The Seventies of the 21st Century – How 2013 Brought Music Back

By now, everyone on the blog scene is well aware of the death of the traditional record label. With the exception of still-reigning mega-pop-stars, and the occasional lucky holdover from the days when people still paid money for music, the bands and artists who’s tireless efforts to enrich our lives with sonic goodness make no more for their labor than the polite Southern lady making your burgers at Whataburger (for Nathan’s Oregon friends, it’s just really greasy and expensive burgers from Texas). Now, I’m not sure that the financial situation necessarily improved much in 2013 for these poor road warriors, but if the quality of music of this year was any sort of indicator, it would say that our audio idols must be rolling in gold. Everything from gutter slam-death to psychedelic indie rock to industrial-informed self-worshipping hip-hop was released this year, and with a small handful of exceptions, just about all of it fucking RULED. Maybe it took the death of the major label to bring music back to Mecca; where once every worthwhile album may have been created by the hand of Atlantic, or by Virgin, we have now reached a time where the most talked about album of the year was a toss-up between post-rock, emo, indie, and BLACK METAL, as distributed by the formerly niche hardcore label Deathwish Inc. In fact, the touch of Deathwish owner Jacob Bannon, as well as God City Studios’ master producer Kurt Ballou (of course, singer and guitarist, respectively, of quintessential metal/hardcore outfit Converge), have been felt all over this year and, of course, the last two. Following their lead, this has truly been the year of the indie record label, and of the self-produced album; beyond that, it has been the year of the comeback album as well. How can music be dead, I ask, when one of the other most-talked-about albums of the year found two underground hip-hop darlings combining forces to drop a FREE album on the masses that slaughtered the competition? When two dead death metal giants and one bloated radio favorite had been massively hyped, for months, and then turned out to live up to every bit of that hype? When a modern-day orchestral outfit could quietly sneak a double album onto its fans and have every second be essential to the complete package? Music is not dead, my friends; it simply needed to TEAR DOWN THE WALL and be face-to-face with its followers. How can anybody be angry towards a hip-hop mega-star bragging himself blue if he’s just being honest with his fans? And for that matter, anybody who says that slam-death sucks, that black metal hasn’t been worthwhile since the mid-nineties, that hip-hop is all about tits and ass, that emo and metalcore are for Warped Tour kiddies, or that indie is gay; you all obviously didn’t listen to a single fucking album put out this year. 2013 is the year that the artist gave back to the fan, and the record label didn’t fuck up the middle-man process in doing so. Except for the fact that Yeezus was not pressed to vinyl. -Dylan Brown

Dylan Brown is a fan of the music. ALL OF THE MUSIC.