Track 7: Fool’s Gold — Lhasa De Sela
I’m at my local library to pick up a hold when I decide to check out the CD collection. After searching the catalog to make sure there actually are CDs at this branch, I find a few metal shelves near the teen section.
Being confronted with the library’s CD collection feels almost aggressively non personalized. Instead of Spotify’s heavily customized, ever-changing homepage, I can take in the library’s collection at a glance. Seeing categories like “jazz” or “classic” reminds me that there are entire genres of music that I never listen to.
The “francophone” category especially gives me pause. Quebec is a French province with its own cultural ecosystem in a sea of English in North America. French is my mother tongue — I learned English second. Yet I can’t remember Spotify ever recommending francophone music to me. The library is anchored in my local context, while on Spotify I float in a sea of shifting data points.
I can also trust that no commercial considerations influence what I’m seeing. In Spotify’s own words:
In some cases, commercial considerations may influence our recommendations. For example, Spotify offers a promotional tool that enables artists and record labels to highlight priority songs, increasing the likelihood of them being recommended in specific algorithmic playlists: Radio, Autoplay and certain Mixes.
Is a given song chosen because it’s the best match or because it’s sponsored?
For streams of those priority songs generated in impacted playlists, Spotify charges a commission.
What am I not being recommended from artists who refuse to take part in this scheme?
I end up borrowing a CD by Lianne La Havas, which is on display, because I confuse her for Lhasa De Sela, a local musician who died of breast cancer at the age of 37. A park that I pass on my daily commute is named after her.
It’s a silly mistake, but it feels a little like true serendipity. I’ve never listened to Lhasa De Sela’s music. Maybe I should.
Finding a way to play CDs is the real challenge. My library doesn’t lend out CD players. I text my dad, but he’s already sold my late Oma’s setup. I visit a thrift store: no luck. They do have lots of used CDs for $1.50, however, and I buy a few. On my third thrift store, a growing collection of CDs from 90s divas in my bag, I find a cute Sony hi-fi system that fits my living room bookshelf. I bring it home and excitedly plug it in, but its audio output port doesn’t work. Mariah Carey will have to wait.
My foray into CDs, while unsuccessful, does remind me of the advantages of owning physical media, something Aaron Perszanowski and Jason Schultz explore in The End of Ownership. The library can buy CDs and lend them on its own terms, instead of having to rely on licence agreements with library vendors that offer music like Hoopla or Freegal. Strangers donated their CDs to those thrift stores, and I bought them for a fraction of the cost of my monthly Spotify subscription. They will sit on my bookshelf until I decide otherwise. I wonder what digital ownership models we might design for libraries to lend music on fair terms.
