It's odd. It's almost as if the music has found me. I started out, really, with Pink Floyd. When I first saw qoyaniskaatsi I dug the hell out of the music, even at the age of nine, despite the fact that my mother - a classical violist - deemed that I was required to hate it. Tracks like "One of these days" and Rush's "Mystic Rhythms" were really where it was at when I was 11 or 12... but as soon as I found industrial music, I leaned towards the softer, atmospheric stuff. About then I found Sect's Telekinetic and industrial took a bit of a wayside; six months later I found The Future Sound of London and Air Liquide and it was like I was getting closer to what I heard in my head. It kind of came full circle as soon as I found Aes Dana and Solar Fields. It wasn't so much that my tastes took me here, it's more that with a gazillion different places to find music, I was finally able to find music. In High School, if I wanted to buy an album, I had to order it out of a catalog and hope it was good, based purely on what the cover looked like. Assuming the cover was in the catalog at the music store. Now? Now it's easier to refine your tastes down to the nine other people on the planet who listen to and play music like you do.
We didn't have a record store nearby, so I ordered catalogs from labels and distributors. They usually had album covers, but most of them were black smudges because they were crappy xeroxes. Then they'd take forever, because the label was actually just one dude and he'd been on vacation or used your order form as a bookmark or something. Finally getting albums from Annihilvs was like Christmas, because it took so long that by the time they arrived I'd forgotten I'd ordered something.In High School, if I wanted to buy an album, I had to order it out of a catalog and hope it was good, based purely on what the cover looked like. Assuming the cover was in the catalog at the music store. Now? Now it's easier to refine your tastes down to the nine other people on the planet who listen to and play music like you do.
I still remember when Cop Int'l announced on rec.music.industrial that their storage container had been flooded and they were blowing out their entire catalogue for $80 if you didn't mind water damage. Oneroid Psychosis sounds about as shitty with the booklet stuck to the disk as it sounds without.
In High School, if I wanted to buy an album, I had to order it out of a catalog and hope it was good, based purely on what the cover looked like. Assuming the cover was in the catalog at the music store. Now? Now it's easier to refine your tastes down to the nine other people on the planet who listen to and play music like you do.
I remember this well. For years my brother had a collections agency hounding him for the 10 CDs he bought out of a catalog for $5 up front and the promise of more purchases that he never made. I remember going to record shops and you could ask to hear certain music if they had an open copy. I would sit there for hours sometimes, with a pile of CDs in front of me whittling it down to one, maybe two that I'd buy. The amount of music easily available now is mind-blowing and awesome. From an accessibility standpoint, it's a great time to be a lover of music.
| I remember going to record shops and you could ask to hear certain music if they had an open copy.| That was an hour drive for us, and even then your only real choice was Rare Bear in Santa Fe. There is no comparison to a world in which you had to burn half a tank of gas in order to go to a goddamn Hastings if you wanted to buy a Cure CD... or burn half a tank of gas twice if you wanted to order some Skinny Puppy. 'cuz they had Too Dark Park, Rabies and the single for Censor and that's all they ever had and that's all they would ever have and why can't you buy a Poison CD like normal people?
That was an hour drive for us, and even then your only real choice was Rare Bear in Santa Fe
-and yet you still made the drive. Why? Because music rules. Did you also listen to radio stations hoping for a song to come on so you could hit "record" on your tape deck? You'd end up with a copy of that Cure song, with some annoying DJ introducing it. I had whole tapes filled with songs like that. I'd call in to stations with requests just in hopes of recording the song requested. I'd lay in bed with my arm draped over the side, finger resting on the record button just waiting to hear the beginnings of a desired tune.
Dude. What part of "New Mexico" don't you understand? We had country, we had butt rock, we had gospel and we had Mexican. Frickin' MTV was as underground as we got.Did you also listen to radio stations hoping for a song to come on so you could hit "record" on your tape deck?
Never experienced New Mexico but it sounds rough. We at least had college radio and even an "alternative" station which at the time meant Pearl Jam and Nirvana and if we were lucky some Fugazi.
Shit. We partied when we got Z-rock. Of course, we also partied when we got a Subway, because that meant we had a KFC and a McDonald's and a Subway. It was almost, but not quite, as cool as when we got a Domino's in 6th grade. Pizza... that comes to you! can you imagine?
You could enjoy your za while listening to Mandatory Metallica! I grew up in a relatively small town too. When we got a new stop light it was a big deal. Getting a Taco Bell was a huge deal. I drove through countless towns like that today (7 hours in the car) and it got me thinking about how I'd fare if I had to live like that now? I can't imagine living in a town with only two restaurants, both of which attached to a gas station. But there are a TON of towns like that out there. Difference is, the kids in those towns have the internet now, we didn't.
Depending on the town, the Internet might not be that great. People in my father's home town still have to use dialup. There isn't much of the Internet that's actually usable on dialup anymore. When I went to my grandmother's funeral a few years ago I ended up having to tether to a cellphone to deal with a work emergency. We really need better rural service.
Africa is where the most exciting things with cell phones are happening.
tether and stolen hotspots is all I have. until they invent stretchy fiber that is. some times I can see that I have email but not have enough bandwidth to answer it. to tell you the truth it keeps on coding rather than surfing.