been Listening To?

[KSubzero1000]

Anyway, I came out very strong in my earlier posts and I should have kept my mouth shut. It's none of my business how other people consume content.

I think your post was perfectly fine, for what it's worth.

It's a complicated issue. On the one hand, there is no ethical consumption under capitalism yadda yadda yadda, but on the other, it's perfectly normal for people to at least try to make the best out of an imperfect situation and find an acceptable solution that works for them. This isn't a clear-cut issue as with single-use plastics.

Personally, I still prefer physical when I have the choice and I even buy CDs on the rare occasion I can find one that interests me (usually a game soundtrack ), but I also find it hard to argue with Stan when he mentions the environmental impact of doing so. The way I rationalize it is that I try to do what I can on the big stuff while also allowing myself a small margin of error on the smaller stuff, such as physical game cases. This isn't a zero-sum game of course which means my solution is far from perfect, but it works for me.

The other issue I have with reducing everything to a matter of personal choice is that we don't live in any kind of libertarian utopia in which regulations and/or appeals to responsibility are inherently transgressive. If somebody has reason to believe that a certain course of action would be preferable, then it makes perfect sense for them to voice their concerns because it's by talking things out and finding compromises that we can find long-term solutions. You made a political argument and that is inherently based on the premise that what someone does usually ends up affecting somebody else, or in some cases, all of us. In this case, there is truth to the idea that digital storefronts are acting as predatory middlemen who exploit smaller creators and lead to bad consumption habits, not to mention the erosion of consumer rights you mentioned. But there is also some truth to the notion that digital media offers a higher degree of convenience at a mere fraction of the environmental cost.

Sorry for going off-topic or if I'm crossing a line again, I just thought this was an important point worth expanding on.

[Alex79]

There's nothing wrong with good debate. Personally, weighing up all the pros and cons, I prefer the convenience of digital. Music, movies, games. The only exception is comics. I read plenty digitally, but if I'm actually buying comics, I'll buy physical every time. I just like having a collection of something, and grabbing a book off a shelf to read isn't nearly as annoying as having to get a DVD from the bookcase, turn on the PS4, take whatever disc is already in there out, wait for the DVD to load, skip past all the adverts, navigate whatever bullshit 'interesting' menu they've built on the disc, press play... It just irritates me. Kids Disney DVDs are the worst for it, literally minutes and minutes of adverts and trailers before you can get to the film, sat there hammering 'skip, skip, skip' about 20 times before the main menu even loads.

I know digital purchases are generally a lot less stable and permanent, but convenience goes such a long way, for me. I hate even having to swap game cards in my Switch!

[Stanshall]

I'm honestly very hard to offend and I'm well up for the healthy debate. I suppose I should say that my own comment about 'wasting resources' was pretty loaded and not really my intention to claim eco superiority. More of a matter of fact statement. It's a useless bit of plastic to me, inconvenient and takes up space. Even when I was well into audio, built a mother fucker of a tube amp, chasing 1950s military NOS tubes and stuff, I was still all lossless digital, most of which I stole via torrent. The alternative is to pay fifty quid for some HD CD release. I suppose I'm revealing a great deal about my ethics and stuff here but I have no interest in contributing to the estate of Miles Davis, nor to Miles Davis if he were alive. I will give Animal Collective fifty quid whenever they bring out some new shirts though.

[KSubzero1000]

Ideally speaking, I think the best of both world would be to find a way to merge the two. Have everything be digital by default with regulations in place that would protect the smaller and more vulnerable creators, but while also giving dedicated consumers the option to print their favorite media at their own cost with the help of an official template, ideally while drastically reducing the amount of plastic involved.

Think GOG's DRM-free approach, but improved and expanded upon to include physical media.

So for example, Alex and I would both download and play through The Witness from the PSN or Steam store at first. After we're done, I would then have the option to transfer my The Witness license over to an approved manufacturer who would then send me a small metal box with official printed artwork and a game card inside (like the Switch cartridges). That way I could have something nice to put on my shelf with all the advantages of physical media while Alex could stick with the convenience of the default option and move on to the next game without any trouble.

PS: You could even combine games if the file sizes allow it. I would love to be able to collect all of my PS4 shmups or platformers onto one cartridge, for example.

[Stanshall]

I definitely pick and choose where my money goes, absolutely, and a big part of it is whether I'll get any more out of them, and how much I like them as people. I buy Berserk for example even though I might as well just bin the books because they are printed on bog paper and I much much prefer to read high res scans. I want the guy to finish the story and stay motivated.

[KSubzero1000]

But of course I greedily tried to gobble it up for free beforehand because why would I pay when I didn't have to?

I think this is a much more prevalent line of reasoning than people are willing to publicly admit, honestly.

Let me put it this way: I've never met the fabled starving child who was forced to resort to piracy in order to download a game out of abject poverty who was mentioned in the emulation thread. I have, however, met a multitude of folks from various levels of income and standards of living who had simply adopted the lazy habit of illegally downloading anything they fancied just because they could get away with it and were openly mocking the marks dumb enough to waste their money on the official stuff instead.

I don't want to position myself as a saint here. I've never pirated any film and only a handful of (ancient and region-locked) games in my life, but I did have a phase of downloading music off the internet, mostly out of convenience. Not the sort of stuff I would do nowadays, but I do get how easy it is to fall into that sort of pattern. I also think there are some important geopolitical elements at play.

But sometimes, a cigar is just a cigar. Creators need income to sustain their work. People are miserly and don't like paying for stuff. People are also experts at performing the mental gymnastics needed to justify their own behavior. Simple as that.

[Stanshall]

I definitely pick and choose where my money goes, absolutely, and a big part of it is whether I'll get any more out of them, and how much I like them as people. I buy Berserk for example even though I might as well just bin the books because they are printed on bog paper and I much much prefer to read high res scans. I want the guy to finish the story and stay motivated.

Are we just talking about music here? Would you pirate videogames, for example? If not, why not?

The reason I ask that is because there was never a time when I would have pirated a game. Never. Even when I was full-on torrenting music and films, games always fell into a different category and I honestly don't know why.

Great question. Honest answer is that I would never pirate a Switch game and I've spent a lot on that system. If I could pirate PS4 or XB1, I probably would because a lot of the multiformat games are a gamble for me. As it is, I haven't. On the other hand, I've pirated plenty of 360 games because of region issues. There's no way of me playing Dodonpachi DaiOuJou without buying a Japanese 360 and importing the game for maybe a hundred quid plus. I bought the region unlocked games which were released only in Japan to support Cave games, even though I could have just robbed them.

In the Wii days I lived in China and pirated every game I owned for it. Very hard to buy original games out there. Very easy to buy every pirate game. I got a DS out there too and an R4 cart, downloaded a million games for nothin, zero ethical concerns and again, zero opportunity to buy official releases out there. As soon as I came back though, I've pretty much bought everything since from PS3 onwards. Income is probably the major factor but availability too, as I say. I often wish I'd pirated a lot of Switch games though or been able to refund as with Steam. I've probably spent two grand on shit games which smarts. I've supported the system though and I kind of think like Seinfeld does about fruit, games are a gamble and there's enough info out there to inform your purchases.

[Alex79]

I used to download stuff that I couldn't afford to buy, so that is definitely a thing. It's not an excuse, but then again I'm not trying to excuse myself, just telling it how it was. Nowadays I pay for Spotify so never pirate music at all. I pay for Netflix but will pirate stream a film now and then. Games on the other hand, very rarely. My Vita is hacked and I've downloaded a few things out of pure curiosity that I'd have never have bought in the first place, but played them for five minutes and deleted them. The trouble with piracy, I've come to realise after 20 years on the high seas, is that it truly devalues everything. I'm not sure I've ever finished a game I've illegally downloaded, maybe a few PC games 10+ years ago, but not much. I tend to hack consoles once they become outdated and have a mess around with this and that, but by and large I probably pirate 2% of what I did 10/15 years ago.

[Alex79]

Ouch. I once splashed out for the super deluxe version of Nine Inch Nails 'Ghosts I-IV' album, beautiful cloth covered slip case, about the size of a large book, 2 CDs, bluray and concept art book. It's lovely. It also has a metal NIN logo on the front. Mine came off. I decided to superglue it back on, and dropped a big dollop of glue right on the front of the cloth slipcase.

[Alex79]

Mike Patton has a new album out, a collaboration with French pop legend Jean-Claude Vannier.

What immediately strikes me about the album, 'Corpse Flower', is just how easy it is to listen to. As any Patton fan will know, most of his work outside of Faith No More require a little commitment and effort from the listener in order to fully appreciate it. No such effort is required here, its instantly accessible, and I welcome that.

The record is largely Patton's trademark 'lounge with a tinge of horror' style. There are songs in which he pulls off an almost flawless impersonation of Leonard Cohen, and others that would feel more at home on a Nick Cave album.

I'm not sure whether or not I would put Corpse Flower in front of someone as an introduction to Mike Patton, but for anyone even slightly familiar with any of his side projects or solo work, this really is an essential listen. It stands alongside the very best of Tomahawk, Fantomas and any of the more esoteric stuff he's put out over the last couple of decades. This is Mike Patton doing what he does, but God he's doing it well.

Recommended.

https://open.spotify.com/album/6wsNQ0Gm ... 36LJfzPmzA

[Jon Cheetham]

Ningen Isu, who are three older Japanese dudes who sound like Black Sabbath with lots of Rush, Blackmore and stoner rock influences, with lyrics about Japanese folklore and Buddhism, are putting out a new compilation to celebrate their 30th year as a band.

They uploaded one of two new songs on the collection to Spotify, I got very excited, but seems like it doesn't work in Malaysia as it was greyed out. I ended up buying it through Ototoy - it is called 愛のニルヴァーナ or 'Nirvana of Love'. In keeping with all their output especially recently, it is pretty amazing - tight and groovy rock with bluesy riffs, some cracking guitar leads and very fat, very furry bass noodling away underneath. Whenever they put something new out I have it on repeat and this time is no different. Earlier this year when they released their latest album, I listened to it for the first time on a bus ride through Wakayama.

If you are into your rock and metal, especially stoner and doom metal or classic rock, the upcoming compilation might be a nice introduction. They've got loads of music videos on YouTube now as despite the fact they are only now preparing to tour outside Japan, they or their label Tokuma have been making an effort to make their music more accessible in other countries:
https://t.co/OEUEij01Hs

[duskvstweak]

I was going through Christmas songs by classic rock artists and came across something I've never heard before.

What the hell, Cheap Trick?

[ThirdMan]

I've been properly rinsing Andy Stott's latest release, It Should Be Us, which has been promoted as a follow-up to both Passed Me By and We Stay Together from 2011. Those two releases fascinated me at the time because it was the first forward momentum that dub techno, a notoriously stagnant genre, had experienced in quite a while. He rid himself of his shackles and created something new and completely idiosyncratic. His most critically acclaimed work came afterward but for me those two EPs are his best work so I was bowled over when I heard he was retuning to that sound.

[Alex79]

So I'm back at school and spending every night (every night ) writing assignments and stuff. I've been listening to a hell of a lot of SUNN O)))

Man they're so good. It's just noise. There's only so many times GYBE! can be listened to before you know the albums inside out, so I thought I'd try some new stuff. This is brilliant. Anyone else a fan?

[Alex79]

See, this is just incredible.



BANOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW, DJOOOOOOOOOOW, *horse neighing* DANANOOOOOOOOOOOOW........

[ThirdMan]

So I'm back at school and spending every night (every night ) writing assignments and stuff. I've been listening to a hell of a lot of SUNN O)))

Man they're so good. It's just noise. There's only so many times GYBE! can be listened to before you know the albums inside out, so I thought I'd try some new stuff. This is brilliant. Anyone else a fan?

I wouldn't consider myself a fan but I've come across them and enjoyed what I've heard so far. I'm guessing you came at them via the metal side of things? I first heard them in DJ sets. There aren't many other acts that can bridge that gap.

[Jon Cheetham]

So I'm back at school and spending every night (every night ) writing assignments and stuff. I've been listening to a hell of a lot of SUNN O)))

Man they're so good. It's just noise. There's only so many times GYBE! can be listened to before you know the albums inside out, so I thought I'd try some new stuff. This is brilliant. Anyone else a fan?

Used to listen to Sunn O))) quite a bit. Funnily enough I remember writing essays at uni listening to their Boris collab album Altar, which is amazing. Haven't kept up with them recently but always found it remarkable how much is going on in those gigantic droning walls of feedback if you listen carefully.

[ThirdMan]

Ohh, Tool are finally on Spotify! I never thought I'd live to see the day.

[Alex79]

Yeah, been on there quite a while now!

[ThirdMan]

Yeah, been on there quite a while now!

Ha, really? Either way today is a good day!