On Being A Music Neophile

If you’re walking down the street looking down at your Doc Martens, your destination is going to be pretty limited. You might get down the street a couple blocks, providing you aren’t hit by a car before then. But when you look up, you start to see the city around you. You notice the bus stop across the street, the Bird scooter on the curb, the the cars whizzing by, the plane climbing upwards overhead. The possibilities of destination become endless.

I’ve been wondering recently how much I need to keep up with new music. Why do I default to listening to what’s new without thinking twice about it? Wouldn’t I have better, more diverse creative ideas if I listened to all kinds of music from across all time and I wasn’t just drawing inspiration from the latest hits? The same applies with any art form, really. Is it wise for an author to only read what is currently on the New York Times Best Seller list, or would it be more worth their time to dive into the classics or even a great book from five years ago? In the music industry, it’s tempting to always be up on the now, the top hits, the viral, the latest songs released on Spotify’s New Music Friday, or that new song blowing up on Tik Tok. It can feel dangerous to be out of the know, but isn't it also dangerous to miss out on what the rest of history has to offer?

Sure, lots of people complain that everything sounds the same right now, but if everyone listens to the same stuff, downloads the same samples on Splice–of course it’s all going to start to sound similar. Yes, one of my favorite parts of what I do and love about the music industry, is scouting and finding new artists. But I think I’m going to dive back into my record collection this year, chase new (old) rabbit trails, do a deep dive into Psychedelic Soul from Latin America, or maybe I’ll just spend some more time with Dylan.