Music
- Circle of Dust
- Between the Buried and Me
- August Burns Red
- Black Sun Empire
- Clubroot
- Underoath
- Living Sacrifice
- Kardashev
- Opeth
- Brainchild (tie)
- Front Line Assembly (tie)
- 2023: Submotion Orchestra (downtempo, trip-hop, jazz)
- 2022: Kardashev (progressive atmospheric deathcore)
- 2021: clipping. (industrial rap)
- black metal
- chamber music
- dark ambient
- doom metal
- folk
- “Un 2023” contains all tracks released this year that have neither been listened to nor skipped
- “Unloved” contains all non-holiday 5-star/loved/favorited songs that haven’t been played in the last year
- “Unskipped” is a little more inclusive version of unloved, but limited to 1 GB of music (chosen by recently added): all non-holiday unskipped, undisliked songs not played in the last year
- “Untouched” is a little more inclusive version of un 2023, but limited to 1 GB of music (chosen by recently added): all non-holiday songs that haven’t been listened to, skipped, or rated
- I like that it shows listening charts based on time not tracks
- Some parts of the system seem to favor albums, and others tracks, and I can’t figure out the design principle yet
- Scrobbling seems to work ok, though there are some mismatches due to the “enhancement” they do to artist/title
- Arc is supposed to work off-network, but looks like it doesn’t without some extra networking work (similar to Plex)
- However, Roon may handle scrobbling better on Arc downloads than PlexAmp downloads (i.e. counting them when it reconnects). I haven’t 100% verified this, yet (For PlexAmp, you have to trick it by playing from a playlist that you happen to have downloaded, instead of playing the download, and then it will sync on reconnect)
- Genre choices are little interesting at times, but it seems things may at least get multiple genres? Not sure on that, either.
- It’s not clear how tagging works or what it adds aside from the other options
- A little lack of clarity around how library is managed when you have some local files and some streaming tracks (e.g. Tidal) that are related, or when you have incomplete albums
🎶🕊️ Pastor Monica writing about tohu va’vohu this morning. (Genesis, Jeremiah)
I think she did it better.
Let there be light!
🎶 Tracking Artists by 5-Star Tracks
I usually use last.fm to look at my top artists by number of plays. Today, I decided to look at who have the most ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ tracks in my library. It came out like this:
A couple of these are in my all-time top-listened artists (August Burns Red, Front Line Assembly) but many of them aren’t. Some of that is because my top-listened artists have great albums that get a lot of plays. Others (like BtBaM and Opeth) might not be at the top because their songs are so long and account for fewer plays per time listened. Others (Kardashev) are newer to me.
Also, as usual, Rhys Fulber and Klayton would rocket off the top of charts if each stuck to one project name. Klayton (already at #1, #10, and remixer of some of #7) would be even higher if I threw in Argyle Park, AP2, Celldweller, and early work with Klank. Rhys Fulber (#11) would be in second place if we included self-titled work, Fear Factory mixes & remixes, and Noise Unit.
I think I’ll revisit this view again after I get more tracks in my library rated.
Who hold the most 5-star tracks in your library?
🎶 I feel like I owe an explanation about my recent black metal post:
I like a lot of strange music (see picture), but what I don’t care for is the “wall of fuzz” sound that a lot of black metal makes. It’s uninteresting and tiresome.
The ones I do enjoy have a little something extra going on.
🎶 Let’s say somebody listens to a lot of metal but finds most black metal tedious, with a few exceptions like:
What would you recommend to them for more non-tedious black metal?
🎶 PlexAmp has this concept of “artist moods” and I haven’t used it much. But tonight I was looking at Clubroot and decided to click on “Ominous” and maybe this is my musical vibe?
🎶 You can also find an apple music playlist of the top tracks released in 2023 on my profile.
🎶 2023 Listening Report
I was going to write a special report, but I received a helpful summary from last.fm (link).
Pictured is the summary-of-the-summary.
📺🎶 Olivia Rodrigo
From boring mumble-song to what might be one of those most iconic SNL performances ever, that was quite the range.
I can’t remember ever being that torn between two SNL performances.
🎶 I keep finding bands where I’m like “how have I never heard of them before, I’m getting their whole back catalog and listening to them all the time!”
🎶 I enjoy some good genre-labels nonsense, and this album delivers (and mostly accurately).
🎶 Update: I’m back on Plex(Amp) and will be working on my setup this weekend.
One thing I really love is the artist mix builder. I like to start a little mashup and create a radio station.
This artists seed created an incredible electro-awesome mix.
🎶 while I’m at it, talking about listening habits, here is what came out on top in November:
🎶 How I'm listening lately
I’m in the process of re-building my Plex ecosystem. In the interim, I’ve either been listening to straight albums or playing from my iTunes library using this structure:
What this means…
“Un” is a folder of four auto-updating smart playlists. I shuffle the whole thing to listen (and of course, scrobble to last.fm).
What it creates…
Overall, this is a mixture weighted toward top songs along with some “discovery” of recent music and recent adds to my library. It works very well with limited “management” of the music.
🎶 Periodic reminder that clipping. performed a really really tiny desk concert with NPR / SXSW and it was weird and incredible.
🎶 For me, Strain is the quintessential sound of industrial music.
Now, after 20 years, Flesh Field are back with a new album, Voice of the Echo Chamber. Eager to check this out.
Believing falsehoods because those falsehoods reinforce our preferred narratives is not harmless. Promoting falsehoods to benefit your faction is not harmless, particularly in a well-armed society. If we remain locked in our own echo chambers, inevitably there will a voice of the echo chamber that speaks in the language of mass murder, believing it justified. This album describes that tragic inevitability.
🎶 For all we know, this could be the last bandcamp friday so get out there and support your artists before artist-friendly music purchasing is dead.
🎶 Roon Trial: Day 1 (vs. Plex/PlexAmp)
Doing a Roon trial after @rcrackley brought it to my attention, again.
Quick Day 1 notes:
So far, not at all worth the 3x (monthly) to 7x (lifetime) cost increase over Plex/PlexAmp (especially considering you get many other functions with Plex unrelated to music, as well as a discount on your Tidal monthly subscription).
🍺🎶 Upland X Haste the Day: Haze the Day
(Hazy IPA, obviously)
🎶 it’s 2.5 years old now, but this was a powerful performance:
🎶 Has anybody made a solid Bandcamp download/archive tool?
I have over a thousand releases on Bandcamp and am worried about them going away.
I download them as I get them, but it would be good to do a single archive.