Evolution of music consumerism – a short trip through time

1. The old age: no musician, no music. As simple as that, unless you count singing in the bathroom as music.

2. The phonograph age: rich people could have professionally played music whenever they wanted to hear it.

3. The radio age: songs were heard by a wider audience. Ordinary people started to hear recorded music too.

4. The vinyl album age: ordinary people could save up and have music whenever they wanted to hear it.

5. The cassette tape age: listening to the radio, waiting until your favorite song comes along, and press record quickly (usually missing the first part of the intro or having the DJ talking through it) – OR : record your favorite songs from your friend who has the vinyl album. Includes the ‘walkman age’: cassette tape player that you carry with you, youths wearing headphones on the bus. Relatively poor people could have music whenever they wanted to hear it.

6. The CD age: sound quality improved, no fiddling anymore to put the needle by hand exactly where the song is that you want to hear. No more scratched vinyl causing repeats in the middle of the song, or disabling the song altogether. If you couldn’t afford a CD, you would record a CD from a friend on a cassette tape.

7. The mp3 age: anyone with an internet connection could download any song they want for FREE if they knew where to get it. Carriers (USB and SD cards) grew fast in capacity. Having 1000 songs was nothing special anymore, plus u could carry this number of songs anywhere with you. Quadrupled the number of youths walking around wit headphones, made the ‘walkman age’ look like a joke.

8. The Youtube age: why bother downloading any mp3, if you can access Youtube to hear any song you want on your phone, wherever you are?

9. The next stage, which I simply cannot predict. All I know is: it will be coming soon.

Doc Jazz