Musings on Technology and Culture

In preparation for my book on music collecting, I signed up for emusic and  starting downloading (and paying for) digital music.   At first glance it’s hard to get what emusic is all about. Its website is  slow, you can’t stream  easily, plus there’s a membership fee. You may initially not see what the big deal is (especially because as a non-member, you only see non-member prices). But look further.

Comparison of Prices for Digital Music Albums

 About the prices listed on this table. I wanted to show the dramatic price differences between emusic and everybody else. I picked these albums here at random — making sure to include a mix of Top 40 (Pink, fun) with some rather obscure new works (Kid Koala), obscure semi-oldies (Sleater-Kinney)  classics (Francophonic, Close Encounters) and some series (Rough Guides). As you can see, member prices for emusic are dramatically lower than most other  music sellers. Top 40 and “hot artists” are somewhat lower on Amazon. In addition to these “normal” lower prices for popular albums, Amazon will occasionally offer 1 day sales on bestselling albums for $1.99 or $2.99 which are definitely worth watching.  Google Play store does this occasionally too.  Also, Amazon has a special section for select golden oldies/best sellers  with regular prices of  $5 (“Dolly Parton’s Greatest Hits”,  Jeff Buckley’s “Grace”,  Black Keys’ “Magic Potion”, ) which beats emusic and all the others.  Each  store will have its special sales and promotions, but on the whole, unless the album is currently “hot,”  you can find it on emusic for 10-20%  less than anywhere else.  Emusic has lots of  low-priced compilation albums (see below for my recommendations), and so does Amazon, although not the same ones.  Amazon has a good number of budget classical music compilations, while emusic has more and cheaper  pop music compilations.  Both services offer lots of free samplers,  with Amazon.com probably offering slightly more.

For emusic you pay a membership fee which applies to your purchases. Usually when you sign up, you receive some kind of introductory gift certificate (mine was $25).  You are given several membership tiers, but you shouldn’t worry worry about that too much. Just decide how much want to spend, then sign up for the appropriate membership level. You can downgrade or even cancel later. I’ll let you in on a secret. If you do cancel, they will dangle a free month worth of credits – how awesome is that?  If you sign up for higher tiers of membership, you get bonus credits. If you pay $134 for a yearly membership, you get credits totalling $204.   Emusic’s member  prices are almost always 10-20% lower than itunes and Amazon, and sometimes even more. (Its non-member prices are basically the same as Amazon and itunes).  Besides having cheaper prices, emusic also has a higher percentage of music-savvy consumers. Emusic staff write a lot of  reviews, and these are often great picks – not only for new releases but also  obscure music and jazz stuff.

Here’s the downside.  You don’t get particularly good deals with Top 40 stuff, and you can only download it once or twice. Emusic’s website kind of sucks and it lacks a  cloud solution and doesn’t even stream music well.  So when you download, you must backup your files to Amazon cloud player or Google Play cloud player. Also, there are holes in emusic’s music catalog –  though most of the time it’s only compilations. One customer pointed out that emusic doesn’t list the bit rate for the mp3s — which is also a bummer, but I have to assume that the mp3s for sale are almost always high enough quality.

Before I describe my emusic purchases, I want to make three  general observations about my music collection habits.

First, the things I buy on emusic are things I couldn’t obtain cheaply as CDs.  Hey, music labels, if your digital  prices were cheaper than the cost of used CDs on half.com or Amazon, I would stop buying used CDs altogether.

Second, because of the lower price, I take a lot more chances with the things I download/buy. I’ve made some mistakes (see below), but I’ve also found some amazing things.

Third, I also pay $5 per month to use RDIO’s streaming music service. I can often stream entire albums and later decide whether I want to buy them on emusic.     One might ask if the album is available already on Rdio, why not just listen to Rdio and never  buy anything? The answer is simple: streaming services pay shit to artists!

1. Best Of Mushroom Jazz, Vol 1 – 5 by Mark Farina.  Farina makes these slow and funky jazzscapes full of random samples and spoken words.  It blends together very well, and actually it’s soothing enough that it doesn’t distract.  I have fallen asleep to many of these unending mixes.  I would have rather bought each volume separately, but this is a good sampling. Sometimes things sag and slow down, but  like  Gong’s soundscapes  (see below) it’s always headed  to interesting places. Ultimately, I bought this more for novelty’s sake than any other reason, but I was not disappointed.
2. One Day I’ll Be on Time by The Album Leaf. I have no idea why I bought this ambient instrumental album other than it had a dreamy meditative quality and it still had vestiges of a rock band  (drums, guitar, etc). It’s more mood music than anything melodramatic, but almost every track has a rhythmic energy that keeps things chugging forward.
3. Selections from Hotel Hell and Stand Up and Fight by Richard Lee Wilson.  Richard Lee Wilson is a great blues guitarist  whose rough and roaring melodies will remind you of his idol, Stevie Ray Vaughan.  Highly recommended even though some of his tracks have an uncanny resemblance to Stevie Ray. Hey, sometimes it’s ok to be derivative!
4. Call the Doctor by Sleater-Kinney. Shrill 90s Grrl band. This album was highly recommended in multiple places, but I couldn’t get into it except for maybe 2 or 3 songs.
5. Pirates Choice by Orchestra Baobab. I have become a sucker for anything by this Senegalese band. They combine many styles: mbalax jazz with danceable Cuban rhythm.  A saxophone is front and center of almost each performance, and singers alternate between Spanish and Oolof.  This was a one-session album from the 1980s (“Pirate’s Choice “ ironically refers to how often their albums were being bootlegged). Highlights include   bluesy Ndiaga Niaw and the slow and deliberate Ultrus Horas. Highly recommended.
6. Selected Ambient Works by Aphex Twin (1985-1992): This early electronic album has been called an early groundbreaking work of electronic music. Personally I found it too minimalist for my liking. Not bad, but it had a tinny and cheap techno feel sometimes. It’s certainly a good listen, but it doesn’t compare to the richer symphonic creations of Tangerine Dream (see below).
7. Pragamatic by Praga Khan. Praga Khan provides the turbocharged electronic energy behind the ground-breaking underground band, Lords of Acid. All of his 90s albums are great (I have them as CDs).  Classify under hard-hitting /house/dancey band with a European feel.
8. Rehearsals for Departure by Damien Jurado. One emusic editor recommended this acoustic singer-songwriter, and  for the hell of  it I decided to buy this early album.  Jurado has a distinct and fragile voice, and his  country  songs are rich, tightly written and arranged with traditional harmonica and guitar. I think the poetic  lyrics are more interesting than the melodies (which are slow, lilting and heartfelt). But the whole package is so pleasant and sincere that I am able to overlook the fact that the songs aren’t particularly hummable.
9. Best of Douglas Sahm & Sir Douglas Quartet (1968-1975) .  Tom Moon of 1000 Recordings to Hear before you die ranked this Texan singer’s compilation CD  as one of his fave recordings. Doug Sahm plays a lot of downhome country songs with a slight Tejano and polka  feel. A pleasant addition to the  traditional mix  of instruments is a jazz sax; however, the songs demonstrate a variety of styles and instruments  ranging from rock blues (I’m not that Kat anymore), country ballad (Texas Me), funky pop, and even 50s rock and roll. Everything feels simple and  old-fashioned (even for 70s music) but I think his best songs are these slow, understated  upbeat country songs like Mendocino and Sunday Sunny  Mill Valley Groove Day.
10. Tangerine Dream: The Virgin Years (1974-1978). I was only vaguely familiar with Tangerine Dream, but I heard that their early electronic  stuff was more interesting and intense. This double set includes 4 complete early albums; that’s enough to get an idea about the  ground-breaking stuff they were doing.  The music has enough  momentum and keyboard crescendos to take your breath away.  It’s exhilarating, eerie, perplexing and spacey without sounding too abstruse. Highly recommended.
11. (Real Love) (Optimo Remix)  by Factory Floor.  Here’s a dynamite single track recommended by the NPR music editors.
12. Nothing but the Blues and Texas Swings by Herb Ellis.  Herb Ellis is an easygoing jazz guitarist who plays lovely melodies. His rendition of “American the Beautiful” is one of the most beautiful I’ve heard, and he has collaborated with many immortals (Getz, Hampton, etc). I bought Texas Swings a long time ago, and it was one of my favorite easy listening tapes. Nothing but the Blues is  one of his best  collaborations.
13. Rough Guide to Psychedelic Africa  Rough Guides are a steal (especially on emusic). They usually contain 2 CDs worth of music, and are impeccably chosen. I check out a lot of them from my public library, but this one was conspicuously missing. The featured performer is Nigerian Victor Uwaifo, whose 10 tracks here show the jazzy highlife sound. Other highlights include great tracks by Orchestra Baobab and other performers unknown to the west. Noteworthy about Uwaifo was the prominence of the flute in his mostly guitar-driven songs. By the way, you can subscribe directly to Rough Music albums. 2 albums per month at 10$ a month (minimum 12 months).
14. Submarine Bells by The Chills. Wonderful 80s New Zealand band who play these incredible soft rock ballads. This album is just perfect – lots of different styles, most of it lowkey synth rock with laid back qualities. I’m thinking of the Eagles/Fleetwood Mac/Police, but really I don’t think the US has any real equivalent. Highly Recommended.
15. Shoes – 35 Years: The Definitive Shoes Collection 1977-2012.  I heard a piece on NPR about how the Shoes have basically been ignored by the public despite being loved by music critics. When i heard an excerpt of their  “easy listening” sound,  I thought, “that’s just like The Chills!” I didn’t immediately love this compilation; the sunniness of the songs can grow tedious after a while, and the singer’s voice doesn’t have a lot of emotional range. Songs like Too Late, Girls of Today, Curiosity,  Feel the Way I do and Three Times are interesting  (and catchy) songs, but they feel a little meandering. Over time I have come to appreciate  the fine textures of both the vocals and instrumentation. These songs are not supposed to overwhelm you, but they have surprisingly intricate rhythms and melodies; I just wished the songs were more memorable.
16. Best of “Rock El Casbah” by Rachid Taha. This Algerian singer does a variety of rock and dance styles while preserving the Middle East feel.  I didn’t love this album as much as I thought I would – it seemed too mainstream and pop, but it still had great moments.
17. Classic Titles by Boubacar Traore  Traore is a great singer from Mali, and I forgot why I bought this man’s music.  He sings these  slow and  gorgeous ballads with a solo guitar. His voice is always plaintive and yet the expressive guitar counterbalances the melancholy.  Aside from the fact that the songs from this album all seem to resemble one another,  they are powerful, intense and by far my most remarkable find on emusic. Highly recommended.
18. Live at the Old Quarter by Townes Van Zandt  This live recording is supposed to be Van Zandt’s best album, and it has some interesting qualities – the small talk in between songs for example. Van Zandt has a great voice, and his songs are earnest and gentle – more country than blues. But no particular song stood out in my mind. Contrast that with Steve Goodman’s comedy songs (see below)  whose songs always made me  say, “Wow.” I realize it’s unfair to compare comic songs with serious ones and that I’m supposed to love this intimate presentation of Van Zandt songs.  But to tell the truth, I don’t think any of the songs came close to “moving” me.  Let’s  compare and contrast Boubcar Traore with Townes Van Zandt. They both have beautiful voices and a soulful style; unlike Van Zandt  (who gives the guitar a mostly accompanying role), Traore integrates the guitar deeper into the song and uses it more expressively.  Traore’s guitar almost overshadows his voice in importance to the songs.
19. Very Best of Toot and the Maytals. Imagine Ray Charles or James Brown singing reggae songs. The songs on this compilation album are funky but also seem laid back for reggae; perhaps one could call slower songs like Never Get Weary or In the Dark  gospel or soul. Toot knows how to rock with fast songs like 54-46 That’s my number or Monkey Man or Pressure Drop or Pomps & Pride.  It’s hard to imagine a reggae singer not being overshadowed by Bob Marley’s memory, but these songs seem less political, more about faith and good feelings. To some, this underlying message might seem bland, but at least it shows that Toots is not simply trying to head down the same path Marley did.
20. DJ Rap Presents Propa Classics Volume 1 . I’m a big fan of DJ rap’s stuff from the 1990s, but this isn’t my favorite album of hers.  I really dug Deep Inside and the downtempo Spiritual Aura 2001 (which ended the album). But the faster version of Aura was really fun too, and so was Diggable Bass. Hardstep was funky and good dance stuff. But I thought there was way too much chitter-chatter on tracks in the middle, especially Your Mind and The Lickshot. (Update: I am really liking some of her more recent stuff, including the $1.96  In the Lazers EP).
21. World of Daevid Allen and Gong CD 1 and CD 2  So far I’ve bought 2 CDs of the 3 CD collection which contains the best of Gong from the early 1970s. When I first listened, I admit I wondered if this freeform jazzy/prog stuff was pulling my leg – it just sounds like a long drug trip. But the slow and emerging melodies always go to interesting places. It sounds like a more colorful and less dark Pink Floyd. Highly recommended — just for the experience.
22. Steve Goodman Anthology.  Goodman is a legendary folk singer who sings these fun songs about baseball, TV,  sex, food.  This great compilation album includes lots of great live performances and  hilarious songs with guitar accompaniment. The songs are catchy, upbeat, and clever. This double album costs 11.98 on emusic vs. 17.98 on Amazon.  Highly recommended.
23. Curve EP by Last Charge of the Light Horse . I used to know one of the performers from high school, so it was a treat to hear this album. Jean-Paul Vest has an interesting voice, and the jazzy instrumental touches really make these songs for me. The best and most accessible song is the lyrical Lately track…a real winner. The other pieces are moodier and less about the lyrics or the singing than about the winding instrumentals and silences.
24. Pop På Svenska + Plan 714 Till by Komeda.  Komeda is a great Swedish electronic/punk band that combines dazzling special effects (a la Stereophonic) with strange rhythms and beeps, and lovely warblings by its lead female singer. Their later stuff was more palatable for the masses (one song even was played on a Powderpuff Girl cartoon). But this album (actually 2 albums re-released later ) consists of their juvenalia when they were still experimenting with styles and forms (oh, yes, the singer sang only in Swedish).  This album isn’t perfect, but it is bold and dazzling and even mind-bending.
25. 100 Jazz Essentials  by John Coltrane.  This amazing collection of Coltrane includes both the familiar and unfamiliar. At the low price of $6, it’s a must buy.
26. 100 Disco Hits of the 70s, 80s and 90s .  ($6) Some have criticized this  (and other) collections for not including original recordings. A number are  “one off recordings” (By that, I mean “different recordings of the same song by the same artist). Let’s not split hairs. 75% of the time, I couldn’t tell the difference, plus I enjoyed the grabbag of stuff from three decades which combines the well-known with the obscure.
27. 100 Greatest Gospel Classic.  ($6) I totally loved this collection for $6, although it seemed to emphasize African-American gospel a little too heavily. Sound quality is ok considering that it contains lots of stuff from 30s, 40s and 50s.
28. 100 Greatest Motown Hits . ($6) A lot of “one-off” recordings, plus a lot of singers I’ve never heard of before mixed with Smokey Robinson, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, etc… Still, I enjoyed it.
29. 100 Original Blues Kings.  ($6!) Some of the specific recordings sound terrible, but there’s enough variety and stuff from little known artists to make up for it.
30. Lounge Top 100 ($6) This is my favorite big compilation, especially because I haven’t heard of any of the musicians. Lounge/downtempo jazz is a genre totally unknown to me, populated by lots of South Americans and Europeans. Highly recommended.
31. Number 1 Latin Jazz Album Ever!  (6$) This compilation  of 100 Latin jazz tracks has a lot of odd selections – quite a number from 1940s and Big Band era and Desi Arnaz?  and I suspect that these are quite a few one off recordings. Still it’s a lot of fun.
32. Close Encounters of the Third Kind: Original Soundtrack by John Williams. One late evening I awoke from bed and felt various melodies from Close Encounters flow through my head. Aside from the amazing interplay of the musical motif  between spaceship and humans in the final scene, there is a lot of good incidental music along the way. This soundtrack was nominated for an Oscar for best musical score, but lost to John Williams’ Star Wars soundtrack (which I consider a lesser work by Williams). Of course, these are programmatic symphonic works, but it’s fun to compare and contrast with Holst, Debussy, Ligeti… Highly recommended.
33. Wild Ones by Flo Rida. (recommended by nephew).  This collection of middle-of-the-road  techno-rap tracks   has sweet spots  (especially in the Sweet Spot starring Jennifer Lopez samples, Good Feeling  and Let It Roll tracks).  Clever instrumentals and good and catchy dance tracks, but its repetitive format gets old very quickly. Also,  it seems a victim of the loudness wars; everything is at a constant volume and can be exhausting on the ears. I think the duets between Flo Rida and females work especially well, and as long as you don’t listen too often to these tracks, they will seem great.
34. Overexposed by Maroon 5 (recommended by nephew). These songs are described on allmusic as “soul groove,” and that’s as fair a category as any (although it inevitably includes some electronic kicks).  Highlights include: Daylight and Lucky Strike  and Sad (an interest  slow number). This album sounded a little too fashionable and prosaic for my tastes and really didn’t leave much of an impression on me.
35. Some Nights by fun.(recommended by nephew).  I was pleasantly surprised at how engaging this pop album is.  The main vocalist Nate Reuss reminds me of Freddy Mercury — naked, boyish, expressive, full of attitude (though not as histrionic as Queen). The songs are catchy, never overproduced and always have interesting lyrics.  The sunny Why am I the one? sounds so much like the Afternoon Delight/Sara Smile  easy listening of the 1970s that it’s refreshing to hear something so unapologetically retro.
36. Various albums by Sergent Garcia.  I saw French-born Cosmopolitan singer perform at a Brazilian international festival in Houston. He and his band sung in so many genres that I had trouble catching up. I ended up buying $8 of his 49 cent songs from 3 different albums, and got some great stuff especially from the Mascaras album. He fuses reggae with salsa and cumbia and everything else and a rapid rapping vocal accompaniment. They were amazing in live performance. Highly recommended because of the band’s  versatility.
37. Nortec Collective Presents Clorifila: Corridos Urbanos is a great and funky  series of electronic jazz pieces with occasional cameos from horns and accordians. Everything has a tribal/ industrial/synthesized feel to it, but the occasional vocals (Naked Ladies), and the dreamy  downtempo songs (Nicole Ya No Baila Aqui and 4:15) make it clear you can’t categorize this album very easily.  This complex pieces are actually collages of Mexican folk with electronic bursts and lots of percussion (almost too much at times).  Highly recommended if only because of their ground-breaking sound.
38. Politico by Mexican Institute of Sound

I want to mention some other titles which I bought on Amazon, Google Play and other indie sites. Generally, emusic has everything cheaper, but Amazon has some amazing prices on compilation albums and occasionally “flash sales” for 1 day on Top 40 albums.

1. Anthology by The Clean. I bought this amazing double album for $7 on Google Play when it was on sale. (now it’s selling for $11.50).  The Clean is an important New Zealand alternative band who at times  resembles  a good rowdy grunge/garage band (Side On, At the Bottom), and at other times sounds like 60s  psychodelic pop. Try the mind-blowing Outside the Cage, Point that Thing.  Franz Kafka at the Zoo.  I guess they’re a kind of Velvet Underground, only smarter and more  obsessed with producing good guitar riffs than meaningful vocals. I liked this album so much that I listened to it continuously for 3 or 4 days and did not feel bored once.  Highly recommended.

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