TOO MUCH OF A GOOD THING

Can you have too much music? I’ve always thought “no”. But I’m starting to have my doubts.

My MP3 player “only” contains about 90 albums or so, and they are  my most “recent” acquisitions. I’ve not even loaded any of my long time favourites onto it.

I’m finding these days that I listen to an album once or maybe twice – and then it’s time to move onto the next new one.

I’m sort of harking back to the old days. In the 80’s for example I used to cycle to work from Musselburgh to Newtongrange, and  I remember at one point I had the same cassette tape in my Walkman for about a month: just for the commute. It was a tape of Woody Herman and his orchestra - and I loved it. I knew the running order of all the tracks. I knew the names of most of the soloists and I knew the name of each track: Opus de Funk…Blue Flame…Woodchoppers Ball (or as we called it “The Timber Hackers Knackers”)…etc. I could, probably even now, “time” where I should be on that cycle trip by what track was playing at any given point. If I wasn’t passing the Cockatoo before North West Passage was playing I was probably going to be late.

I don’t feel I’m getting that familiarity with my music at the moment. I’ve listened to some really good stuff lately, but that’s the problem I’ve “listened” to it when I should be “Listening” to it. Too much is washing over me rather than immersing me. Does access to a huge amount of music devalue the individual pieces? I really don’t know.

 I’m not suggesting that I ditch the mp3 player and go back to tape (as I believe some “hipsters” do). Maybe I should just “force” myself to keep the shuffle function off for a wee while. OR I could get rid of some of my music (Jesus – wash your dirty mouth out, Stuart, for even suggesting that) OR I could slow down my acquisition of new stuff ……. Problem with that is – now that the idea is in my head I really, really want a copy of Woody Herman playing Opus De Funk.

I suppose it's a bit "off" to be "complaining" about having too much of something. Anne keeps accusing me of being a "glass half empty" type. Well... that's not really true. I'm more a sort of a "glass not only half empty; but it's a chipped and dirty glass to begin with- and some bugger has put an old fag end in it while I was away at the bogs" type.