2. analog
  3. 168613-129831

What is it about spinning vinyl?

I just turned the system off several minutes ago. I had been listening to a great, high res file of Tower of Power, best horn section ever. As many know I have been sans turntable for 8 months. I sold my old one and ordered a new one but you know the story. Covid delays. It is under construction now.  Anyway, as I turned the system off I got this real urge to play a record. The wizard inside did not feel like turning the computer back on. It wanted a record. Grumpy, I decided to hit the sack. 
Think about that. I have a terabyte and a half of digital files sitting there in a hard drive.  Everything from Bach to Captain Beefheart. It had to be a record. No record, bedtime. It was not about the music. It was about the mechanical act of playing a record. I've been doing it since I was four years old. My dad got me a Zenith portable for my fourth birthday. You know, with the black cobra tonearm complete with eyes! Is it just repetitive behavior. Perhaps there is some sort of psychological explanation. Happy associations? Platter hypnosis? Maybe it is that we get emotionally attached to certain behaviors. 
mijostyn

Showing 6 responses by edgewear

edgewear
543 posts
 
Interesting variation on ’Everything from Abba to Zappa’, I guess you don’t like Abba? Anyway, it make me put on Trout Mask (on vinyl of course)😎

The ritual of putting on a record seems like some sort of magical act, with or without a Magic Band. It involves a tactile sensation that demands concentration, giving the impression of being involved in something substantial. It literally sets the stage mentally for an experience that has the potential of being emotionally rewarding. Performing this ritual is basically what draws you into the music. Instructing a computer to ’play’ a digital file (or hit ’play’ on a cd player) gives you none of that.

’Round things are boring’ is the closing statement on Lumpy Gravy, but we know better, don’t we?





edgewear
543 posts
 
@mijostyn,
Zappa may well have suspected that the idea of linear progression is an illusion as well as a mentality that has wreaked havoc on the planet. But what do I know?

Ben Watson, the British scholar who wrote 'The Negative Dialectics of Poodle Play' about Zappa's music, proposes that 'boring' might also be interpreted as 'piercing', 'probing' or 'drilling'. Perhaps too far fetched, but it certainly puts another 'spin' on it. It's a vicious circle, you got it?

edgewear
543 posts
 
Mijostyn, that’s quite an imaginative description of Chunga’s Revenge. If the unsuspecting hippies didn’t get enough punishment from his wrath, we could send in Nanook to rub their eyes in a circular motion with the deadly yellow snow, right there where the husky’s go.

Dropping Zappa quotes in the middle of a conversations when you least expect it is source of amusement we greatly enjoy in this household. Another harmless ritual for people who have outgrown the ordinary.


edgewear
543 posts
 
Two second with different time zones, are you kidding?😅. But time is an affliction anyway, thanks to Gregory Peckery who invented the calender. Evelyn of course was of the canine persuasion. Apparently related to Fido, the poodle 'with the oral appendage that was much to her liking'.
edgewear
543 posts
 
You mean 'napkins'? Pink or black? At Warner Bros executive dinner parties? Mo Austin? Miss Pinky? I'm confused.
edgewear
543 posts
 
Ah yes! Now that I remember how that story went I get the 'who' as opposed to the 'why' in your question. I failed miserably, but then again I'm not a native speaker. Yet I can imagine most folks living in Amnerica will have a hard time following that particular 'vernacular' as well.

More to discover