Hunted Down

I have been thinking a lot lately about how things used to be - and how things are now - when it comes to music. I should start this off with a disclaimer: I don't collect records as much as I collect music. I am not one to be looking for specific pressings of vinyl albums, first editions, misprints or anything like that (at least not for most artists), but I am a sucker for finding new music to explore. And today, that is easier than ever. I can get most music on Amazon - and what I can't get there, I can at least check out at YouTube first. There are long articles with detailed discographies available online, so I can always find out what just about any artist has released. And it is great! There is no doubt about that.

 I am ok with MP3 files - if the bitrate is 256 kbps or higher, I don't hear the loss so many complain about (especially vinyl fanatics), and so I have all my CDs converted to MP3 files and while Amazon still allowed it, I uploaded every CD I owned so that I can access it from the cloud, knowing it is music I paid for (I actually believe in doing my small part for musicians to be paid). I have the same relationship with music as I do with books: I have a nostalgic relationship to physical copies (I loved peering over vinyl albums while playing them for the first time just as much as I loved the smell of a new book as I cracked it open), but ultimately, it is the content that matters. The music on albums and the text in books. And If I can have all of them at my fingertips on my phone, tablet, and computer, that just makes it that much easier to always access this content.

However, I also think that something has been lost in all of this, at least for me. I miss the discovery of stumbling over something I didn't know existed as I explored record stores - or the hunting down of releases I knew were out there that I had to convince record stores to get. I remember waiting for Tori Amos' second album, Under The Pink, having to ask the record store to order it, because it wasn't really on their radar. I remember stumbling over Primus' Miscellaneous Debris getting excited that they covered Peter Gabriel on a release I didn't know excisted. I remember going to a late night record shop in Philadelphia in 1995 on my first visit to the US, finding out that aforementioned Tori Amos had released an album under the moniker Y Kant Tori Read, and purchasing it despite the dubious version of that particular release (it was technically out of print, but someone decided to print it anyway...). 

And I remember the sense of awe I felt when I on the same USA trip, this time in Baltimore, browsed through an outdoors record display for a tiny hole in the wall record shop - or maybe it was just one salesman sitting outside with some CDs to peddle - and I stumbled across a Soundgarden release called Screaming Life/Fopp. I was a huge Soundgarden fan, but I don't remember ever having heard about this. I picked it up, held it in my hands, and just looked at it. Was this legit? It sure looked like Chris Cornell... The names were right... Yup, I had to have it. So I bought it. I believe it was on heavy rotation on my DiscMan (remember those?) - and I truly enjoyed it. It might not be their finest moment, but Chris Cornell showed he could wail on the song I have chosen today... And Hunted Down fits, because that's what I used to have to do for albums. But not so much anymore. The only times it happens now is when I go against my interest in the music itself and also want to find a physical copy (such as it was with Tool's Fear Inoculum). But for the most part, the days of surprising finds are over. And while I do miss them, I still will have to say that having access to all this music isn't a bad thing either... Just sayin'.