Sometimes I’m overwhelmed with the music choices I have (local library + Qobuz). I have more music in my combined library than I could ever listen to.
I can’t help but feel sometimes listening to music isn’t as special as it once was when choices were more limited; I had to be more thoughtful about my choices back then. Purchases felt more special.
On the other hand, streaming from Qobuz makes it easier to sample music of which I might not otherwise be aware. But the abundance can be overwhelming and distract from focusing on known and loved recordings.
Am I just some old fart reminiscing about the old days? Or do others here feel the same?
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AceRimmer
(Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast!)
2
You are not alone
My library is pushing 10000 albums with local and Qobuz combined.
More than I could listen to if I retired tomorrow!
But my sentiments mirror yours exactly.
Love the streaming for sampling new music rather than take an educated gamble on buying physical media.
But the old days of saving and buying the “special” albums are sorely missed
But I guess that’s called civilization progression.
Can’t say as I would like to go back to a beater Ford Escort as a daily driver either.
I think we had a similar problem in the old days: we could go to the library and borrow any book they had, so we had access to a lot more books than we could ever read. And we had to be thoughtful about which ones to buy. Isn’t streaming to music listening what borrowing a book was to reading?
Somehow it doesn’t feel the same. Perhaps it’s the difference in effort involved; ie getting dressed, going out to the library/record store vs just grabbing the phone/tablet/computer without having to get up (wearing whatever ) or go anywhere.
I removed Streaming services from my Roon setup to better enjoy my local music and also to slightly lessen the challenge of choosing what to listen too next.
I still have access to streaming from LMS as well as TIDAL and Qobuz and now just sample albums, and if I want to have them in Roon I buy them.
I’ve thought about doing something like this, at least temporarily.
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AceRimmer
(Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast!)
8
It had not occurred to me but I might give it a try for a bit.
Although just about all of the prog rock and metal I listen to is from Qobuz.
My local library is mostly classic hard Rock and power metal.
I think it would end up costing me a fortune
I am not claiming that it has been cheep
It has been a good experience though, and takes me back to my first year with Room when I didn’t have a streaming service in Roon. I have gone to play multiple albums only to find I didn’t own it. BandCamp and Qobuz have as usual been the main beneficiaries of my dwindling pension fund
I expected to add it back within a few days, but it has now been several month’s.
I am definitely more focused on having listening sessions for new music, and either removing them or flagging them for follow up for another listen.
My “method” is to keep accumulating new music, typically ~100 albums/year, while dipping back into older stuff. In my main interests, modern jazz and modern classical, I can find enough excellent material every year to have to force myself to go back to the archive. It’s fun to listen to new music/artists. Most of the artists I listen to are younger than my kids
Are they? Or is it just we do not value music enough if we have the feeling everything is available 24/7 in confusing plenty of a streaming serivce?
Nothing stops us from having our ´special albums´, our carefully curated library taking conscious decisions what we add and what not. I guess the latter is the key to the problem: Do we really take the time and effort for this conscious decision what we add to our library or favorite list?
Surprisingly I find streaming services integrated in roon to be helpful when it comes to limiting the number of albums in the library to our very favorites. It feels easier to move an album to some unwatched folder or remove it from Qobuz favorites knowing that ´it is still out there´. It simply does not overcomplicate my browsing experience.
I made a hard decision once to get rid of most of my local library cutting it down to a core library of things I really intend to listen to. For me personally, 4,000 albums turned out being a reasonable compromise. 10,000 was overly confusing.
Interestingly I had the exact opposite experience. I feel integrating a streaming service, preferably Qobuz, is vital to the way I use roon browsing as it completes the discographies, back catalogues, compositions lists and recording lists per composition (admittingly the latter two are classical music lovers problems mainly). I was without streaming service for quite a while and it felt utterly incomplete.
Funny enough: It feels most valuable for me when I never listen to a single track from Qobuz, add any album sourced from Qobuz to my collection or use the recommendations, roon radio or alike. Just need the completed database and possibility to quickly check something, may it be an album of an artist I am currently listening to or a recording of a composition I am discovering.
I was the same way…selective, bought an album and played it over and over before buying another.
I have a lot of music that I listened to over my lifetime …many are discographies of artis I liked and only new the hits or a few albums.
I like to see it all, sample it, play a subset or go deep. I never know the mood but I like knowing it’s all there. I have all my CDs in Flac with photos.
Qobuz fills some gaps, is great for exploring and when AI kicks in after my selection it adds to the experience.
I can still listen to the latest disc I just bought over and over. When I think about the past, I just change my habits and start listing to a hot new alubm of interst more often.
This part of this sentence made me remember something about my experience with streaming.
Before I tried Qobuz after it was integrated with Roon, I had very little interest in music streaming services. I tried one or two of the free services, but somehow having a separate service just didn’t appeal to me.
However, the way Qobuz is integrated with Roon, making it feel like one collection with my local files, is much more appealing, and have enjoyed it overall.
That said, sometimes it’s just too much. I’ll open up Roon, and faced with a zillion choices, end up not listening to anything. Perhaps I just need to take advantage of Roon’s Focus feature more, focusing just on my local collection when I feel overwhelmed with choices.
Btw, the intention of my original post isn’t to say streaming is bad, just that it does come with some downsides for me (and perhaps others).
I have lifetime Roon, Tidal for $10.99 per month, Qobuz for $129.99 per year, and 6 local albums I never listen to. Pure bliss. Also, no cassettes, CD’s, DVD’s, or LP’s (and no books or magazines).
I mostly listen to 4 or 5 of the 6 Roon “Your Daily Mixes” and let Roon Radio run from there.
Yes to both your questions☺️
Why not carefully curate a playlist of only your most
loved cuts. Perhaps one for each genre you prefer.
Treat them like your cd collection.
Or do others here feel the same?
