Trevin Chow

My music library consists of songs that I’ve acquired from a variety of sources such as web downloads, Amazon, iTunes, eMusic and rips from my own CDs.

One of my biggest pet peeves for the longest time is that songs and albums across my library vary in playback volume.  Since I almost always listen to music in shuffle/random across the entire library (or within a specific genre), track-to-track volume differences are very noticeable.  It’s particularly bad if I’m listening to through headphones.

By default, iTunes will analyze volume information on songs as you add them to your library.  It stores volume normalization in an extended ID3 tag called “COMMENT ITUNNORM” which it will read and adjust playback volume before each song starts.

While iTunes handles this really well, it sucks if you also use other media player software or want to move to another music player in the future.

Since I wanted to future proof myself, I started investigating how I could have a more portable solution that would be player independent.

Solution: Replay Gain

After doing some searches, I stumbled upon various ways of analyzing audio files in order to normalize overall loudness of song playback.  The most popular method seemed to be “Replay Gain” and it was getting a ton of support in 3rd party applications.

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At MacWorld ‘09, one of Apple’s “big” announcements was that the iTunes music store would be completely DRM free by the end of 2009.

As long as there are no competing hardware innovations from other companies, DRM-free music doesn’t matter one bit.

The majority of people use iTunes because they love their iPod (or iPhone) and not the other way around.   The announcement for DRM-free music doesn’t do anything for the normal user, that has a one or two computers and an iPod/iPhone.   Amazon has had DRM-free music for quite some time, but Apple hasn’t been any closer to losing their death grip on the digital music industry.

As it currently stands, the player and music store business is a parallel to the wireless phone  industry.

Traditionally, wireless carriers  would lock you into their service in 4 ways — service contracts, wireless coverage, handset selection and most important, the inability to move your cell phone number to another service provider.  Switching carriers meant that you’d lose your phone number, so for years and years, we put up with each carrier’s BS because we didn’t want Mom inadvertantly calling some stranger because you switched to AT&T.

However, after wireless phone number portability came about, wireless carriers lost their biggest leverage over us.  With this, came lower prices, shorter contracts and an increasing equality in coverage as they all fought to keep our business.  Carriers quickly realized that handset selection could be a big differentiator and became the new reason why customers would stay begrudgingly loyal.  This is why AT&T’s exclusive deal with Apple for the iPhone was key to give AT&T Cingular AT&T a significant advantage over Sprint, Verizon and T-Mobile.  Customeres from other services ran to AT&T not because of their customer service, superior prices, or even their coverage area.  It was because they had the iPhone.

Apple’s dominance with the  iTunes store is not due to lock in from DRM.  It’s because they made kickass elegant devices.  Even though it is an expectation today that buying and sync’ing music is easy, back when the iTunes store launched, it was considered icing on the perfect hardware cake.  This caused more and more people to flock to the holy temple of Steve Jobs for their music purchasing needs.

Until someone comes around and makes a phone or portable music player that is both better than the Apple products and has a music service that is at least on par in terms of selection and ease of use, DRM-free music is just a marketing bullet that Apple can use to show they’re “open“.

Stumbled upon A Fine Frenzy recently and fell in love right away.  I even tried, unsuccessfully, to attend her sold out show at the High Dive in Fremont.  Her magical voice and great song writing in unbelievably captivating!

Here are the lyrics from one of my favorite songs:

Almost Lover

Your fingertips across my skin
The palm trees swaying in the wind
Images

You sang me Spanish lullabies
The sweetest sadness in your eyes
Clever trick

I never want to see you unhappy
I thought you’d want the same for me

Goodbye, my almost lover
Goodbye, my hopeless dream
I’m trying not to think about you
Can’t you just let me be?
So long, my luckless romance
My back is turned on you
I should’ve known you’d bring me heartache
Almost lovers always do

We walked along a crowded street
You took my hand and danced with me
Images

And when you left you kissed my lips
You told me you’d never ever forget these images, no
I never want to see you unhappy
I thought you’d want the same for me

Goodbye, my almost lover
Goodbye, my hopeless dream
I’m trying not to think about you
Can’t you just let me be?
So long, my luckless romance
My back is turned on you
I should’ve known you’d bring me heartache
Almost lovers always do

I cannot go to the ocean
I cannot drive the streets at night
I cannot wake up in the morning
Without you on my mind
So you’re gone and I’m haunted
And I bet you are just fine
Did I make it that easy
To walk right in and out of my life?

Goodbye, my almost lover
Goodbye, my hopeless dream
I’m trying not to think about you
Can’t you just let me be?
So long, my luckless romance
My back is turned on you
I should’ve known you’d bring me heartache
Almost lovers always do

I’ve been hitting the concert tip this year in a hard way and enjoying every minute of it. Here are a few of the notable shows I’ve been to this year and what’s coming up for me in music land.

Ben Gibbard (May)

I always find it weird when lead singers of band tour solo but still play songs from their bands. However, after seeing Ben Gibbard’s solo show at the Showbox, I forgave him very quickly An utterly amazing show.

Daft Punk (August)

This may have been the best show I have ever been to. Daft Punk had the sell-out crowd swimming in musical nirvana for their entire performance. See my past post for videos.

Arcade Fire with LCD Soundsystem (September)

This was unfortunately at HEC Ed Pavilion at UW and since they limited the number of people that could be on the floor, we were forced to sit in the stands which eliminated any possibility of an intimate setting. Something weird about sitting on wooden benches for a concert.

I wasn’t that impressed with LCD Soundsystem’s performance. They were WAY too loud and chose too many of their harder hitting tracks than I liked.

Arcade Fire, on the other hand, completely rocked the house. They have such an phenomenal stage presence and a really impressive stage setup.

Band of Horses (November)

I missed them the last time they came in the summer due to an insane work schedule, and regretted ever since. When I heard they were coming again, I snatched up tickets right away. They played at the the Showbox near Pike Place Market and completely rocked the house. I’m always surprised at how good the vocals are

Evanescence (November)

Amy Lee’s voice is surreal; just as good live as it is recorded. Wonderful performances of Immortal and Bring Me to Life, but I was largely unimpressed. Volume dial was turned up to deaf proportions. Thank god for ear plugs!

Here are the concerts that are on deck for me:

• Prefuse 73 @ Neumos on December 6th
• DJ Shadow @ The Showbox in February ‘08

Here’s my wish list of artists I need to see before I die:

• Radiohead
• Junior Boys
• Mute Math (yes I saw em earlier this year, but would love to see them again)
• Placebo
• Quantic (I missed him at the Decibel Festival this year)
• Explosions in the Sky (I was forced to miss this in the summer because my tickets were lost in the mail. Sigh)
• Feist (I just missed her at the Paramount!)
• Hot Chip (I had tickets for their show in June but they cancelled!)
• Nadia Ali (I just missed her show at Heaven. Damn)

I’m sure there are more artists I’m missing, but with my music insanity I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to list them all.

I’ve been a long time fan of Daft Punk and I finally got to see them live at the WaMu theater on Sunday. This was a top notch show with awesome visuals and the majority of the crowd going crazy with every track played. One down side is that I might have to call these guys Deaf Punk now that they may have blown my ear drums. Sacrifices I make for the artists I love… sigh.

Here’s a short video clip I took near the beginning of the show:

Shows some of the cool visuals on the giant pyramid LCD screens:
This clip is from their encore, where both their suits light up in red neon outlines. The crowd was just freakin’ crazy at this point: