We claim music nerdery as a part of our value proposition at Digital Blue. Finding the right mix of tunes for a show can play an instrumental (pun intended) role in raising the energy level in a room after 6 hours of speeches and presentations. This weekend’s New York Times exposed me, however, to this site, which takes music nerdery to an entirely new level.
Mr. Kuo meticulously dissects indie rock and hip-hop records and shows and then transforms the data into complicated, brightly colored charts and diagrams. The joke is, the more banal the information or sweeping the generalization, the more complex the graphics. “It’s a comment on fans’ short attention spans,” he said. “You think you can glance at a pie chart and decide whether or not to buy a record, but then you’re forced to work to figure it out.”
Here’s a couple of examples. See a track-by-track review of R. Kelly’s new cd Double Up, ranked on a scale of “go to jail” to “timeless classic.”
Or, see the graphical representation of the NYT review for the cd:
Based only on charts and graphs, it looks like the new cd could be a hit. More important than R. Kelly (no!) however, I am humbled by the attention to detail, thoughtful analysis and creative visual communication.
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