This implies you know who you listen to, that also listens to their own music for fun. I bet you don't. Sorry not sorry to call you on that.
"If you never listen to it, you're going to make the same mistakes" - this assumes a ton of stuff. Let's start with producers, musical direction, membership changes between records for a lot of artists. Look at every band who's changed sound by *only* changing producers.
C'mon man.
I get it- you don't like my opinion, but your crits there are not exactly airtight. So c'mon man right back attcha.
I mean
your mistakes, not anything beyond your control (obviously - way to reach for an argument). This may be limited to just your playing, or may also include songwriting/arrangement, as well as other decisions (group or otherwise; including failure to stand up to idiot engineers/producers; at the very least you learn not to work with those types again, or how to construct a better argument, with example, next time - or it could be a positive thing - like the drums sound really good, so we should mic them up the same way next time). But even mistakes beyond your control can be learned from, and you are likely to not ever notice some things when playing the song. The mistake does not have to be yours for you to either learn from it or do something about it next time. You can say that you do all this when you are checking the mixes prior to release. This is not the case in a complete sense, and I can say this because I do listen to them later. There are things you will only notice later, e.g when in a mix between other songs, when you are not in a 'I'm checking my mixes' frame of mind, but a more 'normal' listenning state (not that there is a normal listenning state, but that it's not the same ).
Sure, I don't know whether most artists listen to their own stuff or not. The point is if someone says that, that work is immediately diminished to me, and or I loose desire to work with that person. I'm not telling you what you have to do, I'm just telling you how I feel, and I would appreciate it if you would quit trying to convince me that my feelings are invalid, cuz I sure ain't raggin on you.
That perspective seems so strange to me... Do novelists read their own books for fun? Do actors watch their own movies for fun? Do painters "read" their own paintings for fun? Does anyone taking part in a creative endeavor revisit their old work for their own entertainment? I'd say the answer for most creative people is no.
In my case, the music I write/record is more like a journal entry than anything. I don't write and record music so that I can listen to it. It's an outlet, like writing a journal. I'm not a journal writer so I don't know this for sure, but I can't imagine people read their own journals for fun either
Yes, I do expect that or they should - I suspect many do at least in a, not for fun per se (those are your words, not mine - when I listen to to other people's stuff I wouldn't necessarily call that 'for fun' either but perhaps that is not a hair worth splitting), but for personal-professional development reasons. Also some people do read their diaries/journals, if sometimes only years later. Interesting to go back with a new perspective. Again, not all, but it's far from being unheard of. Yes, both prose (novels) and music are art, but your comparison is not apt. Reading a novel a) takes longer, and b) requires dedicated time and focus (not doing anything else). Neither of those things apply to music. Personally, I find that I get great cathartic effect from listening to music, and moreso if I was involved in it because it's personal- not all of which I wrote, but some. They are great for meditating too etc. Incidentally, I do occasionally read some of my old writings. I mean, I expect people like Grisham and King probably don't read their stuff later, but that's because they're pulp, and they know it. This attitude I have is kinda based on that. I don't want to write a pulp novel that no one will re-read, I want to make things that captivate people on a meaningful (vs spectacle) level; there are novels I would or have re-read, and others I never would. People are free to write or record pulpy stuff, and I am free to not be interested in consuming it more than once (or occasionally, 0.5 times). It may not be fair to associate pulp with authors who don't read their own stuff, but I have no obligation do be fair in this context.
People actually have tried to convince me that it's weird that I listen to so much of my own stuff. I've been called narcissistic and other things for it, which is ridiculous - it comes from a very simple punk ethic: I don't like what I hear on the radio, so I will make my own (the late 90s and early 2000s were particularly unbearable; it's better now, but still). I say fuck that, to me it's weird that you don't, and I can say that without saying that you should, becasue that is not my perogative; it's not a personal attack.
So I'm not saying you have to, just that it is my opinion - curious why you care so dang much. I am interested in meaningful things, if it's just a release for you - like wanking (literally as well as in the guitar playing sense) or a one night stand - then it's just not interesting to me. I owe you nothing in this regard.
