mrstsk:

What makes this such a pleasure to listen to is the space, the chance to hear decays, the rhythmic unpredictability, the way chunky objects become events and single instruments are allowed to show off their unique shapes, textures and properties.

Pop music, which does so little of this, is stuck in a kind of permanent infancy. It’s particularly scared of the decaying sound of single instruments, and of irregular rhythms. It lacks dynamic range, and increasingly burns its mastering files overloud to eradicate, quite deliberately, all uncertainty. It’s tethered to repetition and to quick returns to the originating chord. “We’re back home, thank God!”

Pop music is good for remembering, but not for listening. It’s good for recognition, but not cognition. It puts text above texture. It refers endlessly and knowingly to its own history, but lacks a sensitivity to gorgeous objects, unique events and the present moment.