I Think I'm In the Wrong Room

I finally saw Wall-E last night. It was unexpectedly good. I’ve never had any intention of seeing it, but I’m glad that I did. I like action in my movies as much as the next guy. But Wall-E was a great example of how good a movie can be that doesn’t have any violence in it. Sure the captain wrestles with his steering wheel, but that isn’t too much. It just goes to show that violence, even tame violence via Disney, isn’t needed in movies. Aahh…the conundrum of the American male. I think that violence is wrong and we would do well to avoid glorifying it and only present it in a horrifying manner. But what would our TV, movies and video games be without it? The conflict presented these media would be less dull. But perhaps that would foster more creativity in writing. Imagine a world where writers have to think of a way to challenge the audience, to challenge their characters without presenting violence in a glorified manner. Sure, violence is a part of human nature. But I don’t see why that can’t be changed. I feel that this is the right way to proceed, but do I actually want it to happen? Let’s file this one under hypocrisy and let it be. I need to move on. I’ve got some bandits to kill in my video games.

There has been talk going around about the major record labels selling a new file format (.CMX) starting in November. This format will essentially replace the album. You purchase the file from them and get MP3s, lyrics, videos, art, etc. From what I understand, they don’t plan on pushing it very much. They are just going to put a few releases out in this format to test the waters.

Apple is working on their own version, called Cocktail that will directly compete with the major labels. Additionally, the .CMX file format will not be compatible with iPods. This whole thing sounds like a mess to me.

This all stems from the idea that the album as an organizing principle is dead. More and more, people are buying single songs online and not albums.

All of this got me thinking. Perhaps the album is a dying concept. But the major labels and Apple are right to attempt to resuscitate it. I feel that some sort of organizing principle is needed.

As a musician, I release albums that contain a theme. Sometimes, I can’t get out what needs to be said in a single song. Thus a new theme album is born. All of the songs that I write that don’t fit a theme, or tell a whole story from start to finish are released singly.

Another problem I have with the lack of an organizing principle is that songs won’t be bundled together into one product anymore. If a new fan comes along and ten years of songs aren’t bundled in any way, it will take them a long time to acquire that band’s catalog. Is it worth it to spend so much time downloading it all, even if it’s a free download? Probably not.

My solution to this issue is to release albums and single songs. After I have a good amount of single songs, I bundle them together into a compilation of sorts for ease of acquisition.