Where are you based?
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Where do you work? What do you do?
I am the author of the book Earn It: Unconventional Strategies for Brave Marketers (launching October 1st, available for pre-order now) and a consultant working with the creative industries and entrepreneurs on content and business strategy.
What are you listening to?
It’s summer in British Columbia, which is pretty much the nicest place on Earth at this time of year, and my music taste caters to the sunshine and warm weather. I am listening to everything from the Beach Boys to Kasey Musgraves and from Wolf Parade to Noah Kahan. It’s an eclectic mix that channels summer energy.
How do you discover new music?
This is such a great question and thinking about it made me realize how many ways I hear about new music. I have a 21-year-old daughter who is a passionate music nerd with eclectic multi-genre taste – she lives with headphones in her ears. She texts me links to songs and whenever we are in the car, she demands to be the DJ in charge of CarPlay, so I discover a LOT of music through her.
Speaking of Car Play, I have Spotify on in the car almost all the time. Whether it is a suggested playlist, a suggested artist, or their AI DJ (which I thought I would hate, but don’t mind too much), I algorithmically get suggested a lot of music in the app itself.
I definitely find music on social media – I have discovered a lot of music on TikTok (even though I’m old…), and I have enough friends who are musicians or who work in the music industry that I get a lot of suggestions or alerts about new music on my feeds.
What formats do you usually listen to? LP, CD, Cassette, Digital, Streaming Services? Why?
I listen to Spotify primarily because it’s on my phone, so I’m out on a walk, exercising, driving, on a plane, or anything like that, Spotify is my default.
I have a vinyl collection and turntable in my living room and love it. It’s such a treat having full albums to listen to as a change from playlists and I appreciate the rich analog sound of vinyl.
I haven’t listened to a CD in years and it’s been even longer since I had anything that even played a cassette.
“Even though I use them, it feels like algorithms are taking over everything and that it is harder and harder to find trusted human curation.”
Where do you do most of your music listening?
It’s a split between vinyl in the living room at home and tethering my phone to my car and using Spotify via Car Play. Both options have pretty good speakers and I like turning it up… although not as loud as my daughter likes it!
How do you find and listen to pre-release music?
I am ashamed to admit that I almost never listen to the radio anymore. I get a lot less pre-release music than I used to when I worked at CBC Radio 3 and CBC Music! However, I am fortunate enough that I still have a few musician friends that send me early versions of songs and rough demos, which is a real joy. I feel like I have been trusted with a valuable secret every time I get one!
What are your frustrations with listening to music digitally? Any benefits?
Even though I use them, it feels like algorithms are taking over everything and that it is harder and harder to find trusted human curation. There is a real art to finding, curating, and programming music and it feels like that has been lost in the digital music era.
I also get annoyed that a lot of tracks disappear – I have old playlists I made and half the songs on them are just gone. What happened the long tail and infinite shelf space? 🙂
Finally, as a podcast nerd, I am frustrated that there is no easy legal way to make music podcasts. If the music and podcasting industries could figure it out, it would be a boon for both of them, for musicians, and for music fans. Curation and discovery would flourish.
How do you keep track of everything you are listening to?
I make playlists and just keep adding songs to the playlists when I find new ones. When I’m on the run or in the car, I will “heart” songs that come up that pop for me so I can find them again later. And if my daughter plays me a song, I’ll get her to text it to me so I can add it to a playlist.
Do you tip other people off to new music? How?
I don’t do it very much, to be honest. I have a few public playlists – I made a playlist of my favourite songs from when I was at CBC Radio 3 and made it public and a bunch of people found it somehow. But that’s unfortunately about it!
Anything you want to “promote”?
I have no stake in this, but the album I listened to most in 2023 was Whitehorse’s country record, “I’m not crying, you’re crying.” I loved the track, “If the loneliness don’t kill me (then the good times surely will)” and played it way too many times.
I am also really enjoying the TransCanada Highwaymen supergroup and their first K-Tel style album of classic Canadian covers (discovered through Grant Lawrence at CBC…) – their version of Rock Me Gently is awesome.
