The concept of interactive album experiences, I would argue, was born out of the necessity to make the CD a more attractive artifact. A «CD what?», someone under the age of 30 might ask. The Compact Disc was a «print money scheme» developed by Sony and Philips to create a cheap, compact, format to present recorded music, allowing the record industry to resell their catalogues in the new format, and sell new releases with a far greater margin than vinyl ( a format known even to 25 year olds).
The First Compact Disc Release
From the first pressing in 1980 ( Richard Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony by the Berliner Philharmonic conducted by «CD advocate» Herbert Von Karajan) to the turn of this century, the format grew to have complete dominance in the market (92,3% in 2000). However, «storm clouds» were forming in the digital horizon, in the form of another sneaky format, the MP3.
Unlike the CD, the MPEG-2 Audio Layer III (MP3) was not developed by the record industry. Developed by the research organization, the Fraunhofer Institute in Germany this audio coding algorithm compressed audio, and allowed for online downloads of songs in the format. And, independent entrepreneurs like Michael Robinson (mp3.com) and Napster’s Sean Parker and Shawn Fanning were the first to take advantage and create websites with access to Mp3 downloads of popular songs.
MP3s, CD-ROMs and Other Noise
Napster truly blew the «music vault door» off its hinges, and started a rights management war (more about this here), and gave birth to a digital music distribution revolution. One of the (many) strategies the music industry employed to fight back against illegal downloads, was to try to make the CD more interactive.
CD-ROMs had been around for awhile. The format Compact Disc Read-Only Memory (CD-ROM) offered significantly more storage space than a regular CD, and this allowed for the distribution of large software programs, multimedia content, and datasets. Releasing «an album» in this (also low-cost) format ment you could augment the release with videos, games, film clips etc.
In 1992 Nine Inch Nails released the EP Broken in this format. The CD-ROM included a data track with a music video and other multimedia content, in addition to the music. It was an early example of a band using the format for enhanced content. And, artists like Peter Gabriel and Todd Rundgren, two names not exactly known for shying away from experiments, released similar CD-ROM experiments around this time.
The format never took hold as there were technical issues, slow loading time and other glitches as well as the cost of producing the enhanced material. Record companies did, however, give it another go as a response to the threat from illegal downloading, and albums like David Bowie’s «Hours» (1999), Bjørk’s «Vespertine» (2000) and Radiohead’s «Kid A» (2000) and «Amnesiac» (2001) were all released with enhanced content in a CD-ROM format.
These are all excellent albums, best enjoyed in a vinyl format. And, as high-speed Internet became commonplace, the cumbersome CD-ROM became another format on the audio scrapheap of history. In the age of streaming, technology presents itself, to artists, both as a challenge and an opportunity. We all know the challenge, the meagre returns of streaming music from the Spotify’s of the industry. One opportunity, on the other hand, lies in creating interactive music experiences.
Three Interactive Albums
The following three examples showcase how the concept of interactivity can enhance new releases. The first example, is from our favorite Icelandic indie-pop-experimental-electronica artist, Björk. Her album «Vulnicura VR» Is a virtual reality album experience, released in 2019, that allowed fans to explore the emotional landscape of her album “Vulnicura.” Users could journey through stunning 360-degree environments, interact with symbolic objects, and experience intimate virtual performances by the artist. This groundbreaking project demonstrated the potential of VR to create deeply personal and emotionally resonant music experiences.
The second example is from Childish Gambino. The artist is Donald Glover, renowned actor and rapper who made waves with the inventive and provocative video to his song «This is America» in 2018. With “Pharos AR», released in 2019, Gambino created an augmented reality app that allowed fans to experience his music in a virtual dome environment. Users could explore the dome, interact with visuals inspired by the album, and participate in a virtual performance by the artist.
Finally, Billie Eilish, a young American artists who has excelled at mixing a DIY attitude with major label clout to build a mammoth SoMe presence, and whose 2019 debut album «When We All Fall Asleep Where Do We Go?» was, in partnership with Spotify, turned into an interactive experience. Fans could virtually walk through rooms inspired by her music videos, interact with animated characters, and unlock exclusive content. This pioneering effort set a new standard for interactive album experiences, showcasing the potential of technology to enhance the connection between artists and fans.
What’s Next in Enhanced Album Experiences?
The three examples mentioned here are all from 2019, and five years later maybe the concept hasn’t evolved greatly. Björk, true to her experimental, visionary nature continues to play with the format, and naturally other artists as well. Still, I think we are just at the very beginning of the evolution of the «interactive album» concept.
Advances in the meta verse and AR/VR will inevitably open new «doors of perception» (and interaction). Augmented Reality could take album visuals and music videos into a whole new realm of expression. And, Virtual Reality will offer even more immersive concert experiences and potentially new ways of direct interaction.
AI-powered personalization can facilitate a more interactive storytelling surrounding the music where the listener’s mood and active choices directly affect the music. And, interactivity could be taken to a new level with more co-collaboration, that is participating directly in the creative process both on the auditory and the visual part of it.
Tokens* will probably be a lot moe ubiquitous in this type of releases granting fans exclusive access to more personalised experiences. Artist could further use gamification with tokens as a hook to drive deeper engagement with the content and foster fan collaboration. These could also include a financial reward, tokenizing the whole or parts of the album as Non-Fungible Tokens, NFTs, proving part-ownership of the content.
Since the album format «went digital», the music industry has struggled to find the «winning formula» to package it, maybe «the interactive album» will finally solve the puzzle?
*A Token is a digital asset that represents a particular unit of value or a specific function within a blockchain network. It can also be used as a personal identifier and grant you access to services and experiences.
