diff --git a/beets/ui/__init__.py b/beets/ui/__init__.py
index ba058148d..cd9f4989e 100644
--- a/beets/ui/__init__.py
+++ b/beets/ui/__init__.py
@@ -790,9 +790,6 @@ def _store_dict(option, opt_str, value, parser):
         setattr(parser.values, dest, {})
         option_values = getattr(parser.values, dest)
 
-    # Decode the argument using the platform's argument encoding.
-    value = util.text_string(value, util.arg_encoding())
-
     try:
         key, value = value.split('=', 1)
         if not (key and value):
diff --git a/beets/ui/commands.py b/beets/ui/commands.py
index 91cee4516..6c8e25b85 100755
--- a/beets/ui/commands.py
+++ b/beets/ui/commands.py
@@ -1778,7 +1778,7 @@ def config_func(lib, opts, args):
     else:
         config_out = config.dump(full=opts.defaults, redact=opts.redact)
         if config_out.strip() != '{}':
-            print_(util.text_string(config_out))
+            print_(config_out)
         else:
             print("Empty configuration")
 
@@ -1852,7 +1852,7 @@ def completion_script(commands):
     """
     base_script = os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__), 'completion_base.sh')
     with open(base_script) as base_script:
-        yield util.text_string(base_script.read())
+        yield base_script.read()
 
     options = {}
     aliases = {}
diff --git a/beets/util/__init__.py b/beets/util/__init__.py
index 07ef021ea..fbff07660 100644
--- a/beets/util/__init__.py
+++ b/beets/util/__init__.py
@@ -770,19 +770,6 @@ def as_string(value):
         return str(value)
 
 
-def text_string(value, encoding='utf-8'):
-    """Convert a string, which can either be bytes or unicode, to
-    unicode.
-
-    Text (unicode) is left untouched; bytes are decoded. This is useful
-    to convert from a "native string" (bytes on Python 2, str on Python
-    3) to a consistently unicode value.
-    """
-    if isinstance(value, bytes):
-        return value.decode(encoding)
-    return value
-
-
 def plurality(objs):
     """Given a sequence of hashble objects, returns the object that
     is most common in the set and the its number of appearance. The
diff --git a/beetsplug/keyfinder.py b/beetsplug/keyfinder.py
index 051af9e1f..412b7ddaa 100644
--- a/beetsplug/keyfinder.py
+++ b/beetsplug/keyfinder.py
@@ -77,7 +77,7 @@ class KeyFinderPlugin(BeetsPlugin):
                 continue
 
             try:
-                key = util.text_string(key_raw)
+                key = key_raw.decode("utf-8")
             except UnicodeDecodeError:
                 self._log.error('output is invalid UTF-8')
                 continue
diff --git a/beetsplug/web/__init__.py b/beetsplug/web/__init__.py
index 6a70a962d..7b04f3714 100644
--- a/beetsplug/web/__init__.py
+++ b/beetsplug/web/__init__.py
@@ -320,9 +320,9 @@ def item_file(item_id):
 
     try:
         # Imitate http.server behaviour
-        unicode_base_filename.encode("latin-1", "strict")
+        base_filename.encode("latin-1", "strict")
     except UnicodeError:
-        safe_filename = unidecode(unicode_base_filename)
+        safe_filename = unidecode(base_filename)
     else:
         safe_filename = unicode_base_filename
 
diff --git a/test/helper.py b/test/helper.py
index f7d37b654..b6e425c62 100644
--- a/test/helper.py
+++ b/test/helper.py
@@ -453,7 +453,7 @@ class TestHelper:
     def run_with_output(self, *args):
         with capture_stdout() as out:
             self.run_command(*args)
-        return util.text_string(out.getvalue())
+        return out.getvalue()
 
     # Safe file operations
 
diff --git a/test/test_ui.py b/test/test_ui.py
index ad4387013..2034fb41f 100644
--- a/test/test_ui.py
+++ b/test/test_ui.py
@@ -1163,8 +1163,7 @@ class ShowChangeTest(_common.TestCase):
             cur_album,
             autotag.AlbumMatch(album_dist, info, mapping, set(), set()),
         )
-        # FIXME decoding shouldn't be done here
-        return util.text_string(self.io.getoutput().lower())
+        return self.io.getoutput().lower()
 
     def test_null_change(self):
         msg = self._show_change()