🔊 #NowPlaying on #BBC6Music's #TheMorningAfterMix

Karla Bonoff:
🎵 Isn't It Always Love

#KarlaBonoff

https://tooslowtodisco.bandcamp.com/track/karla-bonoff-isnt-it-always-love

https://open.spotify.com/track/4M7LrSnltIAzPmYziMQZiQ

Really enjoyed this Kyle Chayka essay on music/algorithms/desire paths: https://kylechayka.substack.com/p/filterworld-algorithmic-pathways

I have always loved the beautiful and magical path formed by accidental discoveries in the more organic sense than an algorithm can offer. It's happened to me in big and small ways; the most significant being when Alex Chilton played a Todd Rundgren song in Big Star's encore at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple, and the next day I came across Todd's album Faithful at the Upper West Side used record store I used to frequent and took a chance on it. That was the beginning of the end for me, and a beautiful, magical accident; a musical meet-cute.

More recently, a canceled show I'd been looking forward to led me to seeking out another concert to go to, and I took a chance on Karla Bonoff, and her performance was so beautiful; she's been on heavy rotation in my world ever since. Spotify may have led me to her songs eventually (and certainly I knew some of them already, even though I didn't know it - "All My Life" and "Somebody's Eyes"), and maybe the algorithm is just an accelerated version of accidental discovery, but I can't imagine it having the same impact.

I can't remember a single song the algorithm has led me to that has felt as significant to me as those organic discoveries.

#BigStar #AlexChilton #ToddRundgren #KarlaBonoff #algorithms #music