{"id":89,"date":"2007-11-21T20:27:51","date_gmt":"2007-11-22T02:27:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/?p=89"},"modified":"2010-09-19T10:11:18","modified_gmt":"2010-09-19T16:11:18","slug":"a-year-with-last-fm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/a-year-with-last-fm\/","title":{"rendered":"A Year With Last FM"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a post<\/a> a year ago I\u00c2\u00a0described a recently-published chart of ‘best ever’ albums that claimed to be the most accurate as it was based on historical sales.\u00c2\u00a0 I posited that a chart based on what people were actually listening to would be better, although this would be impossible to obtain.\u00c2\u00a0In that post, I hazarded a guess (by way of example) that the 10 albums I listened to the most were:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Radiohead<\/strong> OK Computer<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n
  2. Desaperacidos<\/strong> Read Music Speak Spanish<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n
  3. Bob Dylan<\/strong>, Highway 61 Revisited<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n
  4. Jesus and Mary Chain<\/strong> Darklands<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n
  5. At The Drive In<\/strong> Relationship of Command<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n
  6. Pleasure Forever <\/strong>Alter<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n
  7. Oasis<\/strong> Definitely Maybe<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n
  8. Suede<\/strong> Dog Man Star<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n
  9. Nick Cave<\/strong> Let Love In<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n
  10. Bright Eyes<\/strong> Lifted or The Story Is In The Soil Keep Your Ear To The Ground<\/a>\"\"<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    A geek-buddy (Neil) replied to my post saying that Last FM<\/a> came pretty close to tracking actual listening habits (and not sales) so could provide a more realistic set of staistics.\u00c2\u00a0 So I signed up, and for the past year, everything I have listened to (save for a two or three month period when my PC was in transit\u00c2\u00a0between\u00c2\u00a0Belgium and the U.S.) has been ‘scrobbled’ to the\u00c2\u00a0Last FM servers, from where I can now see what I’ve been listening to it – just in case senile dementia has set in and I can’t remember!<\/p>\n

    It’s now been exactly one year since I signed up, and checking my charts<\/a> in\u00c2\u00a0Last FM, I\u00c2\u00a0see that I have listened to some 23,895 tracks (running the full gamut from ‘Rock’ to ‘Alternative Rock’!), and the albums that I have listened to the most are:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. The Twilight Singers<\/strong> Blackberry Belle<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (246 track-plays)<\/li>\n
    2. The Decemberists<\/strong> The Crane Wife<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (197 track-plays)<\/li>\n
    3. Broken Social Scene<\/strong> Broken Social Scene<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (161\u00c2\u00a0 track-plays)<\/li>\n
    4. The Twilight Singers<\/strong> Powder Burns<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (150\u00c2\u00a0 track-plays)<\/li>\n
    5. Radiohead<\/strong> OK Computer<\/a>\"\" <\/em>(142\u00c2\u00a0 track-plays)<\/li>\n
    6. Silversun Pickups<\/strong> Carnavas<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (138\u00c2\u00a0 track-plays)<\/li>\n
    7. The Who<\/strong> Thirty Years of Maximum R&B<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (130 track-plays)<\/li>\n
    8. Bob Dylan<\/strong> Biograph<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (127 track-plays)<\/li>\n
    9. The Black Heart Procession<\/strong> The Spell<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (103\u00c2\u00a0 track-plays)<\/li>\n
    10. Kate Bush<\/strong> Aerial<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (100\u00c2\u00a0 track-plays)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      So there we have it.\u00c2\u00a0 Definitve proof of what my favorite albums are – and proof that I really don’t know myself what I’m listening to (so maybe senile dementia has<\/em> set in…).\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0But is this really that<\/em> accurate?\u00c2\u00a0 Firstly, it is only what I’ve been listening to over the past 12 months, versus around 25 years of serious music consumption.\u00c2\u00a0 Because of this, my Last FM generated list is weighted\u00c2\u00a0towards albums I’ve bought recently (I tend to put new purchases on pretty heavy rotation at first) so the listen counts for these are probably artificially high.\u00c2\u00a0 For example, I’ve had Radiohead<\/strong>‘s OK Computer<\/em> for ten years (I know, I can barely believe it myself…), vs. only one year for The Twighlight Singers<\/strong>‘ (very excellent) Blackberry Belle<\/em>, so is it fair to rank them in the same way?\u00c2\u00a0 I should probably extrapolate OK Computer<\/em>‘s listens to 1,420 (142 p.a. x 10 years), which would put it way<\/em> in the lead.\u00c2\u00a0 Assuming I could remember when I bought every album (not always in the year of release) then this would be closer<\/span> to a realistic chart.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 But still not quite there.<\/p>\n

      Secondly, note that I’ve referred to the counts in the Last FM chart as ‘track-plays’.\u00c2\u00a0 Last FM simply counts the number of times a(ny) track on the album has been played.\u00c2\u00a0 If an album consists of five tracks and I listen to the entire album twice, then this will still get the same ‘play count’ as playing one ten-track album once.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s definitely not fair.\u00c2\u00a0 My #7 album according to Last FM is The Who<\/strong>‘s boxed set 25 Years of Maximum R’n’B<\/em>, which happens to have\u00c2\u00a095 tracks.\u00c2\u00a0 Similarly, #8 is Dylan<\/strong>‘s Biograph<\/em> boxed set with 53 tracks.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0I have my iPod on random a lot, so the law of averages (or law of randomness – I was never that good at statistics) dictates that albums with higher track counts will rank higher in my listening habits, although I personally wouldn’t necessarily say I listen to these albums<\/span> more often than other albums in my collection.\u00c2\u00a0 Also, if I played one track from a ten-track album ten times, then this would count as ten plays, as would playing all ten tracks from another ten-track album once each.\u00c2\u00a0 Is that a fair representation of which albums<\/em> I listen to the most?<\/p>\n

      Maybe we could adjust the album charts to take into account the number of tracks on an album.\u00c2\u00a0 So my 130 plays of 25 Years of Maximum R’n’B<\/em> at\u00c2\u00a095 tracks would equate to only\u00c2\u00a01.3 album listens, and OK Computer<\/em>‘s 142 listens at 12 tracks would equate to 11 listens.<\/p>\n

      But even that isn’t really fair, as it doesn’t take into account actual listening<\/span> time.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Albums with a few lengthy tracks such as Godspeed You! Black Emperor<\/strong>‘s Lift Your Skinny Fists To Heaven<\/a>\"\"<\/em> – with an average track length of\u00c2\u00a021’45” minutes – would be penalised at the expense of the Pixies<\/strong>‘ Surfer Rosa<\/a>\"\" <\/em>which averages just under\u00c2\u00a02’20” a song.\u00c2\u00a0 If I listen to Brian Eno<\/strong>‘s 61-minute Thursday Afternoon<\/em>, should this count for only the same amount of listening as listening to\u00c2\u00a0Napalm Death<\/strong>‘s 1.3-second meistewerk\u00c2\u00a0You Suffer<\/em>, even though I would have spent approximatey 2,815 times longer listening to Brian Eno than Napalm Death?<\/p>\n

      Reassuringly (or worryingly…) it’s not just me who is worried about this.\u00c2\u00a0 Some enterprising Last FM user went away and wrote a ‘Normalizer’ that would recalculate your Last FM statistics, based on the track length<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0 This gives me a ‘normalized’ Top 10 albums of:<\/p>\n

        \n
      1. The Twilight Singers<\/strong> Blackberry Belle<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (996 minutes)<\/li>\n
      2. Broken Social Scene<\/strong> Broken Social Scene<\/a>\"\"<\/em> (730 minutes)<\/li>\n
      3. Radiohead<\/strong> OK Computer<\/a>\"\" <\/em>(632 minutes)<\/li>\n
      4. Sonic Youth<\/strong> Murray Street<\/a>\"\" <\/em>(488 minutes)<\/li>\n
      5. Massive Attack<\/strong> Mezzanine<\/a>\"\" <\/em>(434 minutes)<\/li>\n
      6. Bright Eyes<\/strong> Lifted or The Story Is In The Soil Keep Your Ear To The Ground<\/a> <\/em>(411 minutes)<\/li>\n
      7. Afghan Whigs<\/strong> Gentlemen<\/a>\"\" <\/em>(408 minutes)<\/li>\n
      8. TV on the Radio<\/strong> Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes<\/a>\"\" <\/em>(391 minutes)<\/li>\n
      9. 65daysofstatic<\/strong> The Fall Of Math<\/a>\"\" <\/em>(388 minutes)<\/li>\n
      10. Suede<\/strong> Dog Man Star<\/a> <\/em>(380 minutes)<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        This is now getting a bit closer to reality, in that three of what I originally thought were my favorite albums are in this<\/span> list.\u00c2\u00a0 But it’s still not really 100%.\u00c2\u00a0 This could be because the Normalizer takes average<\/span> track lengths for an artist, rather than using the length of each individual track.\u00c2\u00a0 True, it is closer than assuming that every track by every artist is the same length (as Last FM does) but it isn’t really a true<\/span> definition of ‘listening time’.\u00c2\u00a0 Unfortunately, such statistics are pretty much impossible to gather (until we all have scrobblers embedded in our ears — go on Neil, tell me that you know where to get one of these…).<\/p>\n

        So where does this leave us?\u00c2\u00a0 Umm, not sure.\u00c2\u00a0 In fact, what’s the point of it all?\u00c2\u00a0 Not sure about that either.\u00c2\u00a0 But if nothing else, it does make an interesting diversion for\u00c2\u00a0we anally-retentive iPod owners who take our music (far too) seriously.<\/p>\n

        Oh, and Neil: The Beatles<\/strong> are no longer #1 at Last FM.\u00c2\u00a0 That honor now goes to Radiohead (with 96,694 listeners and 1,250,542 plays, to The Beatles’ 78,024 listeners and 902,578 plays).\u00c2\u00a0 Strangely, Radiohead are the only band who appear in all<\/em> of my charts above.\u00c2\u00a0 No matter which way you slice it, Radiohead are officially Bigger Than The Beatles…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        In a post a year ago I\u00c2\u00a0described a recently-published chart of ‘best ever’ albums that claimed to be the most accurate as it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,2],"tags":[30,64,42],"class_list":["post-89","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life","category-music","tag-ipod","tag-last-fm","tag-music-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":224,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89\/revisions\/224"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.planetmanuel.com\/dirk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}