I stood in my natural habitat. Fluorescent light shone brightly, doing a good job approximating actual sunlight. Dub Reggae emanated from the speakers, giving the small room a tropical vibe.
Each record I saw I explained to my friend standing next to me. Bizarrely, a few random people asked me for help, like I worked in the place. Having that small acknowledgment was nice, I’m happy to explain the joys of Slint’s Spiderland any day of the week. Everyone should learn about the alternative to the Seattle scene, the Louisville, KY scene in the early 90s.
I wonder how much longer my musical addiction, affliction last for? I’ve seen all the movies that try to give me some sort of reasonable answer and I’m worried. None of those movies seem to depict me at all. There barely seems to be a movie based off of musical addictions occurring digitally. It always is focused on some record store or being in a band, etc. Physical stores aren’t things that really exist anymore, sorry “High Fidelity”. As cool as you appeared to be in the movies, most people don’t start record stores anymore. Excluding a few beautiful, lovely stores like Other Music, they largely have fallen by the wayside.
Greenberg worries me a bit more. Rather than show musical addiction as something to be celebrated, like High Fidelity did, it shows the downside. Instead of connecting to others through his musical interests, Greenberg ends up getting lost inside his own head. Each time he makes a reference, nobody gets it. I tried explaining my worry about this happening to a friend and he told me “Don’t worry; I don’t get your references even now”. So thanks for that vote of confidence.
Greenberg’s 40 and completely aimless. After breaking up his own band out of idealism, he can barely connect to those few people in his life that he should. Perhaps what happens after being so hopeful is an eventual burnout. It doesn’t happen instantly. Time passes and slowly joy for the new fades, like how Bedhead sings “But this year I think I’d rather be a relic/than part of the present”. I’ve often had rooftop discussions with those lamenting the better, older music, and how “nothing good happens anymore”. Lately I’m growing weary of the negativity to some degree, since I think music is one of my purest joys, unaltered by anything overwhelmingly awful.
When does that point come though, of pure musical weariness, of that yearning for the old? That ought to be something I can prepare for, like having an IPOD on you at all times in case of emergency. If you need to ask what sort of emergency, you’re probably not that big of a music snob. I should have some delicious, gross junk food near me for when that happens, like Pizza Combos or Lindt Dark Chocolate.
There’s so much research to do for music too. Sure, it has become easier to read reviews, and compare various sites with one other, to get a better idea of who suits your interests. Entire sites equally divvy up amounts of “buzz”, trying to cool your interests hip and relevant. And before you say that “Oh, people just get a general idea from them” I’ve been to parties where people read Pitchfork so religiously that they know exactly what score each and every album got for the past year, even albums they never actually listened to.
Finally, to give some sort of closure, I wonder about how people treat me. Am I just a curiosity, reeling off bands like a catalog, complete with blurbs for each, or am I a human being? Or am I slowly losing myself in the midst of so much sounds, so much music, that I become a musical Slothrop? That I constantly seek out that perfect album, that perfect music. That each morning I wake up, check Boomkat, check Pitchfork, check Tiny Mixtapes, and check various blogs, etc. looking for my 00000. People try to help me with this problem, with this search, trying to drag back into working, but I might just go down one of those creative routes, never to return.
We’ll see, hopefully this will help those who wonder the same thing as they endlessly spew out musical references, sorting through the thousands upon thousands of songs, looking for that special one. Perhaps the same could be said for people too, you know, the whole “Special Someone” bit.