Brian Eno on making music, innovation by “leaving things out,” & nomenclature [brilliant]

“A way to make new music is to imagine looking back at the past from a future and imagine music that could have existed but didn’t. Like East African free jazz, which as far as I know does not exist. To some extent, this was how ambient music emerged.

“My interest in making music has been to create something that does not exist that I would like to listen to, not because I wanted a job as a musician. I wanted to hear music that had not yet happened, by putting together things that suggested a new thing which did not yet exist. It’s like having a ready-made formula if you are able to read it.

“One of the innovations of ambient music was leaving out the idea that there should be melody or words or a beat… so in a way that was music designed by leaving things out – that can be a form of innovation, knowing what to leave out. All the signs were in the air all around with ambient music in the mid 1970s, and other people were doing a similar thing.

“I just gave it a name. Which is exactly what it needed. A name. A name. Giving something a name can be just the same as inventing it. By naming something you create a difference. You say that this is now real. Names are very important.”

From this most excellent interview in the Guardian.

My thoughts on on-demand streaming

I generally don’t write much about the sector anymore (too busy trying to make 8tracks work while paying the bills), but I thought worth re-posting my response to The Key to Making Free Music Services Work here.

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Keep in mind that the largest category of music service today is — by far — ad-supported radio, which generates ~$39bn in revs globally, about TWICE that thrown off by recorded music.

On-demand streaming at today’s royalty rates ($.005/stream at the low end) requires direct consumer payment to be sustainable. As Pandora has shown, an internet radio service taking the compulsory license can, despite rates that are still really expensive ($.001/stream), achieve profitability.

Fundamentally — and as Jobs has noted in the past — music is different from video content in that its utility continues over time; as such, it lends itself to an ownership model. Cable TV works just fine as a subscription b/c you don’t have much need to “save” the programming.

While I think music acquired illegally (P2P, iPod-swapping, CD-burning) will likely always remain the largest component of the market, and internet radio may well take over from iTMS and other a la carte download services to become the second-largest category over time, an on-demand subscription could gain some traction if it also incorporates downloads at a reasonable price/track, e.g. either eMusic incorporates something like Rhapsody, or vice-versa.