I have the Best of The Four Tops on my record player. It's half past seven in the morning. I suspect I'll keep listening to it until nine o'clock when I have a lesson. I might just keep listening to it. I'll do what I want to. The one thing I have at the moment is time.
Every good record collection is made up of Greatest Hits. Best Ofs. Compilations. I find music comparisons and lists of music increasingly spurious although I'm obliged to fall back on them and find myself using the language I'm trying to get away from myself unwittingly. I like writing. We all need basic organising principles or the world would fall apart. My fridge would decombust and I would have no milk to pour on my corn flakes.
But increasingly I despair of the human need to do this. It's the competitive urge I'd say and very much a male thing. I much prefer talking to women than men about music these days.Would you want to compare The Four Tops, The Temptations or The Miracles? Or compare them to The Supremes or The Vandellas. What would be the point. Why not just listen to music without turning to these ridiculous kneejerk comparisons. Try listening with your ears. It's fun.
So to expand the argument, why compare Tom Waits and The Smiths. .Chart positions are an interesting thing to think about but ultimately it's the song you return to. Golden Brown reached Number Two but it sounds like a Number One to me. Vienna reached Number Two as well. I didn't buy it. It means nothing to me.
The Four Tops is still spinning. We're still on Side One. This band was on Motown but I have the K-Tel Best Of. I also have a Motown Best Of. It has a better cover but this has more songs. Which one would you play? A great book could be written about the emotions and the cultural experience that these songs concern themselves with.. The struggle. The strife. The love. The quest. A good start to the day.
I'm enjoying your arbitrary rumble, Bruce. It's a great idea to take time out and listen to your old records...and write about them. I think you have a more eclectic/wider range of records to me. Mine would be very much 80s/90s dominant, although I did branch out every now and then. Thought I might have had a Four Tops album, but apparently not.
ReplyDeleteI'm not keen on competitive music-ing, either. And I'm rubbish at comparisons, unless they jump out at me. It's weird, because I have found myself involved with an app called Music League, where you submit songs each week and vote on which ones you like best. I don't really like ranking songs, but there you go!
I was in a Facebook related listening group that I felt I had to leave and haven't missed it at all Darren. I enjoyed it for a couple of years. In the end I felt I didn't need to discuss music so much and preferred to choose what I listened to and then write about. In general in life you're encouraged to compete more than is strictly necessary. My taste is reasonably broad but I don't like Heavy Metal or Grime. Of course I need to use lists writing a blog like this.
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