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Something has happened to me recently. I don't know what triggered it, I have no knowledge of where this came from or an explanation. I don't know if it's permanent change in my brain or something passing through that needs to run it's course.
I'll be sitting quietly, not meditating, but not watching television, not listening to someone speak, not reading. My brain will hang onto whatever was the last input, batting it around, filing it into a category. My mind starts to relax and wander and then it comes. The faint strains of ToTo's Africa.
The radio in my head is stuck and I don't know how to change the channel, other than to constantly bombard myself with other music or words or sounds at all times. I sure as hell am not going out and spending money I don't have on acquiring it. Of course, knowing me, it's somewhere in my non-cataloged vast collection of random songs from mixtapes and compelations and vinyl cheapies.
Of course, there are other things happening and changing in my brain but god I hope there's not a parallel. I hope my mental associations are capable of producing something better. Is it possible my archives have been exhausted and the good stuff is taken? I'd much rather recycle something than settle.
While I often express annoyance with people abusing music for the sake of nostalgia, I also don't understand people who seem unable to appreciate music because of it's contextual place. Sometimes it's preceisely why I enjoy listening to a song, particularly if I was unable to appreciate it when released, because I was either not born or too young -- it's a four minute fantasy land where I can take my adult self back in time and think how I would have used this song. I'm particularly fond of songs that got sung at weddings and played during seductions, but also songs that represent emotional responses to political situations and even just 'blow off steams' songs, whether they involve drugs or drinking or just hanging out. I'm obsessed with the idea of what people were really listening to, not just what we assume was played constantly in the hindsight of 10, 20, 50 years later.
It reminds me of tapes I made as a kid, when I had no money to buy albums and only a developing taste. I would just tape the radio and it would often capture the mixed bag of popular songs and not yet one-hit wonder. I wish I had more of these time capsules.
Most every mixtape I make now is made in this form. It's a strange slice or cross-section of what I'm hearing, though obviously not so much on the radio. I make plenty of planned mixes, but the ones that end up most revealing are the most organic setlists. I maybe only have two or three songs in mind, and I just start building, relying on the momentum of the last song to help me choose the next. I make tapes generally in one sitting, or at least the first side and the beginning of the second, which is where I usually get blocked and struggle with the next selections. But usually by the next day I have it figured out.
Mixing CD's are still a new art for me. I don't have it mastered at all.
I'll be sitting quietly, not meditating, but not watching television, not listening to someone speak, not reading. My brain will hang onto whatever was the last input, batting it around, filing it into a category. My mind starts to relax and wander and then it comes. The faint strains of ToTo's Africa.
The radio in my head is stuck and I don't know how to change the channel, other than to constantly bombard myself with other music or words or sounds at all times. I sure as hell am not going out and spending money I don't have on acquiring it. Of course, knowing me, it's somewhere in my non-cataloged vast collection of random songs from mixtapes and compelations and vinyl cheapies.
Of course, there are other things happening and changing in my brain but god I hope there's not a parallel. I hope my mental associations are capable of producing something better. Is it possible my archives have been exhausted and the good stuff is taken? I'd much rather recycle something than settle.
While I often express annoyance with people abusing music for the sake of nostalgia, I also don't understand people who seem unable to appreciate music because of it's contextual place. Sometimes it's preceisely why I enjoy listening to a song, particularly if I was unable to appreciate it when released, because I was either not born or too young -- it's a four minute fantasy land where I can take my adult self back in time and think how I would have used this song. I'm particularly fond of songs that got sung at weddings and played during seductions, but also songs that represent emotional responses to political situations and even just 'blow off steams' songs, whether they involve drugs or drinking or just hanging out. I'm obsessed with the idea of what people were really listening to, not just what we assume was played constantly in the hindsight of 10, 20, 50 years later.
It reminds me of tapes I made as a kid, when I had no money to buy albums and only a developing taste. I would just tape the radio and it would often capture the mixed bag of popular songs and not yet one-hit wonder. I wish I had more of these time capsules.
Most every mixtape I make now is made in this form. It's a strange slice or cross-section of what I'm hearing, though obviously not so much on the radio. I make plenty of planned mixes, but the ones that end up most revealing are the most organic setlists. I maybe only have two or three songs in mind, and I just start building, relying on the momentum of the last song to help me choose the next. I make tapes generally in one sitting, or at least the first side and the beginning of the second, which is where I usually get blocked and struggle with the next selections. But usually by the next day I have it figured out.
Mixing CD's are still a new art for me. I don't have it mastered at all.
