Streaming Sounds

Musical Listening in the Digital Age

Michael James Walsh

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2024
• Print ISBN: 9781032226170
• eBook ISBN: 9781003862222
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Media Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

In a time when music streaming has become the dominant mode of consuming music recordings, this book interrogates how users go about listening to music in their everyday lives in a context where streaming services are focused on not only the circulation of music for users but also the circulation of user data and attention.

Drawing insights directly from interviews with users, music streaming is explained as never merely a neutral technology but rather one that seeks to actively shape user engagement. Users respond to streaming platforms with some relishing these aspects that provide music to be drawn into daily activities while others show signs of resistance. It is this tension that this book explores.

This unique and accessible study will be ideal reading for both scholars and students of popular music studies, communication studies, sociology, media and cultural studies.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction: Streaming and the transformation of music listening
• 1 User-made playlists and the shaping of social interaction
• 2 Platform-generated playlists and the curation of musical listening
• 3 Social media convergence: Presenting the self through music listening
• 4 The networking of music streaming: Facilitating interaction and obtaining discretion
• 5 Ubiquitous music streaming: Incorporating music into the everyday
• Concluding discussion
• Methodological approach
• Index