Why Own Music?

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

I've this urge to sell all (or at least a good portion) of cd's/records. Perhaps just listen online radio. Maybe download mp3's. Or maybe concentrate on my own senseless noise for a while. Is there a point to owning music? Why own music when you've already committed much of it to memory after about 4 listens? Have you ever felt like having a complete music detox?

― jason, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Have you ever felt like having a complete music detox?

Every so often I wonder. But only every so often. ;-) And why own it? So that whenever I feel That Indefinable Need, That Itch I Must Scratch, I can instantly take care of the situation. And also so that way I can share music with others. :-)

― Ned Raggett, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

...and no, this has nothing to do w/current affairs or economy. Been pondering this one for a few weeks...

― jason, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I can relate that to the urge I sometimes have to get rid of most of my belongings. You know, stuff. Records and magazines and books and candeliers and leather jackets. I wish for a few minutes that I could pack up two suitcases and be done. Through with everything that physically binds me.

But then I naturally come to my senses and play my latest import purchase.

― Simon, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I divested myself of my sizeable collection of vinyl in 1984, keeping only a couple of things that I especially loved. It was all to do with lengthy travelling overseas and the hope of making a big change in my life. Within 5 years I'd regretted every single day that I'd let them all go. Every record is not only a bunch of songs that you like (or hate), they can also be an encapsulation of a time and a place and, even, a specific memory. I've re-purchased almost all of these LPs on remastered CDs now and, whenever I listened to one for the first time again in 15 years, the past seems closer for just a second.

― philT, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

dont' do it dude - you need more music, not less.

― Geoff, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

* So that only pre-approved sounds come out of those little boxes in the corner of your room.

* So you can relive the same moments over and over. So you can live different moments over and over.

* So that you can complete a superstitious economic circuit between yourself and the artist, your money touching their art in a mysterious frottage.

Unless you're real broke, selling off records you've already got seems a touch dramatic. But hey. Fuck it. Your pre-approved friends will already have the stuff you want to hear anyway.

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

What do mean 'committed much of it to memory'? How much, exactly? Like, every single possible nuance? I listen to stuff over and over until it's squeezing blood from a stone. What you hear today, you won't hear tomorrow, and you didn't hear it yesterday.

― dave q, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

My record collection betrays a chronology of foolish impulses (some of which lasted for years). I want all my money back, but selling everything seems so nihilistic and petty. I don't think owning music is all that great either, but selling it seems so much worse. Maybe if I developed a crack habit I could justify it to myself.

― Kris, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

until it's squeezing blood from a stone - exactly how I feel about TRL and Direct Effect, tho I guess these are not ownable as they are TV shows. maybe you could record them. but why, when it's the same show each day anyway? Anyway my point is that only now, on the approx. 100th listen of "I'm a Thug" by Trick Daddy, do I realize the majesty of its genius. I can't decide if this is an argument for owning music or not. What am I talking about?

― tracer Hand, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Why own music? Well, it's an alternative to record companies owning it, I suppose...

Old Fart!!!

― Old Fart!!!!, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Touche, Old Fart. It's apparent that the music industry is in trouble - but now they really have to press to make a profit.

In any case, by committed to memory - I don't know if this would mean memory serves as a surrogate and i'm forever in pursuit of something new (see cult of new thread for an idea of this terrible addiction) or why I collect in the first place? Is it the thrill of finding the rare import or is it listening?

― jason, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

A good friend and collaborator of mine has done this twice now (ie, sold his CDs, the whole bit). I have been strongly tempted to declare all music as superfluous several times, but (in an opposite circumstance than that of my friend's) the necessary liquidation of my CD collection has prevented me from doing so--to me, it represents the nearly-ten years in which I've had a CD player and have been collecting music in general. It's too much of a totem of the past for me to decide to cut away in one day.

However, my friend clearly does not feel this way. If you'd like to ask him anything specific about the situation surrounding it, I'll pass it on and let you know. I've not really asked him about it, myself, other than to let it give me pause to think about succumbing to the same fate.

― matthew m., Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Nah - but thanks, Matthew. I think i've been talked down from the ledge on this one. Been pondering what (besides compulsive buying) drives us to attain media, and in one instance, makes us want to eject it...

― jason, Tuesday, 18 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Me, I'm not shy -- next time any of you wants to sell off some discs, just drop me a line. ;-)

― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 19 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Owning music is essential. The reason being: people look at you funny if you start sniffing their vinyl. Keep to your own.

― emil.y, Thursday, 20 September 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.