I was eight years old, sitting in the back of my dad’s Volkswagen Jetta when I first heard “Giving Up the Gun” by Vampire Weekend. When my dad moved our family to a rural town in Appalachia, his friends in Boston teased him that he was signing up to live in a cultural black hole where the radios only play country music, and the only decent musicians are relegated to Sunday church services.

 To prevent my father’s impending music deprivation, his friend Melissa would send him self-burned CDs with new music from the world of people and things that still move. That brings me back to track five on Melissa’s CD in my dad’s car — “Giving up the Gun”.

 The song shook my world to its very core. I had never heard chords and instruments played in such a way. It was something akin to a religious awakening within eight-year-old me. And how I worshiped that CD, memorizing all twelve songs like it was scripture. I would sit on my bedroom floor at night, playing it over and over until I had to go to sleep.

Years later, my world expanded once again when I discovered the magic of YouTube and iTunes. Like everyone else in my generation, I would sit through ads or pay $1.29 for a single song. Unless of course, I wanted to listen to the pre-downloaded U2 album. Music was, in this way, more accessible but still not readily available.

Finally, the cultural meteor of streaming hit us all. We could listen to any album or artist through Apple Music or Spotify. We could binge any series on Netflix. Commercials and ads were an annoyance of the past. Our generation could access anything, any time, anywhere. The concept in itself seems like a triumph of the age of technology. However, this development has a dark side which we are all now discovering. 

We’ve lost an appreciation for music and media. 

Because music is so overly accessible, we’re often overwhelmed by options and opt for relistening to our favorite artists and albums, so they evolve into a form of white noise to fill the silence. Humans used to have to wait for the radio to play their favorite song, which exposed them to other songs and genres during the waiting period.

Music was spread and shared this way. 

Even before that, people had to wait for records to be released and would save money to purchase them. They weren’t easily accessible, so they were appreciated much more. It’s human nature to want what we can’t have — and we can have anything nowadays. We no longer value media the way we did when we had to go to the movie theater, wait for weekly episodes or hope for our favorite song to come on.

Companies have become aware of the oversaturation of media, so we’re slowly reverting. Two of the biggest pieces of pop culture phenomena in recent years, “Euphoria” and “House of the Dragon”, have returned to releasing episodes weekly in order to keep audiences engaged. We’re slowly coming full circle.

Last year, I listened to over 82,000 minutes of music from Spotify. That’s equivalent to 57 days of nonstop music. But I didn’t exactly listen to that much music. Rather, I played that much music. Most of the time, it was being played as a form of white noise because silence makes me so incredibly uncomfortable.

Half-consuming media by not giving it our full attention is a mark of our generation. I could be starving, and I would still turn on an episode of “New Girl” that I’ve already watched before I would dare take a bite of food in silence. I’m not alone either. Most of my friends walk to class with headphones or have to turn on a show just to fall asleep. 

Music and media are created to be appreciated, not to be used as white noise in the background of our lives. Being aware of the ways in which you consume media is essential to combatting this cultural crisis. I encourage you to do three things.

1. Be mindful of using media as merely background sound, 2. appreciate silence for what it is and 3. sit on your floor and actively listen to your favorite song without distractions.