The reason that a lot of my ideas never get written is that a comprehensive analysis of the topic would usually be much more informative and accurate that an aimless spouting of my personal views. If the topic is important enough to deserve such research, I usually put it on the pile along with the rest of my pending projects that I will surely have time for in a month's time, when things slow down. Well, they really never have. I will elect to take a different approach to this matter, for it is one that I feel very strongly about.

Over the past twelve months, the amount of time I have spent listening to music is pretty close to the amount of time I have spent sleeping. During that time, I have listened to hundreds of different albums, including over 300 that have been released since 2006. I have read hundreds of reviews, sought out opinions, studied artists, genres, and history, revisited albums tens of times, and made and played some music of my own. Yes, in the past two years I have even bought some CDs and music DVDs. What all of this means is that I have done a great deal of thinking about music and culture and art and entertainment and life. I have learned and discovered a lot, but much remains a mystery to me, including some things that I didn't even know that I didn't know.

I hope that those who know me will be able to trust my opinion on this topic even though in terms of time I am still relatively new to comprehensive music exploration. Music, though, has been "my life," in varying degrees and forms, over my life's interesting second half. As it is my goal to make music my full-time occupation, I want to know as much about the industry as I possibly can. My recent music listening experiences, my confusion with the songs atop the charts, and the proximity of my future music endeavours all have prompted me to pursue some appropriate reading material to prepare me and to help me to understand. Part 2 of this two-part series will follow proper research into the past, present, and future issues of aesthetics, ethics in the music industry, musical trends and culture, and other questions addressed in this article.

Long before Top-40 and mainstream radio, people were writing books about how thirds are more dissonant than fourths and other matters of "fact" concerning musical aesthetics that seem almost unthinkable to us today. People have been trying to legislate musical aesthetics to the public for many years. As much today as ever, musical trends very much fall in line with cultural trends, and shifts in musical trends usually correspond with significant global or cultural events. The really unfortunate part about this is that there is very little that the people themselves can do, especially when they are unaware of what is actually going on. The surprisingly immense business of music is so inexplicably narrow in focus that it is no wonder some of the most talented artists in the world are known by less than 1% of people who consume music regularly. No, I'm not surprised that corporations subdue art for the sake of more profitable music. I even understand why some of the less impressive music is more profitable and universally appealing to casual music consumers or trendy pop-culture junkies. My frustration is with the dilemma that every genuine artist will inevitably come to face when he or she needs to make decisions about his or her creative output: Should I rein in my creativity, quality, and artistic satisfaction to please the general consuming majority and my wallet, or should I simply make the best music I possibly can?

This dichotomy is complicated, but it can best be generalized, especially for the sake of convenience and to make a point, by the distinction between mainstream and independent music. For obvious reasons, artists will not be signed to major-label record contracts unless the powers that be believe that the contract will be lucrative for the company. This seems to imply that the majority of music consumers decide what kind and quality of music is allowed to flourish, but it really just means that the system is resistant to change. The companies will not want new ideas and trends to take over because that would mean that the already-signed and established artists would lose popularity and money-making power. Also, they assume that everyone will like things that are similar to the current best-selling artists because that is all that the consumers have been widely exposed to. Because both parties with power see change as a bad thing, it is little wonder that the best music never seems to become the most popular music.

The reason that this is so frustrating is that the system actually makes the artist slave to the corporations instead of the consumers, rather than allowing art to flourish and for consumers to choose what they want to listen to. As stated earlier, the reasons for this are obvious and understandable (money). It is no coincidence that the independent artists are the only ones really pushing the boundaries of what we think as music and making music that is truly progressive and creative.

Radiohead is a good example of this but an exception to many of these rules. On October 10, 2007 (GMT), Radiohead leaked its own new (excellent) album, In Rainbows, as a choose-your-own-price MP3 download. Judging from early reports, the band may have netted over $10 million U.S. dollars from this initial release alone, and there is still money to come from the traditional album release sometime early in the new year. But this is no ordinary independent band. They gained some early popularity in the early-mid 90s with more commercially friendly music, including the hit single "Creep," from their worst album by far, Pablo Honey. The band proceeded to release two of the greatest albums of the '90s, and skyrocketed to critical popularity, with considerable general public popularity as well, especially in the UK. Upon this success, they decided to forsake the formula for successful pop they had developed, and released the spectacular Kid A. A popular failure, perhaps, but for many of us it is the single most important album of this decade. After these three astounding releases, they somehow followed with three more continuing into the new millennium. Radiohead managed to achieve both goals of genuine musical artists probably better than any band in the last 30+ years. The professional path they have followed is one to be awed, and surely will inspire many failed emulations in the future. Ironically, I would barely know that they exist if it wasn't for online music sharing.

About two weeks after the release of In Rainbows, I was rudely awakened to the news that a web site called OiNK, the greatest music sharing community in the world, had been permanently shut down. It's not the advance major album releases or full wallet that I'll miss—OiNK's being shut down isn't actually going to make me buy more music, just like the discovery of OiNK didn't make me buy less—it's all the great independent music that I never would have heard otherwise. This stuff isn't being played six times a day on the radio. The funny thing about online music sharing is that some independent bands even use resources like OiNK to get word out about their own music. Because of OiNK, I'm more interested in going to see concerts than ever before, and I wouldn't have put my money into these bands if I never would have heard of them in the first place. Also, this year I am rewarding the ten bands that put out the ten albums I consider to be best by buying their CDs and attending their concerts if at all possible. I bought Radiohead's new album for $82 because they deserve it. And that's 82 more dollars the "big four" music corporations will never see. There needs to be some incentive for people to make good music.

Yes, I do believe that online music sharing is a big reason that record company revenues have fallen in recent years. However, much of this "lost money" is due to more people exploring non-major-label options and being thoroughly satisfied by doing so. Another huge factor is that the companies refuse to make wide-scale adjustments to the way they market and distribute music to adapt to changing culture and technology. Still, as it stands, no, every song or album downloaded is not a lost sale. Many are, but I would say that most are not.

It should not be assumed or concluded that I am ignorant of the importance of pop music. My issue, rather, is with corporate music; that is, music engineered by corporations who have decided what people are going to like. Since these companies are in control of which bands' and artists' music is available for widespread consumption and can even control the output of these bands to suit their desires, what I am saying is no exaggeration. I have undergone enough of an evolution of aesthetic opinion in the past several years to know that what we like is much more a product of outside influences and being told what is good than we think it is. Of course we are all individuals, but it is our experiences that shape what kind of music we will like. It is no surprise, then, that even very musical people who have become entrenched in radio-friendly melodies and idiot-friendly harmonic progressions following a verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge structure are so strongly put off when they hear even some of the most critically-acclaimed music in the world. Believe me, I understand all of this.

With all of that said, I know that none of us directly choose what we are going to like. In my case, however, it took some effort, research, and study, but my tastes have been influenced for what I believe to be the better for me, personally; it's better because I was completely bored with the music I had had previously. Sometimes, though, I wish I could listen to some of my most beloved albums of earlier years and appreciate them in the same way. It is going to become especially difficult when I try to break into the music industry myself and have to make that dreaded decision: Art or success?

Though popular success of independent music has made some slight progress recently, it doesn't seem as though the record companies will ever ease their stranglehold on the consuming public enough to make this question significantly easier for us artists to answer in the near future.