The Sound of Settling
The new apartment is pretty much settled in now, with the exception of a few odds and ends that need to be sent to Value Village, and a box or two of audio gear that needs to be organized and stashed away. Serene was a real trooper about organizing our CDs yesterday (she has the week off, pending a new job start date after walking out on her previous employers). And the good news about CD organization and music library consolidation is that it gave us both an opportunity to convert duplicate or unloved discs into trade credit at Easy Street records. I ended up with $50 in trade-in credit (I had a short stack of mostly pretty desirable music), which was more than I was expecting, so I converted that credit into a nice stack of vinyl (and one CD).
I’m trying to move away from acquiring new CDs. The one that I bought last night was the new I Am Robot And Proud album, The Electricity In Your House Wants To Sing, which they didn’t have in stock on vinyl. C’est la vie. But regarding CDs: they have a lot of upsides. Convenience is probably the primary one. They’re smaller and more portable than records, and even though I use an iPod for almost any listening I do outside of my house, that is an attractive feature. Especially given that I’ve moved 5 times in the last 4 years. They’re also convenient in the sense that I can pop them into my CD drive, rip them, and have them available for listening, copying, adding to a portable device, burning, etc. without ever having to fuss with packaging or anything. They’re a completely ubiquitous format, available and playable basically everywhere, and despite rising prices and complaints of overcharging by labels, they’re still relatively affordable, especially at larger stores that can afford to order in large quantities and discount to their customers. They’re also capable of a high level of audio fidelity, and while debate rages among audiophiles over the relative quality differences between vinyl and CD, I’ve found that each format complements different musical and engineering styles. They’re incredibly practical, all things considered.
That said, I’m increasingly disenchanted with them, for reasons personal and philosophical.
Let’s start with the more tangible reasons. Larger labels are increasingly trying to shoehorn DRM schemes into the CD format, crippling the very convenience and flexibility that makes them appealing. Also, the current Loudness War being waged in the world of major label popular music (and which is currently bleeding over to the realm of smaller labels and niche genres) in the name of competitive volume comes at the expense of the sonic fidelity that CDs were originally engineered to offer. On both of these fronts, the format is being undermined by middlemen with no concern for either the customers or artists.
There’s an aesthetic difference between vinyl and CD as well. While I find blanket statements of either format’s superiority somewhat silly (they both have upsides and downsides, some of which are emphasized by different musical material), it’s tough to deny the physical and auditory appeal of well-pressed, well-mastered, and well-cared for vinyl records, even without investing a small fortune in top of the line audiophile gear. My cheap turntable coupled with Serene’s cheap stereo would give an audio purist a heart attack, but it works well enough to hear whatever subtle differences exist.
Philosophically, vinyl offers a more direct connection to the music. Even though most music recorded today goes through digital conversion processes before being released, the grooves on a record are physically analogous (hence the name “analog”) to the final waveform being reproduced. It’s nice to know that after the Oil Crash (yes, this is hyperbole), a needle and piece of paper are all that will be needed to listen to a record. Try listening to a CD without electricity!
Not a very convincing case for dropping CDs, I know, but most of my decision is more personal, and relates more to listening habits. I have hundreds of CDs, and hundreds more CDs worth of downloaded music (don’t sue me). I’ve found that the overabundance of music, and the increasing separation between music-as-experience and music-as-object tends to lead (at least in my personal habits) to a sense of disconnection. This is more a product of the availability of free music online than any issues related to CDs themselves, but bear with me here. Most of my music listening is being done now on my computer or my iPod, usually during some other activity. When I bought new CDs, they would be opened, liner notes perused, ripped, shelved, and rarely touched again. Music became a background, an endless cornucopia of sounds to be chosen as background to other tasks. There was so much to listen to that it was difficult to find time for repeat listens to anything that didn’t grab me straight off the bat. Considering that some of my favorite albums (OK Computer, The Milk Eyed Mender, Vespertine, among others) didn’t reveal their charms immediately, this is troubling. How much music have I bought and downloaded and filed away without giving a real chance? I also noticed that I was becoming bad at remembering song titles, track orders, lyrics. I’d find myself sitting down to make a mix CD and not really knowing what half the songs I wanted to use were about. I’d hear a track come up on shuffle and wonder what it was, because it was towards the end of an album I’d never finished listening to.
So part of the appeal of vinyl is a closer connection to the music. My turntable is in the front room, away from my computer desk, and even though I use laptops, wireless internet, and VNC in order to access anything on any computer in my network from anywhere in the house, removing myself from that setting helps to put the focus on the act of listening. Having to deal with the packaging again puts the focus back on relating to the music as an experience with a physical, tactile aspect, and encourages reading tracklists and liner notes and lyrics. It makes music less of a commodity and more of an experience. Listening becomes something to do, rather than something that happens in the background. Vinyl facilitates engaging with music in a way that CDs and MP3s don’t.
I’m not giving up on CDs completely. I’m not going to give up my iPod or digital music collection. I’m not going to stop downloading music (in fact, I’m going to make sure to download copies of whatever I buy on vinyl, when possible). I recognize, that there are plenty of upsides to the wide availability of digital music (most notably the ease of acquiring rare or out-of-print material and easier access to the history of recorded music, leading to the potential to wider exposure to music of different styles and eras). But for me, right now, the shift of mindset that comes with a shift of format feels more beneficial than convenience.
Wow, that was long and self-indulgent. Sorry.
