Notable album releases from today, or after June 3.

Squid - O Monolith

(Rock, Art Punk)
Bandcamp

King Krule - Space Heavy

(Art Rock, Neo-Psychedelia)
Bandcamp

Janelle Monae - The Age of Pleasure

(R&B, Pop)
Spotify

Boldy James & ChanHays - Prisoner of Circumstance

(Hip Hop, Boom Bap)
YouTube Music

Jason Isbell and The 400 Unit - Weathervanes

(Country, Americana)
Bandcamp

Feel free to share more releases below.

Any feedback on the format is welcome!

Hey all,

Brand new Tildes user here. In real life, I work full time as an orchestral and opera conductor. I love all kinds of music (outside of classical, I particularly love musical theater, jazz, and hip hop) but classical music is what I know best. How about let's start a thread about classical music? What do you like? What questions do you have? Do you want to know more about how orchestras, opera theaters, and ballet companies work? Shoot me anything and everything!

And to start, I'd like to share with you this concert recording, the only recording of this amazing and little-known work by composer Alice Mary Smith.

There're maybe 2 aspects to the question: what makes you prefer a certain genre over another? and within that genre, what criteria makes you think one piece performs better than another?

I get that this is a very subjective and probably subconscious thing. Just curious to see how everyone would describe their own tastes.

For me I'm not much of a music person, most music I found were just soundtracks from films or videogames. So I guess the music is good if the film/game is good. Listening is a way to put me back into the moods of the scenes it came from.

Edit: I also listen to meme songs a lot so I guess I like them for just being funny, which is not a very musically relevant criteria I suppose

With the semis behind us, we now have all the qualifiers for Saturday's grand final!

Who's your favourite? Most entertaining stage show? Overall thoughts on this year's crop of songs?

Which song do you think will win? And who (if any) will get the dreaded 0 points?

Who got robbed in the semis? Which songs should have rather won their national qualifications?

The contest is still more than a month away, but all songs have been released, so let's have a listen and a discussion!

Eurovisionworld has links to all the songs (ordered by how likely the bookmakers consider it for them to win the contest). There's also a YouTube and a Spotify playlist of all the songs.

So which songs are your favourites? Guilty pleasures? Overrated, underrated? Most fun? Most excited to see performed live? Predictions? Etc.

It might sound silly to most, but I have had one for years now.

I started to really listen to music on my own volition in the early 2010s when I was in my early 10s, and I was really big into EDM at the time (big room house, brostep, electro house, progressive house, etc).

At some point in 2014 I wanted to expand my tastes so I ended up on rateyourmusic.com which is the kinda place you always end up on at some point if you go down this path the way I see it, and at first I just checked the overall charts and shrugged since it wasn't my kind of music at all (The Beatles, The Beach Boys, Miles Davis, Pink Floyd, The Rolling Stones, Radiohead, etc), but at some point it started bothering me; "why is all that crappy old music so highly regarded?" and I started giving the stuff a try. Didn't like it at all, but I somehow starting feeling compelled to try and understand/appreciate it.

Eventually, I fell down a sort of rabbit hole when I started reading discussions on how some music is "objectively better" than others and I completely believed it. Pushed around by the extremely harsh disdain towards the EDM I loved and godly praise of the type of thing I just mentioned, I just kinda felt like I was supposed to move on and basically listened to a lot of stuff like that.

Another while later I eventually realized that the whole "objectively good/bad" thing is one ugly sack of false shit, but I've been really burned out since then, and now I don't even really feel the music I used to like. Problem is, at this point the act of crawling through the charts looking for new music, constantly listening to new stuff, thinking about genres, etc, is so deeply ingrained in my behavior that I can't seem to stop. I have music on at nearly all times, and I force myself to listen to everything in full despite not feeling it at all.

Something that's also gotten me is the whole repeated listening thing, I've always really loved the idea of being able to enjoy something you initially didn't care for or were lukewarm towards by simply repeatedly listening to it. That also caused me to disregard my own impressions and force myself to repeatedly listen to almost everything. I'm mostly out of that phase now, but I sometimes still find myself digging through random stuff I've given low ratings and listening to it again purely to see if I suddenly like it, but it has literally never even worked once. I also think this has been a contributor to me being burned out on music.

At this point I kinda feel like I'll never truly enjoy music again like I used to and it's really sad. Sometimes it does return a little, but if have to explain it with a rating, I can't say I've ever really felt anything above a 7/10 again, most of the time it's between a 3/10 and 6/10. I totally realize I just need to take a break, but I simply can't seem to stop (through a lot of effort I have actually managed to take a full break last month, but I immediately relapsed when I resumed this month, and even without that it doesn't seem like it helped all that much). What a lot of people have with things like gaming and food, I basically have with music.

Does anyone else have anything like this?

Whenever I try to find new albums, I find myself skipping through the entire record fairly quickly in order to find out if they’re good enough to warrant a full listen. Sometimes I’ll find an album that sounds impressive to me for very simple reasons, e.g. the sound of the bass guitar or frequent use of a pleasant synth sound. In my case, Oneohtrix Point Never is the perfect example. I enjoy virtually every single kind of sound in his discography, even most of the random sound effects. That’s why I began wondering if I’d overrate his future albums if he kept using the same synths, effects, etc. without actually bringing anything new to the table.

Is there anything similar that will always make you more likely to enjoy an album regardless of many other aspects that contribute to its actual quality?

Hi there, I've started a new public server on Discord for music discussion, recommendations, etc. I've seen a number of these go down in flames or completely lose the appeal for their core audience, so I've borrowed some principles from Tildes, adapted for the somewhat different but related issues this kind of Discord server typically runs into. I thought this may be of interest to some users here, so you're all welcome as long as you play by our rules!

If you'd like to see our rules and goals first, check the paste here. They'll be pretty familiar to anyone here, though they are subject to change depending on our needs. This should go without saying, but to be clear, this server is not officially connected to Tildes, nor is it exclusive to Tildes users. There just might be some overlap in ideas :)

Here's our permanent invite link if you'd like to join: https://discord.gg/kC4sSQq

What artists that you know of were written off as one hit wonders or drifted into obscurity, despite them having great music and being talented musicians? I'd like to Nominate Better Than Ezra for this title. They're really only best known for Good off of the album Deluxe, but that whole album gives off a road trippy vibe that I haven't been able to find elsewhere. Also Barenaked Ladies, despite their goofy reputation, are great musicians and have a great vocalist. Conventioneers and The Night I Fell Asleep At The Wheel are both really good songs.

It's neat that Rap/Hip-Hop is having a renaissance of sorts. However, I don't really like any of it. In an industry that claims rock is dying (or at least has been for several years), what rock bands have been killing it, spinning it in a new direction, or paying inspired and original homages to their rock forefathers?

What band that you like/used to like makes you wish they would go back to what they used to do? Personally, I wish Maroon 5 would put out more stuff like Songs About Jane. They had a really chill, jazz-y, very Jamiroquai-esque sound that I dig the hell out of but now Levine's dedicated to pop music full time.

Hardmode: No Weezer

Have there been any musicians you didn't think much of at first, but upon closer inspection, really surprised you? I've recently listened to Barenaked Ladies' album Maroon and it's a surprisingly introspective and melancholy record, but with upbeat sounds. Off The Hook and Conventioneers are fantastic songs that I've heard nothing about

New release today, Erra's Neon.

Apple Music
Spotify
YouTube

Currently the number one metal album on iTunes' chart, Erra's Neon is the latest release from the underground metalcore act. While they've attracted a cult following, Erra rarely gets headlining tours. Neon is their newest attempt at reaching the next step.

My personal opinion is that this is the perfection of the sound the band switched to with their last release, Drift. Just as atmospheric, with little less of the chug-chug-chug of most metalcore outfits, Erra may have finally found out how to make what some call "progressive metalcore" a bit more accessible. I personally enjoy how present the bass is in the mix. Metal and hardcore both seem to forget about the instrument and put it low in the mix as an after thought. The clean vocals have always been reminiscent of post-hardcore's darling Anthony Green, and Neon is no different.

It's a little bit of a shame that we have to wait until track three to really hear some of the noodling guitar solos they are known for. In a genre more punctuated by breakdowns, Erra is a breath of fresh air when it comes to lead guitar work. But when it does happen, it is up to the standard they've put out for themselves. They seemed to have moved even further away from the djent sound of their earlier work here. I don't mind that, even if I do like djenty sounds, as I think this crisper sound is better overall for Erra. While the uncleans do hit like a truck on first listen, they stay in a mid-range throughout most of the album and it would have been nice to see them go low, as JT has been known to do live.

Overall, I gotta say this is one my favorite albums of the year so far. Every song slaps a bit, gets the head bopping along at the very least.

In my opinion, part of what makes places like /r/music so mind-numbingly boring is that outside of news, there's just individual tracks and question threads that beg for individual tracks.

There's some value in this and if that's the way you consume music, then cool. But as someone who primarily listens to albums, I rarely want to discover music like this. Like maybe if I'm looking into a new genre, it's cool to get an introductory song to get what it's all about, but beyond that it's kinda a haze.

So others who value any kind of music listening outside of singles + loose tracks, what do you think we can do to shape this community into something that includes us a little more? Discussions on DJ sets? Album reviews? Games like the survivors done on artist-specific subreddits? I don't think this is something that just naturally gets fixed through the hierarchy system or something, like many of the other problems with /r/music. What can we do?

I was looking over some of my charts of albums recently and I thought this might be a cool idea.

If you don't know what a chart is, basically you can go here and put together a chart of up to 100 of your favorite albums to show people a quick look at your taste or whatever. I've seen people use this as favorite albums, albums that mean a lot to them but aren't necessarily their favorite, people putting custom pictures and making a list of their favorite artists, people making a chart of albums with a "theme" (food on the cover, albums about break-ups, albums of certain genres, etc.), the possibility is whatever you feel like putting together a bunch of albums/artists/anything else you can think of together to show to other people interested in them. I thought it might be a cool idea to see what other ~music users enjoy listening to.

You can also use this to show your rateyourmusic account if you have one, your last.fm, your sputnikmusic, anything pertaining to music that would be cool to look at.

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something!

Feel free to give recs or dicuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

We're at roughly 7 days since the last weekly thread, so here's another! Imo we should have more regular threads like these, if anyone has ideas then drop them here! Personally I like the idea of doing "listening clubs," where we choose an album for the week, all listen to it, and have a regular discussion thread for every week. If there's any interest, I would love to run a hip hop focused one, though I could definitely do a lot of other genres if the desire was there. Anyway, drop a comment if anything like that sounds appealing to you!

Shamelessly copying my own prompt for this one:

--

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something!

Feel free to give recs or dicuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

It's just a quick thought but having a thread like that might be really neat-o.

Something like all parent comments just mentioning the one album, with links to previous discussions, or relevant reviews/discussions elsewhere?

As you've probably noticed, ~music is kind of dead compared to a lot of the other tildes. There's been a grand total of 3 posts that have gone over 10 upvotes in the past week. I'd like to try and change that.

The purpose of this thread is to collect interesting music discussion prompts. Don't worry about if it's a super high quality prompt or not, this is just brainstorming. If you ever notice that there hasn't been a decent discussion for a while and you don't have any ideas of what to post, go ahead and grab a prompt from here that hasn't been posted yet and post it. Try to start off the discussion with your own thoughts on the prompt if you can!

Also, we should try and keep any responses to the prompts themselves out of this thread — it'd defeat the point if we have all the discussion here :)

hey everybody, looks like it's been NINE whole days since the last one so here comes this week's. also, sorry for not commenting in the last one — i'm garbage :)

if you ever notice it's been a week or so and nobody's posted one, feel free to post! just steal the description from the last one (credit to @whom for writing it in the first place) and post away.

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something!

Feel free to give recs or dicuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

It looks like it's been about a week since the last one, so I'll go ahead and post another! @Whom, your post description was great so I'll just borrow that :)

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something!

Feel free to give recs or dicuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

What are your go to workout songs? For me it's usually a toss up between the Doom 2016 soundtrack (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jm932Sqwf5E) and The Lifa album from Heilung (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1BsKIP4uYM). Both get me super pumped and make me want to get active.

I have always enjoyed songs with rich vocal harmonies and structure. Last night I decided to make a playlist that collects the best ones that I've heard. Unfortunately, I realized I don't actually know that many off the top of my head.

Please, share your songs with me.
The playlist I have so far is here (spotify link).

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! Maybe we can make these threads a thing here.

Feel free to give recs or dicuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/