I often write about things and certain individuals who ‘ruin’ music, my beef this time is iPods and people’s use of them
I remember when I was a kid (and no, it wasn’t when telly was in black and white) and I bought myself a Sony Walkman to play my cassettes on (stop laughing!!). I was fucking made up as I’d walk to school listening to Guns N Roses or Maiden made up with my brand new music player the size of a house brick and earphone that looked like giants yellow versions of Ernie & Bert’s nose off Sesame Street! The dog’s bollocks – it really was. It was a pity though that I had a rather dreadful mullet to go with the headphones! The less said about my eighties hairstyles the better!
But, what was great about the Sony Walkman was that you could only ‘Fast Forward’ and not rewind. Another genius factor about it was that once the tape had finished it automatically switched to play the other side! Brilliant
Now, I’m not here to give you a walk down memory lane in a music nostalgia moment, but compare the rather beautifully simplistic world of the Sony Walkman to the rather annoying and complicated world of the iPod. There is a massive gulf! And, like the Guitar Hero and X Factor that I have previously Blogged about = its damaging music
Why? Well I’ll tell ye
Does anybody remember the last time they bought a CD? I do. It was a few weeks ago and I absolutely loved listening to every song on it! And I do mean EVERY song on the album
The problem with iPods is that people will skip the little ‘gems’ you find on albums at say track 8 or track 6 as people are too obsessed with what single was brought out from the album they just bought! Some people play the same single off the album over and over again time after time and simply forget about listening to any other song on the album. Apart from being extremely ignorant to the artist(s), in question, I also see it as a terrible waste of money on behalf of the consumer by just buying the album on the strength of the ‘famous’ single in question!
I feel the music buying public no longer have an opinion of their own anymore when it comes to what music they like. It’s a bit like going into a pub that (is lucky enough) has a jukebox and playing the most popular song by a certain band instead of putting something no one has ever heard of before!
And while we’re on the subject of opinions, I think Rich Hall summed it perfect a few nights back when I watched one of this marvellous programmes about country music. He mentioned the film ‘Walk the Line’ about Johnny cash and the people who said “it’s done a hell of a lot of good publicity for the music of Johnny Cash”. Hall went onto to say “if you’ve never bothered to go and search out the music of Johnny Cash YOURSELF, it’s not much good seeking it out after hearing about it in a Hollywood Blockbuster film is it” – I think he was right on the money with that reply I reckon
So, do me a favour next time you turn your iPod on? Turn off the ‘shuffle’ button and listen to a whole album in its entirety and listen out for the not so famous songs as I’m sure the artist(s) put just as much an effort into writing and recording it as much as the famous hit it sits along side
And, of course pending you pay for your music in a proper legal way, it’ll be a terrible waste of money if you don’t
Mol
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