Asymptomatic

Posts tagged: music

Starting School of Rock
January 19, 2026
music school

Back in November, I walked into School of Rock in Downingtown and asked about learning to play keyboard. The next day, I came back to watch a rehearsal for a show in production. By the end of that night, I’d agreed to play keyboard on a couple of songs I barely knew. A month later, I had my first live rock band performance under my belt.

This is how School of Rock works, and it’s one of the weirdest experiences I’ve had in a while. I take lessons just before my performance rehearsals, seeing a teacher on nights when the band meets. In the past when I’ve tried music lessons, there was always a hard sell—the teacher would push expensive recurring packages. This time, my teacher literally looked at me after the lesson like “why are you still here?” But it wasn’t because he didn’t want to teach. The whole school seems oriented around people wanting to be there because they want to make music. Get your lesson, get to rehearsal, go make music.

Influencing Musical Preferences
March 07, 2024
music Spotify tastes psychology AI mere exposure

The Mere-Exposure Effect is a phenomenon stating that the more you are exposed to something, the more you develop an affinity for it. Lately, I’ve been using Spotify’s “Songs for You” feature, which creates a playlist of songs based on your past listening habits. I’ve noticed that it recommends earworms – catchy tunes that get stuck in my head. While these songs are somewhat similar to my usual music preferences, they’re not what I would expect to discover during my musical explorations.

This makes me wonder if there is some hidden option within Spotify’s corporate structure, or perhaps even the Illuminati, where artists can pay to have their songs promoted more frequently. As a result, listeners experience the mere exposure effect and ultimately develop a liking for the song, wanting to listen to it more.

Reorganizing for Musical Habits
March 04, 2024
music habits

Taking inspiration from Charles Duhigg’s The Power of Habit, I made a grave error when rearranging the family room to move my music production gear for our Christmas tree. I relocated everything into the living room, now dubbed the music room, filled with production equipment, a grand piano, children’s orchestra instruments, and more. But we hardly enter that room, and since removing the tree, I haven’t returned my DJ table to its original spot.

Duhigg’s book mentions learning guitar by incorporating it into his daily routine. He’d pass the guitar on his way to getting coffee each morning, strumming for a bit. Five minutes a day can lead to improvement. However, I’m not progressing in music production since my equipment is in the music room – ironically not where I produce music.

Back to WinAmp
May 06, 2013
music winamp Zune

Microsoft killed Zune, and now I'm using WinAmp... again.  I'm not surprised.  I suppose that somewhere deep in their accounting department they were showing losses, or maybe not enough gains, and word worked its way out of Accounting and up to Management and eventually down to the users.  Canceled.

It's not really canceled.  You can still use it.  You can still pay them.  But they're not bothering to update the Zune software, which is what made paying them worthwhile.  I should explain.