There's little doubt in my mind that you've heard this song before: "Day 'n' Nite," by Kid Cudi. Heck, you've probably also heard the remix a million times as well. Moreover, I'm willing to bet you've known about this track for six months, or even a year.
What's crazy is that this video is only five days old. But you know the song, because you're reading blogs like this one on a regular basis; you're interactive with your music, you want to know what's popping before it pops.
You, the eager listener, are what's known as an early adopter. DJs and industry folks are the tastemakers of popular music -- we hear it first, and if we like it, we'll let you know about it. The early adopters are second-in-line in this hierarchy of music discovery; they want to know what's out there as soon as possible, so that when you finally hear it on the radio, you can look cool and tell your friends, "oh, that song is old. I loved it...last year!"
Early adopters used to be few and far between...but with music blogs and social networking becoming more commonplace by the second, the gap between tastemaker and early adopter (and consequently, early adopter and casual listener) is shrinking at an exponentially rapid level.
As far as quality of music goes, I think this is a good thing. We can weed out the crap more quickly, enjoy what we like, and point our proverbial middle finger at the rest.
On the other hand, the ridiculous speed at which we get our information is killing our attention spans; we're less likely than ever to fully dissect a song for all it has to offer. We know 30% of the lyrics to 2,000 songs, instead of 100% of 200.
If you haven't seen or heard Kid Cudi's instant classic, you're a casual fan. We hope you enjoy the song, we really do! But to us, you're a wee bit behind.
1 comment:
Post a Comment