I admit it: I use soulseek to augment my music collection. It might come from being a music writer for so long in this internet age, where I can see everything as “promos” or “research” (I might have to write about that EPMD album someday, or at least tie it in to Rhymeslayer). Anyway, it’s pretty normal (if illegal) now.
But the odd part, the part that didn’t exist before the internet (really, before Napster, but it’s more explicit on slsk) is the public laying bare of your music taste.
I was just browsing through someone’s collection (as they were downloading from me), and the vast, vast majority of it is hipster-approved bands like Animal Collective, Deerhoof, Black Mountain, !!!… etc. The sort of moderate fringe that defines the Pitchfork aesthetic. But right in the middle of it was a sizable selection of Dave Matthews Band (and one Dave Matthews Band and Blind Mellon collaboration). Who are obviously NOT hipster approved.
On some level, I’d like to think of myself as being beyond embarrasment regarding my musical taste. I mean, after all, I love unconditionally ’80s buttrock (like the aformentioned Bittersweet Alley), I love a fair amount of cheesy disco, I love bubblegum pop from the world over, I even love a fair amount of contemporary country, which I might have dismissed had I not read impassioned defences from people like Chuck Eddy (former Village Voice music ed). I’d like to think of myself as a victory for popism, the broad and fun alternative to canon-concerned rockism, while still having a decent sense of musical history. A moderate in ideology, if not in volume.
But what if I WANT to be snarky and dismissive? I don’t like the Dave Matthews Band. I’m not interested enough to investigate further, to see if their patina of world music and trie self-help lyrics is really a fair assessment. I want to be fair, but I can’t be. I don’t have the time.
And in thinking about my crappy music, I realized that most of the things that are easiest to deride, I can mount a pretty decent defense as far as why I like them and own them. I do enjoy the Human League and other synth pop (including some risible Romo). I found the DMB while searching for Duran Duran, something I would have made fun of as a kid. And for a lot of things that I don’t like, I’ve seen similar defenses mounted. Steely Dan is a hipster musical crush right now, and I hate ‘em the way you can hate music in a long elevator ride. And the stuff that I actually do feel embarrassed about owning (but haven’t gotten rid of) tends to be hippy dippy psych bullshit like Victoria or Kaliedoscope, things that I was seduced by the supposed rarity of and kept trying to convince myself that it was worth listening to (that’s a foolish collector for you).
What about you? Assuming you’ve gotten this far down into the post, I bet you have some shame-faced albums that you can’t seem to get rid of. I’m not talking guilty pleasures, as there’s nothing to feel guilty about for listening to something you enjoy, but albums that you don’t like anymore (if you ever did). For me, it’s mostly the incredibly terrible “industrial” stuff that I listened to in high school. Stabbing Westward, Gravity Kills, Die Krupps, KMFDM. The beats are flat, the “political” lyrics are only slightly less embarrassing than the terrible “relationship” bullshit. But I doubt I’ll ever get rid of ‘em. They’re part of a time in my life when I really liked all of that stuff, and even if I never listen again, it’s hard to let go.
There. I’ve confessed. And I feel cleaner. Now it’s your turn.
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August 12th, 2006 at 6:34 pm
Geoff
Josh, let me first say that this is an excellent topic for discussion. Almost an assignment for readers of this blog, who in good faith should make an effort to respond! haha
My collection is divided into vinyl and CDs. I amassed most of my CD collection in college, and after that I got into collecting records, which led to Cousins Vinyl.
It seems as if anything on vinyl is considered hip. I\’m 27, and if I tell anyone my age what I do (own a record store), or if they\’re over at my house and see my crates of vinyl, they immediatly label me as a hipster or music connoisseur. Which I feel embarrased about. I don\’t want to come across as a snob, as a person who sneers at other\’s musical tastes. My vinyl collection is simply comprised of a good, and in my opinion, important selection of music from the 60s and 70s or earlier in the genres of blues, jazz, soul, reggae, funk, zydeco, and rock. With an emphasis on local music from the Detroit-Ann Arbor area, which also interests me. But all I have is a good basic selection, a start of the exploration that each genre could have if dived into deeper. And there are tons of people, many of our own customers, who blow me away in selection and knowledge in these genres. I\’m by no means a specialist, just a music lover who (luckily) gets to hand pick what he wants for his own listening pleasure.
But with records, who is going to argue against something being hip? Like Josh said, even Bittersweet Alley is pretty cool because it ties in to the history of Detroit music and it\\\’s a good representative of the genre of hair metal or 80s cheese rock. It definitly fits into the category of Fantastically Awesome that CV\’s other owner Justin and I like to joke about. Cheesy records are automatically hip because of how cheesy they are. They\’re fun, they\’re refreshing, and it\’s always an automatic hit at a party to bust \’em out. And for the most part, a cheesy pop record is halfway decent. It\’s going to reach a broad audience, and have a musical structure that\’s easy to relate to. Pop, afterall, is short for popular.
For example, one of the biggest ongoing jokes around Cousins Vinyl is the Awesomeness level of some of the records we have found. There are some records sitting in the office that are literally priceless to us. When we first got into buying and selling records, I found a still sealed Durell Coleman record at a garage sale. We had no idea who Durell Coleman was, but it looked halfway interesting so I picked it up. It turned out that Durell Coleman was the first ever winner of Star Search, and the album I found was the only one he ever made after winning. The cover is super-cheesy, with neon pastel lines around a white background with a close up of his face and his gerry-curls, super hip for 1985. The funny thing was I was halfway excited (in my naivety) of fiding this, and Justin rided me to no end. From there, I defended the album with all my might as being the most awesome 80s R&B album ever made, Justin soon agreed, and there was much debate as to whether or not we should break the seal to listen to it.
When we finally did, the end result was fantastic. It was a cheesily terrific album to listen to, and we secretly loved the enthusiastic vocals and upbeat melodies. We would get together with our wives and put the album on, professing our love to them and singing the words with all our hearts while they giggled and rolled their eyes. To make things better, the LP had a black and white photo insert of Durell striking a pose, looking at the camera with a smirk as if to say, \”Girl, please!\” An all-time favorite album, although incredibly un-hip. The funny thing is, in a way this kind of makes it even hipper than the hippest of the hipster\’s deepest hipster LPs. An album is made to entertain, and at times I\’m moved to be entertained by Durell Coleman. And that is what it delivers, and what is more hip than that? Our infatuation and inside-joke grew to where we googled him and found that he is still alive and well and now fronts the self proclaimed \”America\’s Premeir Party Band\”, one of best wedding and event bands in the country who even played at Shaq\’s wedding. Maybe I can convince Josh to interview him and do a story on him. Check him out at http://www.dcband.com
So it\’s these types of albums (I have a whole crate dedicated to this) among my vinyl collection that brings me joy and makes collecting records that much more fun. My CD collection by the way, is far more un-hip than my vinyl, containing lots of mid to late 90s party music and even really un-hip stuff like the aforementioned Dave Mathews and even (gulp) Will Smith. But I would never get rid of any of it because it brings back happy memories and is still fun to put on from time to time.
So that\’s my confession. It\’s my secret dream to have Durell Coleman play a private concert in my backyard. I would warm him up by playing Gettin\’ Jiggy With It. Now THAT would be super-awesome!