I'm up into the R's, adding all my vinyl to a single Spotify playlist. Ramones, Redd Kross, Lou Reed. I still buy records and cd's--a couple of weeks ago I found the first Green on Red for $8 at Zebadee's and also ordered the new Bob Mould from Merge. I don't like this whole free music thing, but if I own it and the artist has benefited as part of the traditional supply chain, I absolutely love having it randomized on a playlist.
Computers make it easy to go insular with your listening habits. I don't like that either. I want to stay open. But I don't have time to sit around listening to records much anymore, so having that collection on my phone, for commuting and exercising is pretty awesome.
If I've had any prescient moments in my life, they've all been pretty vague and I was probably mowing the yard at the time, listening to Quadrophenia. But I do remember puzzling over Itunes early on and brainstorming on how the radio could become more democratic and not curated by payola. As a teenager we used to call KY102 about a million times just so we could say, in squeaky adolescent voices "hey could you play something by The Stooges?" Yeah kid, we'll get to that.
No one has to bug a radio station anymore to hear a song they want to hear. We only have to be bugged by artists who want us to bug a radio station to play a song they want us to help the world hear--on the radio, not on a phone. That too is a worthy ritual.
Who is going to tell us what is good? I guess we are.
And here is a brutal and deadly proficient progressive punk rock band I heard at Middle of The Map, whose music I own in no format, but should. Anyone who likes this kind of thing would be crazy not to:
