John Mayer Announces Guitar Plugins

John Mayer
Jason Tate

Neural DSP has announced a collaboration with John Mayer for a new guitar plugin series.

John opened the doors to his personal recording studio in Los Angeles and entrusted us with his most prized tools. These are the pieces at the very center of his sound, refined through constant use and chosen from an extraordinary collection. Distilling that world into a single, uncompromising plugin was one of the most demanding and rewarding collaborations we have ever undertaken.

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YouTube Pulls Out of Billboard Charts

YouTube
Jason Tate

YouTube has announced it’s pulling its data from Billboard’s charts:

Billboard uses an outdated formula that weights subscription-supported streams higher than ad-supported. This doesn’t reflect how fans engage with music today and ignores the massive engagement from fans who don’t have a subscription.

Paul Resnikoff, writing for Digital Music News, has the argument for why YouTube should change, not Billboard:

That logic goes something like this: more dedicated, paying fans – and their purchases – are far more valuable to the music industry and its artists, songwriters, publishers, and labels than freebie ad-supported ones. And the charts should reflect that.

The rest is just making up the numbers to fit. Paid stuff feeds the music industry, and accordingly, it weighs more heavily in the rankings. It’s logical enough.

Just one problem: in that framework, YouTube will never be a heavy chart influencer compared to other streaming platforms and formats. The harsh reality is that YouTube Music, once a promising paid platform, never materialized as a serious competitor to Apple Music or Spotify – and with the music subscription market now maturing, it’s unlikely to catch up.

The Maine Dish on New Album

The Maine
Jason Tate

The Maine recently announced some tidbits about their upcoming album on a Pillar livestream. A recap includes:

The only thing left to finish are John’s vocals, which he’s knocking out right now. Two songs are already in the final mixes stage. The album cover is finished; “it’s not all green”, says Garrett.

Can Quitting Streaming Music Bring You Closer to It?

Jason Tate

Craig Manning recently shared an article from Matt Schimkowitz of the AV Club in the forums discussing how quitting streaming services helped save the author’s relationship with music:

The albums are the same, but on streaming, there’s no friction between acquiring an album and listening to it. Low-effort acquisition led to low-effort consumption, and as soon as I put even the slightest bit of work into it, I found more to love. Reading liner notes, admiring album art, and loading a CD into the $30 burner we bought after canceling all made a bigger impression than replaying the same tired playlists I would turn to when decision paralysis made choice impossible. After all, a smaller collection is more welcoming to the lost art of letting an album grow on you. If I took the time to seek out music, be it at the library, the record store, or on Bandcamp, I would be more likely to connect with it.

As a whole I enjoyed the piece. The underlying idea is a good one: spending more time with music, letting it grow on you, letting it be a part of your life, and not becoming just a passive listener to music are all good ideas. It’s one of the reasons I love spending time with vinyl records. There’s a part of collecting, of the intentionality of the process of buying a record, spending time with it and only it, that really resonates with me. It reminds me of the joy of getting a new album when I was younger and the entire experience.

But I’m not ready to give up my streaming service just yet.

I still like using it for music discovery and it’s still very much how I do the most of my listening. But I still curate my “Apple Music” collection in a similar way as I did my old iPod/iTunes one. Cleaning up metadata. Collecting extra album tracks and b-sides. And being (trying to be) diligent about what I actually add to my collection. I’ve found just trying to be more present with my music has helped. Giving favorite artists the multiple listens they deserve. Spending time with full albums vs playlists or shuffling tracks. This is how I’ve stayed connected with music over the years.