Editorial

I spent much of this Thanksgiving weekend on Spotify listening to the 14-year discography of Thee Silver Mt. Zion Band (alternately, A Silver Mt. Zion, Thee Silver Mt. Zion Orchestra, and even Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra and Tra-La-La Band), which brings me to my current problem with music - there's simply too much of it.

First of all, don't mistake this for a criticism of Silver Mt. Zion.  Quite the opposite.  The music I streamed this weekend was moving, emotional, beautiful and inspiring.  My complaint is I don't have time to listen to it more.

I could very easily become a single-minded Silver Mt. Zion fan and listen to their music exclusively or near exclusively, taking time to listen to their parent band, Godspeed! You Black Emperor, too, but today I stumbled across Jim James' fine 2013 album Regions of Light and Sound of God. I had listened to it once, maybe twice, and then saw James in concert and after that moved on to the next thing, and I had forgotten what a magnificent achievement that album was.  If I were to limit myself too narrowly, I'd miss out on so much more, but if I open the doors too wide, I can barely find the time to enjoy everything that comes in.

I download music faster than I can listen to it all.  I download mixes of MP3s from CMJ and the other usual web sites (StereoGum, Gorilla Vs. Bear, etc.) and can barely find the time to listen to their choices once, much less remember which of the bands I liked and which left me just "meh," or listen to something new and different enough times to acquire a taste for it.

I've downloaded whole albums I haven't even listened to yet, and the backlog gets longer and longer by the month and I don't think I'll ever catch up.  Meanwhile, I can barely keep up with my YouTube subscriptions and listening recommendations.  KEXP releases near daily videos of live sets, including all of their Icelandic discoveries, and I simply don't have the time to keep up with it all, much less with their (and KCRW's and The Current's) song-of-the-day downloads.  Thank goodness that radio's moribund because I wouldn't have any time left for that, and while I would like to stream Atlanta's independent WRAS from time to time, where's the time?  I re-load my poor iPod faster than I can listen to it, removing "old" tunes from last month that I hadn't even heard yet for "new" tunes I'll probably never get a chance to play.

Which brings us back to Spotify, which is overwhelming in and of itself,  With close to every song you ever wanted to hear instantly available only one click away, am I the only one who either creates or downloads a playlist, and finds oneself listening to perhaps 15 or 30 seconds of each song before skipping to the next? Who's got time to listen to the whole song?  There are other songs on the list, other lists in the queue, other streaming services to listen to, zip files of albums and mixes to unpack, songs of the day to explore, old albums to reconnect with, CDs and LPs that haven't been played in months, and bands to go out and hear each night, not to mention 15-minute-long compositions by Silver Mt. Zion to savor. Help!

My options are to either restrict myself and decide that I like x and y (where x is a genre and y a particular band in that genre) and be content to listen to that and only that, or to keep clogging up my hard drive space with gigabyte after gigabyte of music to which I may never listen and wonder what it is that I'm missing.  Alternately, I can quit my job and give up what little social life I have left and just listen to music 24/7, but then I wouldn't be able to afford the internet access for the streaming services or the electricity to power my players.

The irony of complaining about getting too much of something that one likes - and generally free or near-free at that - is not lost on me.  It's like hearing some celebrity complain about getting too much money and sex, or a child complain that he or she got too much candy on Halloween.

I'm curious to hear how others deal with this problem, or if they even perceive of it as a problem at all.