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Thursday, June 18, 2015

Pictures of What I’m Hearing

Don’t believe the hype:
vinyl records suck.

The poseurs
can wax rhapsodic
about the warmth
of a record album,
the color…
the ritual…
whatever.

I listen
for fidelity:
truth to what
the musician,
the artist
intended.

Unless
the surface noise
was intentional,
then all the crackles,
and electrostatic pops,
ruin the experience.

Give me digital,
something that sounds
the way it was intended,
not just the first it’s played,
but the tenth time
the millionth time,
every time
it’s played.

But,
I’ll concede
to record albums
this:

those big beautiful covers
that I could study,
gaze upon
for hours at a time
as the music played,
imprinting itself
on my soul,

almost beautiful enough
to distract me
from the

chrrrcshle-sszk
b-bbrrchc-cklle
kcccrmmmlmnnkll
kkmmm-mmmmrllmm

that my music
rode upon.

Almost.

[Written for Fireblossom's Friday My Way Prompt:

20 comments:

  1. I listen
    for fidelity:
    truth to what
    the musician,
    the artist
    intended.

    Often when we listen to music.. we try to hear what the musician intended us to.. and to understand the depth of it all.. Beautifully executed :D

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  2. There is something magical about music through an old Victrola record player.

    I like your piece.

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  3. Snorf. I, too, miss the album covers with their wealth of information. I used to always check who wrote the songs i liked, and who played behind the singer. I found lots of good music that way. BUT, the blessed things broke, scratched, weighed a ton if you had to move, and even the "long play" records had to be flipped every 15 minutes. I will say this, in defense of LPs and discs...if not for having to buy "albums", i would have missed a lot of songs that I still love today.

    That said, I now listen mostly to songs from my phone downloaded from itunes and amazon. Every song is a favorite! No drum solos! Yay!

    la la from the girl who used to sit on the floor reading the jackets to Joni Mitchell and Laura Nyro records.

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    Replies
    1. I am not defending vinyl in the least, and I still voraciously read who makes music- just online and in books. Always loving Joni (who is recovering from an aneurysm) and the late great Laura who I saw in concert in 1988 - she was magic.

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  4. And, it's lots easier to roll on an album cover, too. Just saying.

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  5. Nice reminiscing, Buddah. CD's are easier to care for but they won't last forever.
    I have some old late 60's and early 70's vinyl. Also I recorded digital music on a digital recorder in the early 60's, before digital music recording was even invented.
    ..

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  6. YEs! yeS! YeS! But those scritches and crackles do sound good as soundtrack to memory lane.

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  7. Vinyl records.. made that long ago world go around... they left good memories!

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  8. And imagine that it's gone to streaming.. No more covers, just music that reach me through computer clouds.. So now there are nothing to touch but my mobile phone.

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  9. Yeah, nostalgia is cool, but fidelity and experience do have their superior strengths. I have a lot of old vinyl I took pretty good care of, and its the jackets that are dying faster--the best part! (no wraps, my fault.) Anyway, great take on Shay's prompt.

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  10. Nothing better than high fidelity! Give me the old vinyl any day.

    :-)

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  11. Anonymous7:56 AM

    Oh, this is really great. Makes me think of High Fidelity, of course. And Empire Records. ---Two of my favorite movies.

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  12. I love this. There was a time when the sound of the needle on vinyl was comforting. I could not BELIEVE cd technology the first time a musician friend excitedly told me about it........the album covers were a big thing........but I did hate how the records all got scratched.

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  13. Anonymous10:13 AM

    Interesting take on this subject ~ covers good, vinyl bad ~ and now with everything online we have no visual and no tangible .... just the music!

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  14. Great write and reminds me of the good old days ... when all we had were vinyl!

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  15. Sound..it is all in one's preference I suppose. Vinyl holds such memories for me, but I prefer to hear my music clearly.

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  16. Oh, yes. I'll take my Bose speakers anyway and iTunes, etc. Yet... it's like a book lover loves to hold the real thing - I too remember how much the few I owned meant to me.

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  17. Truth in what you say, but, I miss the artwork on the covers. Love the poem, B.

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  18. ha! well, the movie hi-fidelity was good on disc. :) ~

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