The Medium is the Mutation (Pt. 4): What About Music?

It is unclear (at least to me) how this logic will play out in the music industry, but the signs point to a coming shift. The streaming model, dominated by Spotify-style micropayments, has flattened genres and favored volume over depth. But cracks are forming. There's growing appetite for live, hyperlocal experiences—often driven by exceptionally robust regional scenes, short-form social media buzz and good old-fashioned word-of-mouth.

As capital becomes disillusioned with endless streaming losses, a return to performance-based revenue may become the new frontier—not as nostalgia, but as the next rational adaptation to the mode of delivery.

In that world, the performer is once again the product. Artists may increasingly own their performances and monetize them directly through tours, local residencies, and subscription-supported releases. This could render both the traditional record deal and any streaming deals obsolete.

Just as TV once displaced sheet music as the dominant form—shifting music from something you performed at home to something you watched others perform from a distance—we may now be seeing the return of the live performance as the anchor of value in music culture. Musicians won’t just sell records to fund tours; they’ll perform live to sell the experience. The songs will follow. And guess what? The songs themselves will be written, orchestrated and performed in such a way that only hearing them live will do them justice.

I think that’s a good thing.

Tomorrow we will wrap this series up.