tiredsoundsofthelid

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

drew the lovely @vyva-melinkolya

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

the death of dvds is so fucked. what about bonus features

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

Akio Hino (Japanese,contemporary)

Red fox, Hokkaido, 1980s 

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

we all agree that the push towards short form, vertical video (tiktok/reels/shorts) is ruining fucking everything right? Tiktok has been useful for the dissemination of political information (e.g Gaza) i’ll give it that, but that feels moreso a result of meta and twitters algorithms being just a little *more*’evil and censor happy. And i want to make it very clear that my hatred for tiktok has nothing to do with the fact that it was a product of a Chinese company, because i see a lot of critiques relying on some sort of sinophobic conspiracy. On the contrary, it’s what tiktok has become in the vacuum of western popular culture and marketing that makes me fearful.

I know that every generation faces a new, polarizing technology and inevitably, there are those among said generation who will critique it. That is the nature of things. However, there is also something to be said about how, with the acceleration of technology (running parallel to the acceleration of capitalism, acceleration towards collapse etc), each coming generation faces an increasingly more malevolent “advancement”. TLDR, i’m going to talk my shit.

I’m going to speak on the aspect that is most relavent to me, as a musician. I am petrified by what short form video is doing to music and to musicians. I think that tiktok provides the illusion of making music and being a musician more “accessible” while actually pouring gasoline on the fire that the pop music machine had already started. Standards for what popular culture “expects” from music are being doubled and tripled. Let’s talk about song length. Success and marketability favoring shorter songs is not something new, it has been the trend for decades. But with short form video, it goes even further. You’re not just hearing the same song over and over on the radio, you’re hearing the same 15-30 seconds of the same song over and over again. This in-turn, starts to influence the way people write music, persuading people to make songs that *could* have that 15 second appeal. There is an art to pop music, there is an art to writing a catchy hook—this is something else. We weren’t meant to hear or understand music like that. There are so many songs from reels that i found annoying, until i heard them in their full context. It’s insidious. It makes everything feel like a fucking commercial, even if nothing is being advertised.

I’m going to pull directly from someone else’s experiences, someone who’s music seems to be everywhere on short form videos. The ambient musician My Head Is Empty has a hundred million streams on the song “i was only temporary”. Despite that exposure, they experience “never ending copywrite issues” and have “received death threats” by people who refuse to credit them when using their song. Pulling a quote here, from a comment on their own post

“vyva_melinkolya unfortunately it just gets worse. i saw a bot content page that steals pod cast footage and spams dozens of videos with my song stolen, comment on a "motivation" spam content , who actually made a post telling people the name of my song, and the previous page i mentioned, the pod cast spam commented on that video saying "Bro stop don't give out the sauce. this audio helps me pull numbers brooo" - so people are actively INTENTIONALLY stealing it and telling people to not credit me. like. u can't make this stuff up”

Beyond this, My Head Is Empty feels frustrated that despite all this exposure, the rest of their work (nine albums) as a musician remains under appreciated, and i think that frustration is 100% valid. People cannot fully appreciate music, or even understand it as a work of art created by another human, when it’s taken so far out of its context. Again, the soul being sucked out of art by “the machine” isn’t anything new but, this is a whole other level. Being a musician is more expensive than ever, streaming earns you fractions of a cent etc, it all feeds into itself.

When a song or a musician i love deeply finds its way on to tiktok (let’s use Duster’s “Stars Will Fall”, one of my favorite songs ever as an example)I am not upset that i cant “gatekeep” it anymore. I’m not upset by the idea of something I love and hold dearly finding a larger audience. I AM upset in the manner in which it is being disseminated. I’m upset with art I hold dear to me being chopped up and used as “trending audio”. When I saw Duster in concert recently, lStars Will Fall” was the song I was most looking forward to hearing. It was the last song they played, and it was the song seemly everyone chose to talk loudly over. The audience was mostly people my age and younger. This complaint might come off as petty or pretentious or cliche, i frankly do not give a shit.

Let’s talk about how musicians are expected to promote music on tiktok/reels. This is a matter of opinion, at the risk of sounding very pretentious: the “POV we are x band from x” “My label says i need x followers before x” “posting this video until c musician notices me”. I understand that some of it is in jest but, what the fuck? When did this become the norm? I do not blame anyone for promoting their music like this, but we should want more for ourselves. I’ve always said being a musician is deeply embarassing, inherently. If being a musician is inherently embarassing then what is this? I dont have a solution for this, and the music industry has always been ugly and bloodthirsty and seldom fruitful— but i feel like the very small amount of dignity we had as artists is now lost and I cant fucking stand it. Artists seem to promote the same single with dozens of reels over the course of months, hoping that something sticks. I dont want to sound like i’m shaming or, again, sound like i can provide a solution. I’m just very fucking sorry that it seems like this is “the way”. And personally, i’m scared that if i dont “get with the program”, im going to fail.

Again, all of this speaks to larger trends in entertainment industry and even larger trends in capitalism. But i’m just airing specifics right now because frankly? I cant take it anymore.

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

The Last Day of Summer (1958) dir. Tadeusz Konwicki

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

i gave away myself

slipped on the spiral stairs

tumbling down the well

i fell on a soft spot

im white heat im white hot

again

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

rock n roll , lace n leather

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

the sight of love find me tonight

i close my eyes, close my eyes

it looks like fun, feels like love

can't even get my shoes on,

i can't even get my shoes on

hold on to the wall, don't slip so much

my feet or my tongue, don't slip so much

on to the wall, don't slip so much

my feet or my tongue, don't slip so much

and i hear you say, "hold on to me,"

hold on to me, hold on to me, hold on to me

and i hear you say, "hold on to me,"

hold on to me, hold on to me, hold on to me

hang on tight, love,

i'll watch you from the sidelines

regret something made up by my mind

hopefully you'll see the signs

and the changing line

won't take your time, don't take your time

hold on to the wall, don't slip so much

my feet or my tongue, don't slip so much

on to the wall, don't slip so much

my feet or my tongue, don't slip so much

and i hear you say, "hold on to me,"

hold on to me, hold on to me, hold on to me

and i hear you say, "hold on to me,"

hold on to me, hold on to me, hold on to me

hold on to the wall, don't slip so much

my feet or my tongue, don't slip so much

on to the wall, don't slip so much

my feet or my tongue, don't slip so much

and i hear you say, "hold on to me,"

hold on to me, hold on to me, hold on to me

and i hear you say, "hold on to me,"

hold on to me, hold on to me, hold on to me

the sight of love finds me tonight

i close my eyes, close my eyes

it looks like love, feels like fun

i can't even get my shoes on

can't even get my shoes on

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

"Let us go further still... We haven't sufficiently dismantled our self." -- D + G

A Thousand Plateaus, pg. 151

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

i need to minimize it more

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

Aqa Riza (Iranian, born Meshhed, ca. 1560, active until ca. 1621) Calligrapher: Mir 'Ali Haravi (died ca. 1550) "A Youth Fallen From a Tree", Folio from the Shah Jahan Album verso: ca. 1610; recto: ca. 1530 Ink, opaque watercolor, and gold on paper

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

took a rare selfie the other day

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

a lesbian shows you a film you sit your ass down and watch... a lesbian shows you a song you sit your ass down and listen

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

so h5n1 has officially jumped to humans in texas and texas being texas, i think we are fucked

edit: i was misinformed about the possibilities of human-to-human transmission. i didn't realize that it going from a cow to a human doesn't necessarily mean it will go straight to human-to-human. it's one confirmed case of a dairy worker contracting h5n1, but it is most likely not contagious from him. i hope that he recovers, and that it doesn't spread.

that said, i am very on edge about the chicken and dairy industries' lackluster response and wide refusal to cull infected livestock. even if it's "only" transmitting from animals to workers, it's unacceptable to put the workers in such a dangerous situation. and every transmission increases the risk of it becoming human transmissible. our current stats on h5n1 in humans reflect a grim survival rate. it's not okay to put people at risk this way for profit.

i am still extremely nervous about this situation, but i will try to be more cautious about sharing information. as always, please stay masked, stay safe, and stay vigilant.

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

wicked loss of phrase

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

having achieved nothing

[tiredsoundsofthelid]

toil toil toil toil toil toil toil toil toil toil worthlessness worthlessness worthlessness worthlessness worthlessness toil toil toil toil toil toil toil toil toil toil worthlessness worthlessness worthlessness worthlessness worthlessness