Dear music industry, give me permanence, or I won't give you money!
This is not going to be like most of my blog posts.
I am going to go on a huge rant about why I love cds & HATE the idea of streaming music as our only options.
Before I start that, I should give a little personal background on this subject.
My dad is what I like to call a musical connoisseur. He has thousands of records, cassettes, and cds. Many, he has 2 or more copies of, cause, "1 for listening, 1 for collecting, 1 if something happens to the other two."The variety of music that my father likes is huge. In high school, when you rebel by listening to music your parents hate, I had no choice but to choose gangsta rap, cause my dad liked everything else. I still love my rap, but my dad's openness to music has worn on me as I've gotten older. If he taught me one thing, it is to be choosy with what musicians you choose to support monetarily. I grew up in the 90s/early 2000s, when digital music was just coming out, before piracy was realized.
My dad made clear that you pay for the music you love, you rent from the library music you like, and you don't pirate music.
This has stuck with me to this day. I have a list of top 10 artists that I love. It is VERY HARD to get on this list, and VERY HARD to get kicked off. The rest of this letter is directed at those 10.
*Sidenote*my music taste is just as varied as my father's, no judgement here.*
In no certain order:
1. Steve Earle
2. Young Jeezy
3. T.I.
4. Tom Petty
5. Paul Thorn
6. Brantley Gilbert
7. Eric Church
8. Black Lillies
9. The Bottle Rockets
10. Taylor Swift - sorry Dad, I love her, and if ANY artist is going to listen me, my bets are on her.
To my favorite ten artists, please don't release future albums on streaming services only. I BEG OF YOU! If you do, I will no longer support you. I know some of these artists/bands, I don't have to worry about. T.I., for example, I own every studio album you ever released. I want to give you my money, but I won't give in to streaming services if you go that route.
My issues with streaming services:
1. I don't have a credit card, and I can't afford monthly charges. I can save for a one time CD / digital download purchase. PLUS, if ya'll release on different platforms, that's more charges.
2. I don't want to support a streaming service. I want my hard-earned $ to go to you. I know it's like pennies of my monthly charge going to other artists on the platform, but still.
3. Spotify, you are the absolute worst and I will NEVER pay for you. "The next 30 minutes are ad free thanks to this brief message", is the biggest bullshit lie ever.
4. I want to own the music. If I pay for it, I want it on my cloud, or my hard drive.
What happens when spotify goes out of business in ten years cause some hot, new service took over?
I'm only 28. I want to be able to enjoy your music when I'm fucking 90. That's why you're on my top ten.
So what am I asking of you? I would love if ya'll would keep making CDs or records, but I realize that may not be viable in the future, so I'm willing to reason with you. If you're going to deprive me of have the CD book in my hand, to show my grandkids when I'm 80, then I want something I can keep, like a digital download offered directly through your website. I want to give you my money, I want a file I can download to my computer, than transfer to all my devices. I want to put it on my music hard drive, I want to put it on my phone, I want to make a road trip cd that's mixed up with all of your songs.
I love you all, I feel like we're friends. You don't know this, but we've all been together through some tough parts of my life. I want to continue to support you. I want to continue going through life with your music. If you release an album with only streaming options, you will lose this fan.
