iPods and their users

Second to the shellac record and perhaps the player piano, the invention of magnetic tape is widely regarded as the pivotal addition to music in the twentieth century. Conceived in 1900 by Valdemar Poulsen, a Danish engineer who magnetized plastic tape coated with ferric particles, magnetic tape was the initial development in audio recording that served as impetus for the 33 1/3 vinyl record, the stereophonic stylus, and the cassette tape. As the 20th century felt the inevitable beckon of the 21st, digital technology again redefined both music production and distribution. Shortly after WinAmp popularized the "digital jukebox" in 1997, portable .mp3 players entered development. And thus it came into being... the iPod.

Drastically shifting the means by which people receive music, the iPod quickly became the must-have gadget--easy, convenient, portable, stylish, even relatively inexpensive. Previously, technology had only sought to improve audio fidelity and unit durability. Even the portable cassette Walkman was simply a little boombox sans speakers. However, with the iPod, people could navigate catalogs of music with the press of a button and write the soundtracks to their own lives--any where, any time. The theoretical implications of such a technology are countless; its actual application have only begun to be realized.

Who uses iPods? What classes of people? What ages? Which gender? How do people use their iPods? When? Where? For what purposes? What features of the iPod actually change the way people listen to music? Do people still buy records? They can't all download illegally, can they? Are certain genres more popular on iPods? Which ones? For what reason? How do people relate to their iPods, and to what part? The look? The convenience? The features? Or, god forbid, the music itself? It seems the most obvious questions prompt the most revealing answers.

Sampling the student population of Brown University, I attempted to find a cross-section of iPod users who answered these questions in a variety of ways in order to glimpse the broad capabilities of the iPod and its innumerable uses. While I interviewed users across the spectrum of age, race, gender and class, the eventual determining factors for their inclusion were the model of their iPod (or iPhone), their primary uses, and their opinions of the technology. Equally important to my analysis, the focus of my ethnographic research atypically centers around a technology, not a population or subculture. Because of this, many of the common responses do not reveal relationships of people together, rather individuals with their own digital music. The three interview excerpts below represent three differing personal/digital relationships, which best depict the range of iPod use. (Personal photos submitted by interviewees.)














Michael Fruta, senior.
Model: 4gb nano
"I use [my iPod] getting to and from places, walking. Other times too, but mostly just having it on in the background."
"All my music is on my computer. I get all my music from bit torrent sites so the iPod is really the only way I can keep it with me."
"Yeah, who buys CDs anymore? Not me."












Rebecca Sigel, sophomore.
Model: 20gb video
"Honestly, I rarely use it. Only when I'm driving do I use it regularly, but it's more convenient just to pick something than to change CDs in traffic."
"I still buy a few CDs, and tracks off iTunes, but other than those and maybe some NPR, most of my music is on my iPod or computer."
"Not that I don't enjoy the "Wicked" soundtrack, but sometimes I'm embarrassed of my iPod contents."














Ethan Levy, junior.
Model: iPhone
"I use my iPhone for music all the time. Biking, walking, chilling, sleeping, working, cooking. I have a set of speakers that lets me listen to it at home all the time."
"I really like [the Shuffle feature]. Most of the time I just want to listen to an artist, and I'll have a lot of their stuff, so I just use it to get to know more of what I have."
"Sharing? I do use my iPhone to show music to other people, and vice versa, but also the iPhone Internet makes it easy to access a lot as well."


Beyond these three interviews, several more students described similar patterns of usage, and even some to greater extremes. (Despite the technological literacy of most students, I specifically excluded the most tech-savvy interviewees who live and die by their gadgets with no regard for the music itself.) Athletes used iPods for working out, rather than driving; users of the iPod Shuffle embraced the feature instead of avoiding it--different profiles with different uses, and indeed none too surprising.

The variance of iPod use I found in Brown students is predictable. Some completely reliant on the technology, others indifferent to its myriad features. Yet the conclusion I have finally drawn is as revealing of the iPod itself as it is a number of new technologies. What I found in interviewing users from this age group is that the iPod is now a technology inseparable from its digital contents; iPods exist no longer as a convenient replacement for CDs and vinyl—by in large, they have relegated all analog media to antiquity, and iPod users could care less.

The cyclical patterns of fashion seem to skip generations of technology. Vinyl records have come back into fashion for the hipster scene because they are outdated enough to warrant revival; cassettes and Discmen are yet to deserve such categorization. This is not unlike the repopularized classic typewriters for those who desire subcultural supremacy by rejecting modern invention, yet surely there are few users who work on a first generation Apples because they are realistically practical. (They. are. not.) The iPod generation has established itself as perhaps the most significant landmark in this cycle to date. There is no going back. The iPod here and will not regress. More than any specific words that interviewees said about their daily iPod use, it was the tone in which all interviewees spoke--a matter-of-fact acceptance of iPod technology--that illustrated to me that however it was used, the iPod was simply an accepted facet of their life that was no longer just novelty.

Nowadays, the iPod isn't even questioned. New features, redesigns, the ever-expanding access--the iPod forces all music listeners to accept it and let go of obsolete technologies. As a traditionalist, I find this realization hard to swallow. Nevertheless, as I have learned from others time and time again, the iPod will assuredly soundtrack my generation.

Steven H. Hall
May 6, 2009





Works cited:
Chris Anderson, "The Long Tail"
Tia DeNora, "Music as a technology of the self"
Mark Levine, "Pandora Maps the Musical Genome"
Steven Levy, "The perfect thing: how the iPod shuffles commerce, culture, and coolness"
Gerald Marzorati, "How the Album Got Played Out"

Critical Review - Wald

Drawing from other research I've done (and mentioned previously), I find a lot of similarities between Wald's analysis of the "corridos" in Mexican/SW American culture, and the culture of British 19th century music halls. While the latter emphasized variety performance--dance, song, comedy, cabaret, theatre, etc.--both seemingly serve(d) a dual function as both a recognized popular style, as well as a conduit of subcultural lore. As Wald characterized: "Since their inception, corridos have been a sort of musical literature and newspaper for the working class community... they have always gone in for a good deal of tabloid sensationalism, and frequently mixed truth and fiction, but they also continue to transmit the news and cultural information that is of interest to their audience." [p216] Similarly, the London music halls served as popular nighttime entertainment for all, yet were of particular popularity for those "in the know," who read through the often comical or satirical fare to grasp working-class social, cultural or political subtexts. In my mind, that certain aspects of music go unknown to entire populations of listeners is significant because it multiplies the role that music can have; the dual function of music to entertain and inform implicates both the performer and the audience in the music itself.

Discussion question(s): so, how can it do this? How does music take on a role of something more than just "the music itself"? What is it in the music that fosters some to take it at face-value and others to decode? Furthermore, what can one discern of a subculture centered around such musics? Is immersion necessary for understanding?

Critical Review - Wayne&Wax

I'd like to comment specifically on an observation made early in the Wayne&Wax post "we use so many snares." In this post, Wayne notes that "reggaeton is an Internet music" and to me this is a crucial point that contextualizes how one perceives reggaeton and what goes into its composition. Particularly in light of other "Internet musics," the composition directly effects how individuals consume music, how it is performed live, and how people identify with the music itself. To emphasize my point, to underscore the importance of prefacing a music as an "Internet music" I would like to refer to an example we often use in class.

GirlTalk, masher-upper extraordinaire, stands at the pinnacle of digital music, exploiting the possibilities of both digital composition--in his meticulous splicing and laptop performance--as well as digital distribution--sweeping dorm room playlists through viral videos and MySpace links. Both these uses of digital technology connect GirlTalk with his audience, yet distance him from the music. In composing his tracks, GirlTalk does not conventionally write a melody nor a chord progression, he simply lifts snippets from other songs (albeit masterfully). The music is thus reduced to simple ctrl-X/ctrl-V commands, detached from the sounds themselves; the beat becomes regulated by its BPM, not by its "feel." This deconstruction of the "music itself" is further reflected in GirlTalk's live performance: an obviously over-compensating spectacle of stages full of fans in Day-Glo garb, aggrandizing a musician whose music is entirely pre-composed. Granted, this participation connects fan to artist, yet illustrates the inherent limits of digital music composition.

My point in using this example is not to accuse reggaeton of any such distance, but simply to frame further analysis of the genre by identifying the pitfalls already experienced by a (not so) distant relative. Wayne's detailed analysis (and examples) of reggaeton rhythms visually break down this simplistic view of composition--instead of previous generations speaking of the "feel" of different rhythmic patterns, different regional tendencies, he now makes his case by showing us FruityLoop sequences. On one hand, it opens the doors of composition to innumerable young beat-makers and aspiring reggaeton artists, yet conversely exposes its restrictions.

Discussion question(s): How can digital composition and live performance be reconciled? What works? What doesn't? Does seeing the process behind reggaeton broken down and analyzed in any way detract from the "music itself" or emphasize its artistry?

Research... not going as planned.

For all those in my class reading this, this is an open request for help.

In beginning my research, I have found more and more obstacles in what I thought would be a straightforward subject of research. For those who don't know, my initial research proposal is here -- it outlines my intention to survey at least 100 Brown students to identify quantitative data on iPod use. My hope with this survey was to determine what people used their iPods for, how they were incorporated into their daily life, to what extent people identified with digital music, what genres of music people used most, generally what the relationship was between subject and technology via the iPod. However, after a sample of this survey, the preliminary results proved quite opposite.

The cross-section of Brown students revealed the entire spectrum of iPod use. Some would say this is a good thing--I disagree... somewhat. My aim was to reach specific conclusions as to how people interacted with their iPod, how they used it in their daily life, and in fact to generalize this usage to broader conclusions that might illuminate college students and their patterns of digital music consumption. However, what I now predict I will find in further research is that these patterns cannot be generalized and (for the most part) cannot be summed by quantitative data because it simply reinforces the undefinable versatility of the iPod as a malleable technology. Because of the great variety in my initial findings, I have now decided to forgo the quantitative portion of my research and focus specifically on qualitative profiles of iPod users, ones which can then be compared to form a cross-section of iPod usage.

I will admit two primary mistakes in my research thus far, two that I hope will illuminate the problem so that those reading this may understand where I was coming from in undertaking this project and may understand where I need to go. My first mistake was generalizing a student population that, at face value, often seems homogeneous in taste yet is in fact quite broad. I assumed that genres of music would be consistent, downloading patterns too, and that surveys would produce statistics that reinforced my initial hypotheses that iPods were in fact a dominant means of music consumption, often used in a similar manner by varying users. My hypothesis was wrong: wrong not only in its superficial evaluation of the Brown student body but also wrong in how greatly I underestimated the versatility of the iPod--both in its technical features and in the creativity of its users. My second mistake was my interview: I interviewed someone out of my target range, hoping that an older iPod user would shed light on the student population and in fact bring context to trends among student groups. In fact, this interview only confused me, complicating my survey findings yet assuring me that I needed to change direction.

Class: this is where you come in.

Think about your friends. Think about their iPods. Think about their music in dorm rooms, dining halls, locker rooms, house parties, frat lounges, libraries, back porches, wherever. When you think of music in all these different contexts, what comes to mind?

I don't mean to stereotype music in these different locales, quite the opposite. I really want your feedback because in reading these surveys (primarily from people I didn't know) I came to understand that the cross-section of student iPod users extended beyond what I would have guessed, and I hope that you all can help me find these extremities of which I was unaware. So perhaps I should rephrase my question: if you had to describe how three friends used their iPods differently from one another, what would they be? Could you guess why?

By taking these suggestions, I would like to dissect the different iPod uses and varying iPod technologies. What is the difference, say, between one who owns a iPod Shuffle (without a display screen) and one who owns an iPhone (with an accessible iTunes store)? How can one compare one who meticulously outlines playlists for moods, settings, genres, and one who lives and dies by the shuffle feature? By what criteria can one measure one uses their iPod to augment their vinyl collection and one who solely downloads illegal files? These are but a few of the questions I now realize I am unable to answer quantitatively and questions that I need help in answering. What say you? How can I redirect my research to a more productive, nay, illuminating end?

So to conclude, really, I have no new research to speak of. In fact, I'm almost starting over. Kiri, Liam: my apologies. More information is soon to come, and hopefully from the comments of this post. But if nothing else, I am learning during this research not to put the cart before the horse and think that hypotheses will in any way guide actual findings. Hopefully, I can find subjects willing to offer in-depth, qualitative information that will better illustrate the culture of the iPod and how it so deeply (and distinctly) ingrains itself with each user.

To all: think, next time you plug in your earbuds. Your iPod may hold more than mp3s.

Critical Review - Flores

I didn't even really know what 'boogaloo' was. I have been listening to a record called "Boogaloo to Beck" for years, a jazz tribute record to pop icon Beck, wondering what it meant: is the sound boogaloo? Are the songs boogaloo? Did they mean to write "bungalow"? Wtf? Needless to say, I was quite surprised to actual learn the history of boogaloo as Flores here describes it.

However, to hear that boogaloo is regarded as a short-lived, disregarded genre seemed funny to me because (though I should have guessed that) I actually that it must be some developed jazz subgenre, intricate and inaccessible. I find it interesting that a genre cast aside would then be appropriated by jazz artists. Anyway, while I realize it sounds like an aside, my discussion question relates:

Discussion question(s): Is musical language recycled? Genres? Styles? If so, how? Do the cultural associations transfer with the revivals or interpretations of a genre such as boogaloo? Where have we seen a similar appropriation of one music by another, and how has it functioned differently?

Interview Excerpt -- Daniel Smith

For this interview, I spoke with a former colleague of mine about his musical preferences, regarding both taste in music and use of technologies. Smith went into great detail through the interview, and the responses I have selected for summary below only glimpse some of the broader issues addressed. Unfortunately, the audio recording I made--speaker phone to digital recording--peaked throughout the interview and unfortunately is very distorted. However, if anyone would like to read the full transcript, it is posted here.


Q: With the mood-related music, is there one aspect of it you tend to relate to—tempo, beat, lyrics, aesthetics, etc?

It’s a balance often. I’m absolutely interested in lyrical content and there are artists such as, oh well, without getting too specific, someone like Bob Dylan, who fascinates me as well as others because the lyrical content is so important. However there are other realms too, rhythm particularly—I grew up in a household with an older brother and sister and my musical tastes were very much influenced by theirs. And oddly enough, about the time that I would’ve been a young teenager, it was the punk incursion in America, as well as shortly thereafter sort of the start of rap and hip-hop music, but more significantly I think for me was that my sister had just traveled to Jamaica. She had brought back records from that country that were absolutely riveting to my brother and me. So there has always been that attention to heavily rhythmic music like rap and reggae, both of which remain very important to me.

Q: From what you’ve said about your history with vinyl records and other formats, I have to ask what new technologies you use in discovering/listening to music—iPod, iTunes, MySpace, Pandora?

Primarily iTunes. I find it absolutely fascinating and I got into it in this way. There was a part of my collection that was simply not appearing on vinyl for a long period of time so I would continue to look for traces of it out there and now of course as more time has passed more and more of what in the marketplace would be obscure recordings or not previously commercially a viable recording, in other words 10, 20, 30 years old, are appearing now, and it’s so much easier to look back through iTunes and pick out several of the songs that I liked or remembered. Also within that realm, there was always a tension in years past, you never got to preview a vinyl album unless they had one on in the store and of course I’m talking about ancient history here. Now however if there’s an album, for example, if I’m thinking about the new Lil’ Wayne album… heard the big hit, perhaps in the club perhaps on the radio and I want to know what the rest is like, well, I can actually sample it online, and I think it’s absolutely wonderful. Oddly enough it hasn’t led to greater increased purchases for me, in terms of purchasing entire albums based on this or along the lines of purchasing specific songs. That tends to be a mean too now in my listening which is, I tend not to be as much out of focus as perhaps I once was. I’m much more into preparing mixes or different compilations and that tends to be very rewarding for me and they even have a new feature on iTunes, it’s a button where if you selected a specific song in your library it will arrange a mix for you based on its interpretation of the qualities of that song and I find that delightful.


Q: Touching on what you’ve said earlier, what is your relationship with live music and what do you get out of it as opposed to recorded music?

I started going to live performances when I was a teenager, and I’m racking my brain now to try to remember a touchstone live performance and it probably wont come right to the surface. However, I did start going when I was a teenager. The interesting part of it was I think I initially went probably out of that teenage desire to just get out of your house and do something fun with your friends and all the rest. But you’re also very much too a part, not just of experiencing the music, but many of the initial concerts that I went to were a part of that whole fandom that many of us lived in to in that age. It was not just that you needed to see a live recreation of your favorite song or album, but you really wanted to see that performer and you wanted to have that physical experience of being in the same room with them. I still remain a fan of certain performers, but it doesn’t have that same emotional resonance that it might have at say the age of 15 or 16, being in the same room with someone you considered the greatest artist that year. It’s interesting, because I’ve had this conversation with friends, I’m obviously, as any concertgoer, I’ve been to some pretty bad ones where nothing lived up to what you thought it would be, but I think I tend to go to concerts now with a different perception and that is the performance aspect of it. An art form, which is the presentation of music in concert. Certainly I’m still going to them, in fact, as I’ve gotten older, one of the things that has happened is that I’ve become a more frequent traveler to shows. I just came back from Montreal, and the reason I had gone there was to see Nick Cave perform, and that was fascinating for me because I’d first seen him in ’83. And I’d seen a lot of him in the 80’s when he toured more frequently. The first time I saw Nick Cave was the birthday party show. But it was very interesting because Nick has just turned 50 I believe, and nothing could have stopped me from going to that show. I had to see where he was you know I’ve followed his released work and recorded for him, but it’s been a long time since I’ve seen him physically, publicly, you know, not since the 90s.
Although if you had asked me though at the age of 15 or 16 if I would ever go see Bob Dylan, I would have dismissed that as not really a probable concert that I would see, possibly because I associated him with the 1960s and having much less to do with my time. Now however? I will travel to go see him, in fact just last year I traveled to go see him. Often the people I will travel to go see are people with whom I’ve had a long history with, I don’t know if it’s a good thing or a bad thing but I’ve actually now seen Bob Dylan in a hockey rink in Rochester, MN. I drove to Missouri, maybe 7 or 8 hours, to see the Fall perform in a strip mall, simply because they weren’t going to be performing where I was. Maybe part of it too Steve, is that some of these artists will not be performing in the future, that some of them are getting up there. But part of it is still that excitement of the concert experience that each one is going to be totally different and some of them have just been epic.

Performance Ethnography Essay

As I waited for the blue-robed clan to ascend the Holy Mountain, I could feel the cold sweat run down the back of my neck, balance to the hot pulse in my ringing ears. The cacophonous noise, optic saturation, blindly inebriated surrender to all things synesthetic—a one-night amalgam of sensory overload was the fortuitous result of the most unusual elements. Together, a gay club, noise rock and surrealist film provided equilibrium between two widely variant cultures for a performance both entertaining and enlightening.

Walking down to the White Mice show, I really only expected to have my ears blown. I heard the Providence noise scene was a force to be reckoned with, that its fans took the music as seriously as its bands did, and that earplugs were strongly advised. Yet this fervor, if nothing else, implied to me a vibrant subculture with lively shows and passionate members. The night was far more than this, to say the least. Even just walking up to the venue, visible septum piercings, jagged Mohawks and overwhelming body odor alerted me to the authenticity of the hardcore fans, emphasized by their cryptic cant and insouciant candor. Pushing my way through a sea of Marlboros to the door, I quickly broke eye contact with the shadowy doorman, and quicker hid my notebook in pocket. Ultimately friendly, at face the crowd at the Dark Lady did not appear too welcoming.

But this would be the first of many surprises throughout the night. Despite glares from bystanders outside, the women at the desk were warm and friendly, or so I thought until I met the effeminate, affectionate bartenders. This was the first major contrast during the night, and the first large question about the event: how did a notoriously homosexual club and hardcore noise scene come to coexist in an evening’s performance? Why these cultures? Why here? Why now? All the staff, most all the audience, were all smiles, jokes, and spirit. What in theory sounded like an absurd combination presented itself to be a natural partnership of kindred subcultures, weakly linked in the Providence periphery.

For me, culturally enforced gender stereotypes portray most gay clubs in urban America commonplace for disco revivals and Cher karaoke. One certainly imagines late nights of drinking and dancing, perhaps even pride nights and drag shows. At great distance from this stereotypical culture I thought to find Providence noise shows, but I was mistaken. In recent months, the Dark Lady has collaborated with local noise rock, hardcore and underground indie bands to present a series called Paint It Pink, a loosely curated series whose MySpace profile boasts the motto: “Paint It Pink wants to book the gayest show you’ll ever play.” Sure, gay club: gay music: okay, I get it. But the puzzling pairing with noise rock seemed unfitting for the Dark Lady, whose crystalline chandeliers were adorned with pink feather boas, whose bar featured a dozen brightly colored liqueurs. Moreover, for the first hour waiting for the show to start, I found myself sipping drinks rather quickly to offset the collective tension of concertgoers viewing two wall-size screenings of midgets and transsexuals fellating enormous, enormous dicks. Even some of the most metallic punks in the room seemed slightly off put.

Soon as the music started, the porn stopped—the atmosphere even stranger. The first act, Suffering Bastard, tore through a set of 20 one-minute songs, pausing their aural assault for momentary introductions like: “This one’s about shit!” or “This one is for the Fonz, heyyy.” Ever-shifting from half time to triple time, the band nearly destroyed their two basses, grinding them between pelvis and amplifier for distorted effects while the lead singer bit his own arm repeatedly, drawing blood.

The second band, Pygmy Shrews, was rhythmically more consistent yet lacked the hardcore potency of Suffering Bastard, sticking to a more accessible post-hardcore featuring female vocals, astutely observed by one unseen audience member to sound like “a really fucked-up Bratmobile.” This appeal was not lost on the gen(d)erally indifferent audience who seemed drawn to the vocalist’s defined androgyny and masculine presence, I noted as a few Dark Lady regulars took their fingers from their ears.

After the first two bands played in rapid succession, the headliners of the bill, White Mice, delayed performance for a seemingly endless stint at the bar with a whiskey bottle. As the lights dimmed a large man, dressed in garb befitting a tyrannical Russian czar took center stage, shouting introductions from blank pages, wearing a turban made of film rolls. And then… well I’d never experienced anything quite like it. Three white mice, eyes glowing red from heads torn and mangled, assailing their instruments into a jarring din, enrapturing an audience of dozens into a swaying, sweating, submissive frenzy. Half moshing, half meditating, the audience reacted to White Mice’s every note; one could watch the faces of those closest to the stage, contorting with every shift in the endless drone of distortion. To say there was interaction between White Mice and their audience might be a stretch—they said virtually nothing from stage, had no discernable lyrics to sing along with, and rarely fell into any regular beat suited for dance of any kind. Nevertheless, the audience loved it and applauded enthusiastically at the conclusion of a 45 minute set.

Strangely enough, the most obvious link between these two cultures was the visual presentation during the musical performances. A muted showing of “The Holy Mountain,” 1972 Lennon/Ono-sponsored, Jodorowsky-directed cult classic cum mescaline trip transported the audience from the Dark Lady to a post-Dadaist dreamland, at some points tracking the screaming vocal lines to protest portrayals, doves bursting forth from peoples’ chests, and at other points underscoring deep bass drones with shot after shot of clans climbing mountains, shaving their heads, and partaking in sacrificial rituals. The juxtaposition offered little explanation of the scene the audience found themselves in, yet seemed to provide a subtle reconciliation.

It then became clear—the answer to all those “why” questions I had asked myself when I first entered. As I watched factory clones model manufactured anatomical parts, I began tying together the possible connections between these two cultures—noise rock and gay nightclub—only to discover that the overlaps were as innumerable as they were remote. A penchant for self-indulgence, affinity for a trancelike state, the idea of public display as a projected self-image, populating a real environment in which things could be both simulated yet honestly exaggerated—the cultures awkwardly fit together by melding performance into space by means of clever curation. While the show was certainly anamolous in the larger music scene, it certainly worked well this night and emphasized the not-so-impervious barriers between oft relegated subcultures, perhaps even foreshadowed future cross-cultural exchange.

What struck me most about the night was that both subcultures existed so strongly before the new series Paint It Pink. It was not the case where one dominant culture advocates another, nor where both collaborate for mutual survival. Rather, the collaboration seemed purely creative and succeeded in achieving a artistic synthesis in which the audience was shown but a greater glimpse at the underlying nature of both cultures, their small shared essence, in the shared glorification of real performance.

Word count: 1202