I've been using Deezer (a Spotify equivalent - but with better recommendations IMHO) to stream music at work and downloading the albums I want to listen to offline onto mobile. This still seems a bit strange to me. For £10 a month, I can have as many albums on my phone as I want? I initially wondered if I was contributing to the decline of the music industry. And then I got used to doing it. It's so easy.
But it doesn't feel like it's mine. I'm trapped between ecosystems. I want to take tracks from albums I've found on Deezer and integrate into my iTunes playlist but I can't. Initially I was angry at Apple for getting me hooked on their product, but now I'm starting to work out why the service is only £10pm. I never actually own the music. (note to self, iTunes only licenses you the music...)
So I find myself going back to iTunes, why? I wanted the new Vampire Weekend album. I knew enough about it that I wanted to own it. I can commit that I want to use it on various devices, in various playlists and when I'm dead and buried, I want it to be in my belongings that my grandchildren go through, get inspired and bring back their style in the 22nd century.
I then realised that I actually want the old iTunes. The new version is simply something I can't understand. I feel 30 years older when trying to find where everything is. The old version wasn't particularly clever, but it was intuitive. I clicked and dragged files in random places to see if they'd appear on my phone. Luck rather than skill helped me here.
The anger returned. Why should I continue this commitment to Apple when every download further commits me to their platform? I don't particularly hark for the physical format. I don't want to wait for music to arrive, I don't have time/inclination to goto shops and I don't want to get into the argument about "you've got too many CDs". But why must I feel that I'm contributing to some evil empire when I buy?
What I want is an independent record store feel online. I want to be able to find a site that has the depth of Rough Trade, but the ability to buy and download all albums, not just a handful. I want to have people dedicated to the music making intelligent suggestions, not iTunes suggesting I might like the new Kasabian album or grinding my computer to a halt with Genius. Twitter Music sounded exciting, but has ultimately revealed that as much as they may think it, musical tastes should not be predicted via an algorithm (or based on people who you have a small overlap of interest with). The player we use should then be agnostic, files then sync seamlessly across all devices.
This is where I should announce the revolutionary new music service that I'm launching. But I'm not, I fear that the barriers to entry are too high (I'm too lazy). In the meantime, I find myself compelled to a situation where I can't fully trust the service providers I use, and yet can't bring myself to move back to physical music.
But perhaps if I move to vinyl...
(ps - perhaps I'm incredibly dim, but I've been trying to download iTunes on a Windows 8 computer and it NEVER works. Perhaps this is the way to be brave enough to move away)
