My family & I had been living in L.A. for the last 5 years, but a couple of months into the pandemic we packed up & moved out. We spent the winter in the mountains around Tahoe but in the spring we moved to Todos Santos on Baja, Mexico.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I run a startup I co-founded called ROSTR<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019re a modern version of the music industry directory. We\u2019re currently tracking 150k+ relationships across the music industry between artists & around 10K labels, agencies & management companies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Music has taken a slight back-seat to soccer in the last month as I\u2019ve had a lot of the Euro championships on in the background! Otherwise very recently I\u2019ve had the return of Kings of Convenience<\/a> and Polo & Pan<\/a>\u2019s new record on a lot. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Part of what we do at ROSTR is keep an eye on up & coming artists. So I tend to be across a lot of new music (almost by osmosis). <\/p>\n\n\n\n But, I\u2019m actually more in a zone right now where I\u2019m digging into catalogues of indisputably great artists who I haven\u2019t spent nearly enough time with (vs trying to find some hot new artist on a playlist).<\/p>\n\n\n\n I spent almost a decade at Spotify, which I joined after becoming obsessed with the service, so I\u2019m definitely a streamer by default. <\/p>\n\n\n\n However, I find myself increasingly listening to digital radio. I feel like my ~10 years of listening history on Spotify has dug a deep algorithmic hole. So I\u2019m leaning more on traditional radio curation, on great stations like BBC 6Music, to help me climb out of it & into more variance \/ serendipity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I\u2019m leaning more on traditional radio curation”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Mostly when working, which these days is from a spare bedroom in an AirBnB.<\/p>\n\n\n\n These days, I don\u2019t really. I had enough pre-release links sent to me in my Spotify days to last me multiple lifetimes \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n\n\n\n My biggest frustration with digital music & the way DSPs & streaming have evolved in general is that there\u2019s been such a de-emphasis on \u201cyour library\u201d. Spotify has recently made some improvements but you can probably still get better library functionality if you spun up an old PC with Winamp on it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I don\u2019t think this is entirely unintentional either. Every DSP & music service out there wants to be able to \u201cdrive streams\u201d. They want to have promotional power. They do this by shifting your behavior so you\u2019re more likely to listen to \ud83d\udd25 HOT NEW PLAYLIST\u2122<\/strong> that they control than that album you found that you might really love if only you gave it 2-3 more listens. <\/p>\n\n\n\nWhat are you listening to?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
How do you discover new music?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
What formats do you usually listen to? LP, CD, Cassette, Digital, Streaming Services? Why?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Where do you do most of your music listening?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
How do you find and listen to pre-release music?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
What are your frustrations with listening to music digitally? Any benefits?<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n