Sound
Posted by Harry Haller |
On any given day, I listen to a lot of music and my tastes follow a winding, eclectic route I am not certain can be properly defined—but I believe most people are similar, and few are locked into a certain groove after reaching maturity. Musical categories seem to exist mainly as marketing tools, while music itself has no boundaries and inhabits a fluid universe where things overlap, blend and meld, where nothing is rigid and all colors reside on a palette meant to be sampled and combined to create new colors and experiences.
A friend who is a trained classical violinist is one of the best examples of this I know. One might call her a groupie of jazz guitarist Pat Metheny—she never fails to see his latest tour—yet one morning when she and her husband were visiting, she jumped up and insisted, “You have to hear a wonderful new CD I found.” I expected Pat Metheny’s latest, or maybe a well-performed version of a Mozart violin concerto. Instead, she played a cut from June Carter Cash’s “Press On”, entitled “Tiffany Anastasia Lowe”—and, as always, I was blown away, not only by the selection, but also by the openness of the mind that chose it. I once teased her that women couldn’t play hard rock ‘n’ roll music, because their testosterone levels weren’t high enough and a player needed a penis to fully appreciate the guitar as a phallic symbol. Not a good idea. I still chuckle when I remember her over-the-top reaction.
The truth is, all music is for all people, both listeners and performers. They take what they need from it and give back bits of their own understanding, and the symbiosis is always exhilarating.
I cull music from dozens of different sources. My family and friends constantly lead me into new soundscapes. When I was a kid and AM rock stations were the big moneymakers, radio was my lightning rod; as my tastes broadened, I found inspiration in a great FM AOR station from Knoxville, TN. And anyone who was young during the 1980’s who fails to mention MTV as a musical taproot is either amnesiac or hopelessly out of touch.
But all those streams dried up, one-by-one. AM is now full of bombast, local FM stations play either dull classic rock or the horribly generic, commercial variety of country music that makes me want to run over those whining orthodontists’ sons and daughters with a John Deere tractor and then serve their roasted flesh to their parents for birthing them. Quite simply, MTV sucks. And don’t get me started on satellite radio. It’s too antiseptic. A child of the ’70’s, I need a little static or album hiss and pop to make my listening experience worthwhile.
The sole remaining, wonderfully eclectic, free to the public wellspring of sound is NPR Music, and thanks to the Web I can hear as much as I want, any time I want.
There is a God.
While on the subject, Volker Hoffman’s site, “Living With Music” is a great source for essential listening. Volker and I have been acquainted since the early ’90’s, and his tasteful contributions to the Web have been an important part of my reading ever since.
Every time I go out looking for new music, I find that what I’m really looking for is my Old Stuff. I’ll eventually get back to something like Marillion’s “Script For a Jester’s Tear”, U2’s “Unforgettable Fire”, or anything from The Beatles and say, “THAT’S WHAT I’M LOOKING FOR!”
I disagree with your assessment of satellite radio. I’ve been a Sirius subscriber for three-and-a-half years. Their “Sirius Disorder” station isn’t antiseptic — as a matter of fact, I think it’s more, Look-At-All-The-Obscure-Records-I-Have radio. “Underground Garage” is quite eclectic. “Coffee House” can be nice.
And I enjoy everything from “Left of Center” to “Soul Town” to “Outlaw Country.”
Are you sure that you’ve listened to satellite radio? Maybe you’re an XMer; I haven’t had the opportunity … but Sirius is damned good.
I’ve heard both Sirius and XMer. It isn’t their playlists that alienate me — as you said, Sirius is varied and pretty brilliant at times. It’s the quality of the sound. Too pristine. Too digital. Too pure. Give me AM snow and FM disc jockeys, the pop and crackle of vinyl and the sinewy sound of analog. I miss them.
I’d love to own a pirate FM station somewhere in the middle of the desert. I’d employ a handful of broken down bluesmen and aging jocks and we’d spin vinyl 24/7, filling the airwaves with the sort of music only desert reptiles and bleary eyed truck drivers hauling radioactive waste from coast-to-coast could appreciate.
What am I saying? It would be sort of like this blog: No one but a handful of crazies and I would listen.
Where do I sign up for Werewolf FM?
smiles…
If you’ll take me, I’d like to give weekend overnights a shot.
Here’s my mix: Progressive Rock (and influences) peppered with obscure facts and stories about the songs and/or artists; personal anecdotes only I care about; 3 o’clock in the morning wake-up calls to my friends; dead air; philosophical readings from obscure sources like the Tibetan Book of the Dead & the I Ching to The Gospels & poetry from Dickinson, Rilke, et al juxtaposed with passages from Robert Fulghum, H.L. Mencken, Orwell, Milne, and company.
For the record, when speaking I often have “word finding” difficulties. And step on the punchlines of all my jokes.
My jokes are all bad puns.
Consider this my application.
Yours sincerely,
Jim
@MonkeyProvider: I’m afraid at the present time you’ll have to use your imagination, although Werewolf FM does have a nice ring to it. I wonder whether the call sign HOWL-FM is presently in use.
@Jim: If we ever do go live, you’re hired. You’ll have to work on the “word-finding” thing. When in doubt, howl. Or use the phrase “fellow babies”. It worked for Wolfman Jack.
Of course, the voices we’re seeking are the same as the deejay in the Jim Jarmusch tribute to Memphis and Elvis Presley, “Mystery Train.”
I wonder what it costs to set up Internet Radio….
I’d spin my entire vinyl collection, The Who, Depeche Mode, Guns n Roses, Fairground Attraction and a ton of cheesy 80s 45s…ooo and a fantastic version of Fine Young Cannibals singing Wade in the Water. Vinyl makes listening tactile: you feel the needle as it finds its groove, waiting, drawing you in.
I’d also do some dramatic readings from non dramatic works…just because.
Please do not make me do the morning shift…ack.
mp
There will be no morning shift. As an alternative to those cheesy, self-important, irritatingly non-funny “morning drive-by” deejays, we’ll offer 4 hours of uninterrupted punk music in all its LOUD permutations and combinations.
Maybe with some hard bop and quirky avant garde jazz for good measure. And we’ll send Henry Rawlins to wake anyone caught sleeping in their offices through the set.