Flirtations in the gym, PsychoCandy in the Times
A few months back I deserted my old gym on the grounds that it played some of the worst music of all time – on repeat and at a quite frankly obscene volume.
My new gym is the exact opposite. It plays incredibly good music (and at a reasonable volume). For example, over the past few months I have regularly heard tracks like:
- ‘Nothing but a Heartache’ – The Flirtations
- ‘I Believe in Miracles’ – The Jackson Sisters
- ‘Money’ – Buddy Guy
- ‘As’ – Stevie Wonder
- ‘Push it’ – Salt ‘n Pepa
- ‘Black Gold of the Sun’ – Rotary Connection
- ‘It Takes Two’ – Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell
However, there is just no pleasing some people and the exemplary music taste of my new gym is beginning to disturb me (although not as much as the 10cc dance remixes and Pink albums favoured by the last one, don’t get me wrong). But this music is too good for the gym. By becoming the soundtrack to my showering and hair drying, it’s like the songs are being devalued and slipping away from me.
For the same reason, I am more than slightly perturbed by the fact that The Times is now giving away several of my very favourite albums of all time for free. For FREE!!!! I don’t mind more people discovering the brilliance of Love’s Forever Changes through a national broadsheet rather than by some ‘cooler’ means, but there is something soulless about it being given out gratis to all and sundry with absolutely no emotional effort or expense from the listener.
I know I’m a music snob, but I don’t want soul classics becoming background music to sweaty bodies and stinky feet in the gym changing rooms, and the idea of someone hearing Joy Division thanks to a free CD give-away by The Times irks me. There is just no romance or passion to it – and that’s what music’s all about, isn’t it?
October 8th, 2008 at 5:19 pm
I think Thomas Paine said it best “That which we obtain too easily, we esteem too lightly. ”
I think the ease of access to tunes will devalue peoples relationship with music, I think artists are torn between perserving their image and missing out on a tidy pay day from the papers particularly at a moment when music’s monetary value is dropping faster than the stock exchange.
October 8th, 2008 at 10:13 pm
Or BLTP, there is the alternative view that we’re all wrong. Recorded music is just a blip on the history of music and seeing it live is where you appreciate its real value. We are, when you think about it, members of a very small number of generations who’ve even thought about actually paying for a recording of something. Maybe this, like the damn credit crunch, is just the market correcting itself!
Still annoys me though.
October 9th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
I can understand where you’re coming from. I’ve often loved that many of the artists I’ve listened to are not that well known or popular among today’s masses. It made me feel like I was in on a secret. Something like this almost feels like it’s cheapening the spirit of that music. Many of the albums I’ve found were from flea markets, yard sales, etc. It wasn’t just handed to me. I had to work and pillage to find such gems. Here people are just having it given to them.
October 9th, 2008 at 4:42 pm
It’s the new generation of music fans I feel sorry for. No bands gigging in pubs, just graduating from the Brit School. No record shops. No Top Of The Pops. Just downloads and free CDs from the Daily Mail. I’m glad I grew up when I did.
They’ll never know the excitement of the announcement of the new Top 40 on Tuesday lunchtimes, browsing through the racks in the record shop, etc. Sad.
October 9th, 2008 at 6:27 pm
I know exactly what you mean Keith. There is an added extra quality that comes from hunting down your records in dusty second hand stores, garage sales and specialist record shops with snobby staff! It’s like the music is really yours. I can remember finding/hearing or buying most of my records for the first time, but I certainly can’t remember downloading tracks from itunes or even blogs in quite the same way.
And F-C, I’d like to think that all of these things will be replaced somehow by new forms of excitement for the music lover – the thrill of discovering your favourite band on myspace, having a sense of ownership and of belonging to a wider community, probably mediated by social networking. I can definitely see the benefits in that.
October 10th, 2008 at 12:58 am
I think I’m still something of a late 20th Century boy and have no clue about i-choons or anything like that. That said, I can live without rifling through the contents of yr average 2nd hand record shop quite easily. The stench of damp and mould can quite merrily stay in the past thankyou very much. The moment I get a new record deck, I shall quite shamelessly and piously change my mind on this matter, but you know……….that’s me all over really……….
Myspace boggles my mind, but that’s cos I’m old and lazy. I agree that it’s a damned fine way of picking up on great new music, with the emphasis on networking and getting to gigs and not on the ‘product’ as such
p.s., like yr theory Cocktails. You may well be a bit right.
Asfor freebies, I don’t mind. It’s when they give away copies of Jesus Lizard and Melvins albums that I’ll start to worry………….
October 10th, 2008 at 11:24 am
Ill Man, the papers might well start giving away Melvins albums yet. I bet people in 1980 didn’t think that The Times, The Times!!!!, would give away Joy Division albums. And even in the late 80s I never thought I’d ever see the Pixies on the front cover of the glossy Guardian lifestyle mag as they were a few years ago. Really the problem with all this is that music just has no political/sub-cultural bite anymore. Not since all the ex-NME/MM/Rolling Stone writers started working for mainstream newspapers anyway.
I should come clean on the theory – it’s not really mine. I stole it from Bob Lefetz and ex-KLF legend/chancer Bill Drummond.
October 11th, 2008 at 2:03 pm
I don’t know. The Doors, The Doors is just the kind of thing I would expect to be given out for free. I do think it’s an impressive debut, but it’s not really something I listen to for pleasure, If I’m honest.
Love’s Forever Changes should be on everyone’s shelves anyway and if it’s not, then it’s about time it was.
The only shame really is the packing will be nought to nowt though, even by CD standards, it’ll be rubbish. And I’m romantic about music too although I’m a hypocrite if I say I source and buy all music I own myself. That’s the beauty of marriage, the ultimate tape share.
October 11th, 2008 at 10:20 pm
You’re right about the packaging RE. it’s a very shallow reason, I suppose, to buy a record in many ways but it is important. Theoretically, if the music is that important, you shouldn’t be embarrassed to have a CD/DVD collection of stuff in cardboard slips from Sunday papers but…. I’m just a snob.
Marriage = the ultimate tape share? Not in our household! We’re not married, but after 7 years it’s record apartheid round here – with two completely different filing systems, not to mention attitudes/emotions/memories. That’s what I mean. There is ’something’ about my copy of Beggars Banquet because I know where I was when I bought it, as opposed to W’s, which has his memories attached. Probably couldn’t find his copy anyway the way he keeps things…
October 12th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
Ha, you sound like my sister. She’s been married almost as long as me but they have different shelving units for their CDs. That, I no comprend, because like Mr RE and I, they have virtually the same taste.