By Michael Valinsky

Vine overtakes the music world with Aidan Moffat releasing his new album, The Eternalist…

The overwhelming influx of iPhone apps, Android apps and the constantly changing platforms have pushed artists and users to exhibit their work and projects through internet and social media. It’s hard, however, to make the distinction between a work of quality and one of superfluous importance. The easiness of the production process makes it difficult to delineate the posts with substance and the trivial, menial ones. Artists, actors and musicians are using Vine as a vehicle to advertise themselves, not only as the icons they aspire to be, but also as humans with a standard every day life. For instance, artists like Flying Lotus, Blood Orange, Sky Ferreira, Tyler the Creator, are just an example of artists today using Vine in this manner.

Lady Gaga will be releasing an app-album called ARTPOP soon. Jay Z  just released a free App-based record, Magna Carta Holy Grail, which after giving away a million copies via Samsung, was still able to reach #1 through paid purchases. The immediacy of App-based products is a strong incentive for consumers, who are starting to lack the patience to really search for products. There is something very peculiar and alternative about releasing a full album solely on Vine. Instead of going on Youtube or iTunes to look up and stream or buy a song, The Eternalist shows up in your feed, almost automatically – given that you have followed the artist. In that, this music, this album comes to you, you don’t go to it. Aidan Moffat released the first Vine album under his pseudonym LPierreMusic and not only does it come to you, it can also do so infinitely. Each Vine video is programmed to loop and repeat itself so long as the pointer is on it. His album is available via his twitter and tumblr accounts, but also by following LPierreMusic on Vine directly.

Internet and technology have somehow placed themselves outside of time, allowing for a spread of information that exists a-temporally, without boundaries. In fact, some websites offer an infinite scroll where the lines and borders of the page are blurred. Now, Moffat has made it possible for music to emulate technological phenomena. Drifting away from the traditional 12-track album, Moffatt crafted an 8-track album with songs shorter than Vine’s 6-second limit. What this does is create short, quickly paced loops that allow for an exceptional auditory experience. It is so easy to listen to one song for 10 minutes and stay enthralled.

Moffat veers towards a sound art experience that pushes and redefines the word album. In fact, many of the words we use to define and identify products are changing and expanding towards something much more technologically driven. This is a time to start exploring the different ways of putting out a record or at least to stat recontextualizing this process; Aidan Moffat is a good and stimulating start.

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