With the long anticipated release of the new Coldplay album Viva la Vida, I got to thinking about the sanctity of music. Unlike George Bush’s reference to the “sanctity of marriage” I believe my thoughts actually hold some logical water.

With the new age of music coming fast, there are many positives and negatives in the change. Mostly there are positives for consumers but here is something I consider to be a major loss. The power of the Album is dwindling. This saddens me because as I have developed my love for music and grown my collection, I have learned that a song alone rarely matches the power of the whole album.

I remember a couple summer back, after hearing the single Somebody Told Me, a friend and I picked up the album Hot Fuss by The Killers. When we popped it into his car stereo it changed our summer. The album made our experiences more thrilling. It became like a soundtrack for our lives at the time.

This has been my experience with many great albums since then. When a musical artist makes songs and they blend them together so perfectly in a twelve track LP it creates such a serene feeling for the listener; something that few songs on their own can do, especially for an entire hour straight.

Now it seems artists and fans have forgotten this magic. Since many fans want to just buy the song that they heard on the radio and can do so with a simple download, all the focus comes off the album and onto the single. But singles don’t make super-fans. They make one hit wonders. In my observations I think this is why Hip Hop Stars especially have very short lived careers in most cases. They make that one great song but then their album does not live up to fan’s expectations. What ever happened to Chingy? Or Chamillionaire? They may still be in the business but they are not the successes they could have been.

So here is a message to the industry, the labels, the artists, and the fans. Don’t forget about the album. Putting a focus on creating a great album ensures the longevity of the artist and ensures that fans won’t just listen to the music, they will have an experience that they will look back on for years to come like past and present generations have with The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Eagles, The Cure, and so on…

Viva la Album!

(Photo of my mom Paula, my sister Emily, and I on vacation in California.)

It seems that holidays have recently been deathtraps for my happiness. My Valentine’s Day was tragic (read about it here), my birthday was not very good either, and now Mother’s Day has been a bad day. A bird kamikazeed my car (and died), I ran into my ex-girlfriend, and a bunch of other bad things happened. But the main reason today was terrible was because I did not get to see my mom. This is the first time ever we have not seen eachother on Mother’s Day.

So, though I cannot say it to her face today, I want to say Happy Mother’s Day to my mom, Paula Fox. You have been the rock in my life and I love you for it. I would be a far lesser man if I was raised by anybody else but you.

This is a question I get asked a lot when people visit my blog. This is a syndicated feed from the blog by Hugh Macleod which shows his views on people, business, art, religion, etc. through a series of doodles that he does on the back of business cards.

I originally found this weird little sidebar widget on Guy Kawasaki’s blog. The cartoon that hooked me was this one. It is actually a great insight into marketing masked as a crack to the inventor of the iPod.

Check out GapingVoid.com

I have a weird interest in apocalyptic scenarios so when Phil from The Philip DeFranco Show mentioned this video series on YouTube I had to check it out. It is a fascinating look into the future if all hell really broke loose in our country.

Though it is not a huge budget series, the production quality and editing are excellent. They are currently on episode 4 and each episode is between four and five minutes long. Even if you do not daydream about the end of the world, you should check out this series.

Check out 2009 A True Story