I’ve been reading Questlove’s Mo’ Meta Blues, and it’s an incredible education. The book is helping me appreciate an era of music that inspired the era that inspires me — the music that drove the Roots, J Dilla, Fugees, D’Angelo, Common, Erykah Badu, Kendrick Lamar, and so many more to create what they have.
Chronologically, I’m in a chapter covering mid-90s hip-hop, which is full of conflict. There’s a tension alluded to in the book of the musicians that made it and those that didn’t: does increased radio play make songs popular? There’s some science that suggests yes. Or is there something intrinsic to the record that puts it in that virtous loop of requests and airplay, the equivalent of usage and virality in a web product?
There’s a great ancedote in the book that I think is useful when thinking about products. All of the links are my addition, not in the original text.
There was one moment during the recording of Voodoo that really brought this home. We were recording DJ Premier’s scratches for “Devil’s Pie,” and Q-Tip had just let the room to go work on something else, so there were four of us left there: Premier, Dilla, D’Angelo, and myself. During the break, Premier asked if anyone had any new shit to play for the group, and D’Angelo went for a cassette and played a bit of a new song, and the whole room just erupted in hooting. Then Dilla put on some new Slum Village shit and it was the same thing: an explosion of excitement. Then Premier, who had started the whole thing, played an M.O.P. song and some new Gang Starr material that he was working on for The Ownerz.
I was last at bat. All I had on me was a work tape for what would eventually become “Double Trouble” on Things Fall Apart. It didn’t have finished vocals yet, didn’t have Mos Def’s verse. It was just a skeleton. I played it, and I will never forget the feeling that came over the room, including me. It wasn’t that they didn’t hoot and holler like they had for the other songs. They did. But they didn’t mean it. I know the move people resort to when they’re not quite into a song: they keep a straight stare on their face and bob their head a bit, not saying anything, not making eye contact. That’s the sign of death. That’s what they all did to me, and I felt humiliated. I was like Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction: I will not be ignored! I went back into the studio that same night and gave that song a radical, extended facelift. I refused to sleep until I had that thing up and running.
I love the idea of Questlove realizing the song was missing something, and going back to the booth to keep working on it until it resonated with his target audience. A song that doesn’t stand up on its own wouldn’t be any better when bundled as part of an album. (Or Samsung would have the most popular apps on Android.) Fans hear the care and quality of each track, and they become super-fans. The bands that break out weren’t bludgeoned into fan’s ears by radio play, they were pulled by these passionate few into a wider audience.
I love the mixtape culture that so many of today’s successful artists have come up through, and it is amplified online. Drake had three ever-improving mixtapes before his first album. It harkens to a line from PG’s startup canon (in 2009!): Better to make a few users love you than a lot ambivalent.
There’s this tension in everything we produce. Where’s the line to tread between 1.0 is the loneliest and a minimum viable product? Or is it about a minimum lovable product? Are we building a car with no air conditioning or a car with no wheels?
“Pivot” has become passé, but it’s much worse to assume that distribution will solve something core to your product that isn’t working.
The premise that you have implied again here but did not elaborate on last night is that the REST API is in some way broken. Can you make the argument that the REST API is a car with no wheels rather than a car with no air conditioning? And can you do so explicitly rather than implicitly, with your reasons enumerated, so that others can judge the value of your argument?
It’s better to have that discussion for the REST API in the Slack channel or at one of our meetings, not some random comment section of a blog, even mine. 🙂
If you want a good heuristic to use generally: there were decades of cars, millions of vehicles and drivers, before they had air conditioning. The core value proposition of a car is transportation, AC just helps you get there more comfortably. You didn’t need a car to get AC, you could have it in your house. AC might cause you to chose one car over another, but you probably wouldn’t walk or ride a horse if the car didn’t have AC, you’d just roll down the windows.
Thanks for sharing this. Look forward to reading it. As added irony, I was listening to Kendrick Lamar yesterday.
Hi Matt,
I’ve been checking and rechecking your blog for the new “What’s In My Bag” post. Do you have an anticipated release date?
Thanks!
Mike
It’s on my list!
I think that graphic is rather interesting, because while the “Like This!” approach looks nice, it’s not really a reflection of the historical reality.
The “Not like this” is far more accurate representation (wheel → cart → open air buggy/early car → enclosed car). It’s a good reminder that while the path to an end might unexpected and sub-optimal turns, those “wrong turns” don’t necessarily make it the wrong path.