Tommy, Can You Hear Me?
This is probably going to sound silly [no pun intended], but I concerned about how we are listening to out music these days.
No, I don not mean the usual digital versus analog or CD versus vinyl debates. I admit it - I have gone to the dark side on that one, if only for convenience. Amazon is the devil and I am caught in its evil clutches. A lot of it is convenience, like not having to buy a whole Jethro Tull album to get the 7 songs of theirs I like. And those one hit wonders. The only time I put on an album these days is to play it for conversion to a digital file. But I am still buying vinyl - there is no late 80s / early 90s Pere Ubu on Amazon, people!
No, my concern now is about the little things we are actually sticking in our ears when we listen on those MP3 / iPod wonders. I mean first of all, haven't we been warned for time eternal NOT to stick the tip of the Q-tip into your ear canal? [Yes most of us do it, but you're still not supposed to.] But we gladly stick these little grape sized things into our ears. And there are some you have to squeeze in because they don't stay in any other way [I'm looking at you Sennheiser!] In the interest of full disclosure, yes, I do have a pretty bad tinnitus - from listening to music on real old head phones [and you children of the 70s know what I mean - the old headphones that covered your ears and half your face] at volumes that could be heard clearly in the next room. Yes, all this records that said "Play this record loud" or " best enjoyed at maximum volume"... and just about any other record for that matter. Same thing with the portable tape player [we could never afford a "real" Walkman, so we got the Wal Mart knock off]. And in the vehicle when I was/am riding by myself.
Don't get me wrong - the invention of the portable personal music device has been a godsend. Being able to plug in Aerosmith's Toys In the Attic or X's More Fun In the New World on a two day car trip probably saved some nice family argument time back in the 80s - though it always sucked when the batteries wore down. But I fear the ear bud generation is missing something - I mean besides music made by real people on real instruments.
My argument goes something like this - I was sitting at work listening to the latest offering from Wilco [which I bought in a digital format from Amazon, not on a CD] and it felt like I was missing something. Or missing a lot, really. I couldn't get the music to sound full enough - either it sounded like the highs were clipped off or like it was all compressed in the mid range. Remember when the early CDs came out and the sound sucked because the record companies said "you can't hear anything outside the range of 20 - 20,000 Hz, so we will not worry about sounds outside that range and we will compress the shit out of everything and get these things out before this CD fad ends!" Well that's what the Wilco sounded like. Yes, I know Jeff Tweedy likes to do weird shit, but I don't think he would do that for a whole album. A song maybe but not a whole album. Except that he might... But he didn't - I played it on my real headphones [Radio Shack Nova 40s circa 1986] and on my real stereo [Pioneer SX-737, mid 70s vintage pushing 2 Bose 301s and 2 Sony SS-B3000 speakers] to be sure.
In the ear buds, the bass was muted and the highs seemed exaggerated. Listening in the headphones gave a pretty full range but any excessive volume irritated my tinnitus. Listening in the room I seemed to be missing some of the highs - they do seem to get lost when I have a fan going but the Bose really disappoint with their high frequencies, hence the Sony to boot mid-range and highs. I wonder if this all has to do with sound reproduction and the amount of distance it takes for the sound to reach my ears. Moving a few millimeters in my ear canal versus the headphone where the sound is focused down the whole ear versus room ambiance and speaker performance. Throw in all the music I listen to in my car [confined space ambiance].
Its a silly thing to be curious about but I wonder if how you experience music affects how it affects you. I mean our parents generation went from mono to stereo, our generation went from speakers to headphones to ear phones and now our children [okay, your children] are getting their music straight from their ears. Do they appreciate a full range of sound? When you have them in the car do they listen to the radio / CD you are or put those things in their ears and tune you out? I mean I can jokingly say that it obviously affects them, look at the overproduced computer generated perfect pitch crap they listen to - the same way your parents put down Van Halen / Motley Crue / Black Sabbath / Black Flag / Dead Kennedys / Beastie Boys.
What's my point? Maybe I don't really have one. Maybe I just wanted to plant an idea in your head, something to think about next time you're grooving on your iPod or driving down the road listening to KXT or your Stones comp for the car...
This is probably going to sound silly [no pun intended], but I concerned about how we are listening to out music these days.
No, I don not mean the usual digital versus analog or CD versus vinyl debates. I admit it - I have gone to the dark side on that one, if only for convenience. Amazon is the devil and I am caught in its evil clutches. A lot of it is convenience, like not having to buy a whole Jethro Tull album to get the 7 songs of theirs I like. And those one hit wonders. The only time I put on an album these days is to play it for conversion to a digital file. But I am still buying vinyl - there is no late 80s / early 90s Pere Ubu on Amazon, people!
No, my concern now is about the little things we are actually sticking in our ears when we listen on those MP3 / iPod wonders. I mean first of all, haven't we been warned for time eternal NOT to stick the tip of the Q-tip into your ear canal? [Yes most of us do it, but you're still not supposed to.] But we gladly stick these little grape sized things into our ears. And there are some you have to squeeze in because they don't stay in any other way [I'm looking at you Sennheiser!] In the interest of full disclosure, yes, I do have a pretty bad tinnitus - from listening to music on real old head phones [and you children of the 70s know what I mean - the old headphones that covered your ears and half your face] at volumes that could be heard clearly in the next room. Yes, all this records that said "Play this record loud" or " best enjoyed at maximum volume"... and just about any other record for that matter. Same thing with the portable tape player [we could never afford a "real" Walkman, so we got the Wal Mart knock off]. And in the vehicle when I was/am riding by myself.
Don't get me wrong - the invention of the portable personal music device has been a godsend. Being able to plug in Aerosmith's Toys In the Attic or X's More Fun In the New World on a two day car trip probably saved some nice family argument time back in the 80s - though it always sucked when the batteries wore down. But I fear the ear bud generation is missing something - I mean besides music made by real people on real instruments.
My argument goes something like this - I was sitting at work listening to the latest offering from Wilco [which I bought in a digital format from Amazon, not on a CD] and it felt like I was missing something. Or missing a lot, really. I couldn't get the music to sound full enough - either it sounded like the highs were clipped off or like it was all compressed in the mid range. Remember when the early CDs came out and the sound sucked because the record companies said "you can't hear anything outside the range of 20 - 20,000 Hz, so we will not worry about sounds outside that range and we will compress the shit out of everything and get these things out before this CD fad ends!" Well that's what the Wilco sounded like. Yes, I know Jeff Tweedy likes to do weird shit, but I don't think he would do that for a whole album. A song maybe but not a whole album. Except that he might... But he didn't - I played it on my real headphones [Radio Shack Nova 40s circa 1986] and on my real stereo [Pioneer SX-737, mid 70s vintage pushing 2 Bose 301s and 2 Sony SS-B3000 speakers] to be sure.
In the ear buds, the bass was muted and the highs seemed exaggerated. Listening in the headphones gave a pretty full range but any excessive volume irritated my tinnitus. Listening in the room I seemed to be missing some of the highs - they do seem to get lost when I have a fan going but the Bose really disappoint with their high frequencies, hence the Sony to boot mid-range and highs. I wonder if this all has to do with sound reproduction and the amount of distance it takes for the sound to reach my ears. Moving a few millimeters in my ear canal versus the headphone where the sound is focused down the whole ear versus room ambiance and speaker performance. Throw in all the music I listen to in my car [confined space ambiance].
Its a silly thing to be curious about but I wonder if how you experience music affects how it affects you. I mean our parents generation went from mono to stereo, our generation went from speakers to headphones to ear phones and now our children [okay, your children] are getting their music straight from their ears. Do they appreciate a full range of sound? When you have them in the car do they listen to the radio / CD you are or put those things in their ears and tune you out? I mean I can jokingly say that it obviously affects them, look at the overproduced computer generated perfect pitch crap they listen to - the same way your parents put down Van Halen / Motley Crue / Black Sabbath / Black Flag / Dead Kennedys / Beastie Boys.
What's my point? Maybe I don't really have one. Maybe I just wanted to plant an idea in your head, something to think about next time you're grooving on your iPod or driving down the road listening to KXT or your Stones comp for the car...
