Things are beginning to come, once again, full circle. Just like the 50s and 60s, when pop music was just coming out of its infancy and "single" records determined the breadth of your dominion over your peers, the emphasis these days is no longer on the full-length album.
Album sales are falling and the completion of any kind of album, in the classic album mentality, is rapidly going out of style. YouTube and the ever popular forms of music downloading only continue to foster the music industry into a singles market. Anybody know T.I. King? His album was titled the 3rd best of 2006 by PitchforkMedia, yet what do we all know him for? His one popular song, "What You Know About That?"
Don't even get me started on Gnarl's Barkley's "Crazy". If anybody has heard the entirety of St. Elsewhere, please review it for me. Let me know if it was worth the pain of watching Cee-Lo belt out "Crazy" in every eclectic style he can muster.
What of the concept album then? Think of all the recent concept albums that have made it big (and I mean REALLY been a hit). I don't think there are that many. Sufjan Stevens' Illinoise got good reviews, but it was something of an underground indie-darling.
Anyway, the NY Times sums it up better than I can. This is hardly new news anyway.
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2 comments:
Sufjan Stevens I would argue is a bit more than an underground indie-darling. But you are correct. Concept albums have gone under.
I remember reading an interview with Thom Yorke a few years back and this is what he said:
"It's always been album, album, album," he says, adding that he believes the music business will be forced to change because the way people listen to music is changing. "Things like iTunes and people splitting up tracks," he says. "I kind of think that's good. I listen to music on random all the time."
Cheers.
Good call. I retract the "underground" from Sufjan description at this point.
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