How Do You Listen to Music?

plus recommended books by Nicola Griffith & Molly McGhee, recommended music by Slowspin, and a playlist of new music

Last week I wrote about organizing books, which made me think about music.

Before I moved to Brooklyn in 2011, my music collection was split between CDs, vinyl, and mp3s. Thousands of CDs, alphabetized by artist filled a rack in the spare bedroom/office of my two bedroom house. A bookshelf half-filled with vinyl fought books for space. A hard drive on my desk held a couple of gigabytes of mp3s, with an identical drive cloning it in real time. Assorted box sets of CDs and vinyl were scattered everywhere.

Streaming changed everything, as did my move to New York City. I gave away, donated, or sold almost all the CDs and vinyl, keeping only what had sentimental value or what was not available digitally. I lost album art, liner notes, and (according to some) sound fidelity. Both hard drives filled with mp3s failed within a year of moving to NYC.

I miss the physicality of album art, of reading liner notes or lyrics while I stream an album, turning over the CD or vinyl case looking for Easter eggs hidden in the artwork. Yes, digital album artwork, lyrics, and liner notes are available online, but I haven’t adapted to them (yet). In some ways, though, I find myself more focused on the music itself without the distraction of its packaging.

These days my music collection is mostly in the cloud. My earthly collection consists of a small shelf of vinyl albums, a handful of CDs, and an external drive packed with review copies of forthcoming music and recordings of live performances (mostly Guided By Voices shows should I ever decide to relaunch the streaming GBV Radio).

With little physical media, I end up listening to music more and organizing it less. I still listen to albums much more often than individual songs, but spend more time deciding what to queue up. Tangents arise much more frequently with almost endless options of music to stream. Streaming lets me listen to a wider variety of both artists and genres, and for that I’m grateful.

How do you listen to music these days? Streaming? Vinyl? CDs? Cassettes? 8-track tapes!

This week’s playlist of new music:

This week’s subscriber playlist includes new music from ANONHI, Spoon, Mega Bog, Weyes Blood, Pere Ubu, Beverly Glenn-Copeland, Julie Byrne, Blur, plus much more.