Achieving Freedom in Music

I have an unhealthy obsession with collecting things -- music is no exception. In fact, I find myself picking up new genres and artists that catch my eye. After a few hours, I've stashed away every song, live show, and/or low fidelity recording I can find in their discography.

This was the case with an artist I'm deeply fond of: Abu-se-ken (虻瀬犬), or simply Abuse. Without him, I doubt I would have cemented my mark in Internet history with my most widely-acclaimed cover, dogdog ft. Rouon Aro.

However, I was sick of dealing with the devil; it's inexcusably expensive to buy subscriptions to streaming services like Spotify or Apple Music just to listen to my favorite artists. Having exposure, whether through official streaming or not, is often the best way to get more sales. I mean, just look at TikTok!

Also, audiophiles & music fans can unanimously agree that the recommendation system of Spotify & Apple Music doesn't meet the user's needs. It suffers from a strange "tunneling" effect, where artists you listen to are merely regurgitated back into your feed, with only a handful of new artists appearing in your Discover tab based on local listening & somewhat adjacent genres.

Nowadays, I've developed a system that completely eliminates all streaming services from my life, relying only on a self-curated playlist, alternative applications, options to buy music.

It's important to note that I am by no means an expert on collecting music, nor am I claiming that my method is the best way to find and share music. I'm simply explaining my thought process & workflow in the hopes that you'll learn something new that you didn't know before!

Finding Your Motive

First, it helps to consider how important achieving freedom is to you. How often do you listen to music? Are you happy with the current prices of your monthly subscriptions? Maybe you're not aware of alternatives and are curious about the possibilities.

Factors such as the obscurity of your favorite artists, the amount of time you spend listening, the availability of music on different devices, etc. are all important to consider when thinking about this topic.

For me, my breaking point was the lack of awareness of emerging trends & artists due to the poor recommendations I was getting from Spotify. If I had stayed loyal to that platform, I wouldn't have curated the music taste I have today. Artists like Patricia Taxxon, Jane Remover, or xaev would never have been able to make a significant impact on my life, and the feeling of not knowing the larger than life world of music outside of my own circle was soul crushing.

I recommend that everyone should take my suggestions with a grain of salt. I encourage anyone who is skeptical to try it out yourself and see what your motive is.

However, if you're someone who (1) doesn't have disposable income to spend on monthly subscriptions, (2) is an avid supporter of less-popular platforms, or (3) prioritizes digital freedom, then this article may be useful to you.

For those who are still unsure, I've included a rating system of one to three asterisks based on how morally dubious the solution is.

Searching Better Alternatives (*)

When considering other alternatives, the first thing I look at is how widely available the music is on that platform. For more popular "radio-friendly" music, this is less of an issue as the publishing label/artist will ensure that their song/LP is available on all platforms.

For more obscure/independent artists, different platforms have different advantages for them, and I'll give a brief introduction to each:

• Youtube: Easily the most accessible platform, fostering an "anyone can create" mentality that paves the way for emerging artists, producers, and mixers alike. I was able to make music by creating covers, and it was thanks to Youtube that I was given an opportunity to build a following. Even if you don't use Youtube Music, the main platform is still amazing in its own right. Don't underestimate its top-notch recommendations & vast network of many genres/artists.

• Bandcamp: If you've ever wanted to support local artists, you may have heard of Bandcamp. Despite its reputation as a shopping platform, Bandcamp has a dense catalog of new artists, trends and recommendations to check out. In addition, Bandcamp is transparent when it comes to different file formats (supports FLAC, OGG, WAV natively) and allows you to maintain your own catalog through its own playback service. An underrated feature of Bandcamp is its follower/following social network, which allows you to easily see people's new purchases, reviews, and listens, which is a much better recommendation system on its own. Some artists even allow users to listen to full LPs and EPs for free, and there's an option to donate to your favorite artists through Bandcamp, a feature missing from other streaming platforms. A common drawback, however, is that some artists/labels don't release their music on Bandcamp, limiting its availability. My recommendation is to limit Bandcamp as a side option for finding music, as it's most effective for niche and/or new artists.

• Soundcloud: While Soundcloud has a somewhat controversial role in the media, it is undeniably a valuable resource for finding music. Most indie artists got their start on Soundcloud, and with its easy barrier to entry, anyone can produce and release music on Soundcloud, diversifying the amount of music you can find. For covers, flips, and/or mixes, Soundcloud is your oyster. Not to mention, Soundcloud's recommendations are oddly effective, and it's a strong competitor to even Spotify.

Although I've reviewed these options separately, I often use a combination of all three in my daily life, picking new songs from each, so don't limit yourself to just one.

To aid your search for more music, I would recommend considering Last.fm for tracking your music & seeing others' listens, RYM to see anonymous reviews of all things music, and if you're willing to sift through the cesspool, 4chan's /mu/.

A tool that I found useful for discovering genres was Music Map, which may be worth exploring!

Migrating to Self-Curation (*)

Let's say for an ideal citizen, they purchase a LP they really enjoy from Bandcamp, and now they have the digital files in WAV to listen for free. While Spotify & Apple Music allow individuals to listen to music offline through their local library, I would recommend shifting away from these softwares and use open-source alternatives to catalog your music.

A lovely person by the name of Marcika was able to document how they were able to upload their music to a portable MP3 player, which is definitely an option for those who are willing to live frugally. The video also goes more in-depth in some alternatives that I won't mention in this article, so it's worth checking out, especially if you're interesting in burning CDs, listening on a Mac, or ripping music through other means.

For most people with PCs, I recommend foobar2000. For full theming support, it's heavily advised to opt for the 32bit version, not the 64bit one. At the time of writing, I've been an active user of this software for 6-7 months, and I'm utterly floored by its compatibility & features.

• Built-in tagging support: Have you ripped music files from unofficial sources? Missing album titles, out of order and/or incorrect information? Simply edit a song or entire albums in foobar and keep it in your files indefinitely. It's crazy how easy it is to edit your files with this software, when the alternative is to download some obscure third-party software with fewer options than foobar.
• Direct folder-library UI: Most people will keep their music in a dedicated music folder, which is already provided in most versions of Windows + Linux. foobar, by default, supports the native folder in the OS, and allows you to freely navigate your directory through the application. It supports sorting by album, artist, alphabetically, and by year, and with the display of album art, a local rating system, visualizations, EQ, and smart search, you will find yourself comfortably browsing through your music with ease.
• Custom theming: If you've ever been dissatisfied with the appearance of foobar, you have the freedom to customize the look and feel of it, from the layout, to the colors, to even custom scripts. Personally, I use Ottodix's Eole theme, which elevates the user experience to the next level, and is my primary choice for modernizing the software.

To give you a little taste, here is a screenshot of my all-time favorite artist, Porter Robinson's Nurture on foobar2000:

There is something magical about owning your own music, and keeping your listening space as minimal as possible. No distractions, no ads, no feeds.

Acquiring Music via Soulseek (**)

If you can't find the music you're looking for, and you want the ability to listen to your favorite artists, I don't blame you. Most music can't geographically pass through various countries, but I want to introduce you to a client software available for Windows, Mac, and Linux called Soulseek.

As mentioned in its About, it's "ad-free, spyware-free" and is simply a file-sharing network with connected peers.

To put it simply, let's say you're looking for a particular rare EP in produced in 1993, and you couldn't find it through the official sources I mentioned above. 9 times out of 10, someone else may have the files for that EP, and is sharing it publicly through Soulseek. By connecting to this client, you're now free to explore the music shared by thousands of avid users. With enough dedication, you'll be able to find not only the full list of songs, but also multiple variations with different file formats.

Can it illegal? Yes, absolutely, if you endorse sharing of copyrighted music. I encourage everyone to stick to non-copyrighted music/works to avoid any legal issues with copyright holders.

As for the sharing of music, you will bear responsibility of ensuring you don't download malware or viruses, but considering the nature of the Soulseek community, which is outwardly generous & pro-sharing, it is extremely unlikely you will encounter a virus. To be safe, check the file format of your download (safe: MP3, OGG, WAV, FLAC) and ensure you're not downloading an executable, for instance.

Remember to be an active participant if you decide to use Soulseek: always share, never leech. There is no penalty, but keep in mind that you can be banned by others if they see that you haven't shared any music of your own. Soulseek wouldn't exist without its users after all!

Acquring Music through yt-dlp (**)

If you are able to find the music through the official sources, but there is no way to download it to your local library, there is a solution for this as well.

You may know about online services like Youtube-MP3, but these websites are unreliable, slow, and sometimes can even be more dangerous than you may think.

A better way to download music through official sources is a command-line interface software called yt-dlp. Although it's known for downloading Youtube videos (e.g. videos, music, films), it is constantly being updated to expand to other websites, such as Twitter/X, Soundcloud, and more. To see a complete and comprehensive list of supported websites, I recommend visiting this page.

For installation, follow the instructions listed in their README. Personally, I recommend using a package manager if your OS supports this & you're comfortable with it. Otherwise, the binary standalone executable works fine out-of-the-box. It's recommended to download ffmpeg + ffprobe for videos if you'd like to use yt-dlp for that purpose as well.

For all intents and purposes, look into the official Wiki if you have any questions about usage, customization, and installation.

Again, keep in mind that it is a roundabout method to scrape a website for content, rather than visiting their official APIs. Therefore, I don't necessarily recommend this option, just because you can experience throttling or even a soft ban from the service.

Transfering Music to Devices (*)

Once you've found a workflow that works for you, you may wonder if there are ways to migrate your files to your devices. For example, most people don't just listen to music on their PCs, but they also like the availability of the music on their smartphones, tablets, etc.

In the case of Spotify and Apple Music, all the music you've saved is essentially stored on an account basis, but in the case of the methods we've mentioned, it's strictly kept on physical local storage.

The solution is to be able to transfer files across different devices and "sync" between your devices without relying on accounts + permissions.

For some, this may be a better alternative since you don't have to rely on creating accounts that put you at risk of overreliance on third party platforms & data breaches, so it's worth keeping in mind.

There are many ways to transfer files, from OneDrive, Dropbox, Google Drive, and even open-source file sharing methods like Catbox. Honestly, it's up to your needs which option you choose, since the advantages of each are relatively the same.

Of course, there will be storage limits that are specific to each one, and as such you will have to pay for more storage if you need it, so I'll discuss a software that has worked for me for free: Syncthing.

Given two devices, Syncthing is able to establish a working connection between them by connecting to the local server and allowing the user to share a file/folder via the server.

In other words, you can share your music folder on your PC, connect your iOS/Android device to the Syncthing server, and watch your files automatically transfer to your device without any hassle. In Syncthing's own words: "Your data is your data, and you deserve to choose where it's stored, whether it's shared with third parties, and how it's transferred over the Internet."

A common pattern you may have noticed in these recommendations is that they are not exclusively for sharing music. This is true! You can easily extend your experience with this handpicked set of applications to other important files, documents, or videos you may have lying around.

You can even authenticate your session, close the server whenever you want, and share multiple folders. Personally, I've had success using Syncthing to sync my Obsidian vault, pictures I've taken with my phone, and videos I've produced. It's really as easy as it sounds, and far better than any alternative I've come across. Please give it a try!

My Workflow

For me, I frequently browse Youtube Music for streaming music, with the occasional visit to Bandcamp + Soundcloud for interesting stuff. After I buy an album from Bandcamp, I'll listen to them at my leisure through foobar2000.

This is what works for me, and of course this article is by no means comprehensive. There is seriously a vast world of resources and tools that people have created to make the process of finding your music easier. I hope this was a helpful introduction, and I wish you luck on your music journey!

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