We’re nearing Record Store Day and I for one am pretty stoked. In what appears to be an authentically organic worldwide reaction to the sublimation of physical recordings into the ether of the digital age, bands from every genre and decade, from The Beach Boys to The Beastie Boys, are releasing material, with lots of exclusive releases produced for this celebratory event.
What I really especially like about this musical holi-day is that sales of all this great collectible music are exclusively the domain of Independent (as in we don’t have to suck Corporate Richard) Record Stores, an essential element in the foundation of the Independent Music Scene.
Foo Fighters Will Release B-Side Collection Medium Rare
In the age of downloading music, Record Store Day can be seen as a reaction to the paradoxically impersonal technological age at large. Implicit in the soul of musical experience is the humanity we seek at that experience’s core. In her document of the surge of female rock musicians in the 1990’s, Grrrls: Viva Rock Divas, Amy Raphael wrote that “we read as to not feel so alone.” I believe that’s why we listen to music, too.
Tom Petty & The Heart Breakers Re-Release, Blue & White Vinyl
When I first started listening to music, you had to get it at a store, a physical space, specifically designated to handling tangible recordings. I especially loved collecting not only records, but CD singles because of the B-Sides. I knew my record store clerks, and I knew who I would get along with at school by whether they wanted to hit the shop after class or not. Those recordings were documents, an actual record (as well as recording) of a moment.
Think about that for a second; how novel that is. Scientists identify sound as “touch from far away”. As well as a physical phenomenon, I believe we can use this description in an existential fashion, too. When I listen to In Utero, for example, I know I’m listening to a real holy moment that actually happened. I think that’s also why at the end of the day, I’ll always be a sucker for rock and roll, as opposed to thoroughly electronic compositions. It’s just more real to me.
I Attended This Live Recording In AP. Also To Be Released This Saturday!
So fast forward, through the days of the cassette tape, the soon to be obsolete CD and finally to the MP3. As always, what you pay for in convenience is insidiously detrimental to the experience to be had. When Wesley Willis sang about a “Rock-N-Roll McDonald’s”, I don’t think he meant to capture the empty calorie desert that the digital age produced with it’s well meaning, but narrowly focused objective of streamlining music consumption, but it is a fitting metaphor none-the-less.
Look around; rotten teeth and bad skin epitomize the modern popular music age. Artists defecate out a slick single that will sell right away and then be forgotten just before the next one comes out. Quantity, not quality, is the goal of many a mainstream artist today. Compare that with the band pictured below.
4,000 Of These Will Be Released Saturday. Please God Let Me Get One!
I think Record Store Day is a reaction against the Goliath that Corporate Rock has quietly become, as well as the assembly-line manufacturing of “music” that’s released to the masses like so much of our Use-Just-Once-And-Destroy commodities. ( It wasn’t always that way—remember Queen, and Black Sabbath and other bands that labels actually nurtured?) Even artists that are today signed to giants like Capitol and Columbia are participating in limited releases of a few thousand copies, unlikely to produce much in the way of cash to line pockets over at A&R.
Sonic Youth Releases “Whore Moaning” Saturday, Too. Recognize The Artwork?
In a Herculean effort, the international music community has come together to remind us that the reason we fell in love with music was not because it helps us through a work out or plays in the background at our cubicle. We love music because we collectively share human experience and have a pure and true and perfect need to get through this thing, whatever it is, together. And we are going to dance and sing and laugh and weep and crack jokes and throw punches and kick and yell right out loud together the whole way through.
Rock’s First Female Supergroup, Wild Flag To Release New Single This Saturday.
Make sure to peruse your local record store, Like AP’s own HOLDFAST and check out the listings of releases! It reads like my dream concert line up. Then walk into your local shop. Interact with other human beings instead of iTunes! Take home a new album with blazing cover art that you’ll forever associate with the record. Smell the ink of the liner notes as you pull them out to read what the band wrote about the record just for you. Then drop the needle and get ready to feel something real.
XOXO
Ang
