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Tactile Music
Jan. 12th, 2011 08:19 pmIn 2003 my English A Level class went to Birmingham to hear a day of lectures on Shakespeare. We arrived into Birmingham early, just as the shops were opening. It was a grey and dreary day, we scuttled through the town centre from Birmingham New Street Station, following our teacher who didn't really like students and appeared to be trying to get away from us rather than lead the way.
A dreary start gave way to an unseasonably warm spring day, I recall I was only wearing a t shirt during the lecture itself. Unfortunately that's the only positive the inauspicious start threw up. The lectures were terribly dull and we were, by a country mile, the 'rough' kids - not in uniform (we didn't have one) and lounging about on the lecture hall seats - who got disapproving from the other schools' representatives. Most of our party, including the teacher, fell asleep during the day and we ducked out at the earliest possible opportunity.
Our teacher told us we had 45 mins before the train and to meet at the station, then she disappeared at top speed. Slowly we all dispersed, not out of a desire to stay together, but for want of knowing where to go. I split off with a friend, Lux, and we ambled around the shopping centre. Being 18 we gravitated to a large HMV and split up. I fished out a copy of Generation Terrorists by Manic Street Preachers, it was priced at £17.99* and after some debate with myself, I decided to go for it.
At this point I owned Forever Delayed (bought in Grantham on a rainy Sunday afternoon, with S, from a now defunct record shop), The Holy Bible (from now closed HMV Listergate, Nottingham - Saturday afternoon) and Gold Against the Soul (also from now closed HMV Listergate, Nottingham, Saturday afternoon. Listened to it in car on way home, got Life Becoming a Landslide stuck in my head for 2 weeks, my Mum told my brother I was listening to 'suicide music' as a result of me singing it semi-constantly) and nothing else by the Manics. The logical next choice should have been Everything Must Go (from Amazon, no idea when) but there I was, in HMV in Birmingham, one peculiarly out-of-place afternoon, holding Generation Terrorists. I was wearing a pale blue golddigga zip up jacket, jeans and Vans trainers.
I paid, rejoined Lux and we went to MacDonalds to pass the time before the train. Gazing out the window at the passers by, I don't recall us talking much, companionable silence I think they call it.
Once on the train I sat against the window on a table seat, travelling backwards. This is back when Central trains ran the line so the carriage was a gaudy shade of green. I put the new CD in my Panasonic 40 second anti-shock portable CD player, sat back, turned my eyes to the window, and listened.
I couldn't believe this was the same band who produced the mature The Holy Bible and the polished Gold Against the Soul. I poured over the lyrics in the insert booklet as I had done with the other studio albums but my eyes widened as I tried to distinguish details in the collage of black and white photos in the centre. It was loud and stupid and glorious and joyful.
The album - if you skip the second Repeat (Repeat UK), as I did, thinking it was a duplicate track - lasts exactly the same time as the train journey from Birmingham to our destination; Melton Mowbray
When I was packing up my posessions in Brighton I tried to find Generation Terrorists - nothing helps packing like Motorcycle Emptiness - and couldn't, I had the box yes, but not the disc . With difficulty, I managed to convince myself it'd 'turn up' when I unpacked. It did not.
What to do? Another disc from Amazon or the like would not be the one I reverently placed in my CD player that day. Besides, what would I do with the case? The one which had first caught my eye and convinced me to buy it? Take the disc out of the new box, place in old box and discard? That seems like cross contamination! It was quite the conundrum.
Fate, however, was smiling on me. It sent me to Birmingham on a course. A dull course at that. Only a month or two ahead of the original purchase anniversary I found myself standing in front of the very same HMV, some 40 minutes before my train to Melton Mowbray departed, after an unrewarding day's study.
I took the stairs to the fourth floor 2 at a time and rummaged until I found it - Manic Street Preachers: Generation Terrorists. Lyrics: Nick and Richey, Music: Sean and James. This time it was a snip at £7. Glowing with pleasure I clutched it and found myself, for the first time in many years, browsing real live CDs, rather than pictures of them online.
In due time I paid and departed for my train where I pulled off the wrapping and opened the booklet. In lieu of a CD player I turned on my iPod and navigated to the appropriate album.
To my surprise, I enjoyed listening to Generation Terrorists on yesterday's train journey homeward in a way I haven't done since that first time in 2003. It sounded fresh. And I actually listened to it - something I rarely manage to do these days, particularly with albums I know inside out.
When the train arrived into Melton I decided to listen to the album again in my car on the drive home. But it was the same old Generation Terrorists I've come to ignore over the years. Somehow, the spell was broken the moment I got off that train.
It has made me reflect on how I buy music. I categorically do not buy album downloads because I would rather have the cd and manually make it digital but I think I'm still missing something by buying those cds online. I can tell you where every single CD I bought in person came from and usually the time of year and where my first listen was. Every single one. I'd struggle to tell you when I received the ones I bought online, much less where and how that first listen sounded.
Music has always been more than the sum of it's parts for me, I just never realised how key one of those parts was in creating something more. Consider my new years resolutions amended.
* This in a time where the average cd price was around £12, so it was still expensive.
A dreary start gave way to an unseasonably warm spring day, I recall I was only wearing a t shirt during the lecture itself. Unfortunately that's the only positive the inauspicious start threw up. The lectures were terribly dull and we were, by a country mile, the 'rough' kids - not in uniform (we didn't have one) and lounging about on the lecture hall seats - who got disapproving from the other schools' representatives. Most of our party, including the teacher, fell asleep during the day and we ducked out at the earliest possible opportunity.
Our teacher told us we had 45 mins before the train and to meet at the station, then she disappeared at top speed. Slowly we all dispersed, not out of a desire to stay together, but for want of knowing where to go. I split off with a friend, Lux, and we ambled around the shopping centre. Being 18 we gravitated to a large HMV and split up. I fished out a copy of Generation Terrorists by Manic Street Preachers, it was priced at £17.99* and after some debate with myself, I decided to go for it.
At this point I owned Forever Delayed (bought in Grantham on a rainy Sunday afternoon, with S, from a now defunct record shop), The Holy Bible (from now closed HMV Listergate, Nottingham - Saturday afternoon) and Gold Against the Soul (also from now closed HMV Listergate, Nottingham, Saturday afternoon. Listened to it in car on way home, got Life Becoming a Landslide stuck in my head for 2 weeks, my Mum told my brother I was listening to 'suicide music' as a result of me singing it semi-constantly) and nothing else by the Manics. The logical next choice should have been Everything Must Go (from Amazon, no idea when) but there I was, in HMV in Birmingham, one peculiarly out-of-place afternoon, holding Generation Terrorists. I was wearing a pale blue golddigga zip up jacket, jeans and Vans trainers.
I paid, rejoined Lux and we went to MacDonalds to pass the time before the train. Gazing out the window at the passers by, I don't recall us talking much, companionable silence I think they call it.
Once on the train I sat against the window on a table seat, travelling backwards. This is back when Central trains ran the line so the carriage was a gaudy shade of green. I put the new CD in my Panasonic 40 second anti-shock portable CD player, sat back, turned my eyes to the window, and listened.
I couldn't believe this was the same band who produced the mature The Holy Bible and the polished Gold Against the Soul. I poured over the lyrics in the insert booklet as I had done with the other studio albums but my eyes widened as I tried to distinguish details in the collage of black and white photos in the centre. It was loud and stupid and glorious and joyful.
The album - if you skip the second Repeat (Repeat UK), as I did, thinking it was a duplicate track - lasts exactly the same time as the train journey from Birmingham to our destination; Melton Mowbray
When I was packing up my posessions in Brighton I tried to find Generation Terrorists - nothing helps packing like Motorcycle Emptiness - and couldn't, I had the box yes, but not the disc . With difficulty, I managed to convince myself it'd 'turn up' when I unpacked. It did not.
What to do? Another disc from Amazon or the like would not be the one I reverently placed in my CD player that day. Besides, what would I do with the case? The one which had first caught my eye and convinced me to buy it? Take the disc out of the new box, place in old box and discard? That seems like cross contamination! It was quite the conundrum.
Fate, however, was smiling on me. It sent me to Birmingham on a course. A dull course at that. Only a month or two ahead of the original purchase anniversary I found myself standing in front of the very same HMV, some 40 minutes before my train to Melton Mowbray departed, after an unrewarding day's study.
I took the stairs to the fourth floor 2 at a time and rummaged until I found it - Manic Street Preachers: Generation Terrorists. Lyrics: Nick and Richey, Music: Sean and James. This time it was a snip at £7. Glowing with pleasure I clutched it and found myself, for the first time in many years, browsing real live CDs, rather than pictures of them online.
In due time I paid and departed for my train where I pulled off the wrapping and opened the booklet. In lieu of a CD player I turned on my iPod and navigated to the appropriate album.
To my surprise, I enjoyed listening to Generation Terrorists on yesterday's train journey homeward in a way I haven't done since that first time in 2003. It sounded fresh. And I actually listened to it - something I rarely manage to do these days, particularly with albums I know inside out.
When the train arrived into Melton I decided to listen to the album again in my car on the drive home. But it was the same old Generation Terrorists I've come to ignore over the years. Somehow, the spell was broken the moment I got off that train.
It has made me reflect on how I buy music. I categorically do not buy album downloads because I would rather have the cd and manually make it digital but I think I'm still missing something by buying those cds online. I can tell you where every single CD I bought in person came from and usually the time of year and where my first listen was. Every single one. I'd struggle to tell you when I received the ones I bought online, much less where and how that first listen sounded.
Music has always been more than the sum of it's parts for me, I just never realised how key one of those parts was in creating something more. Consider my new years resolutions amended.
* This in a time where the average cd price was around £12, so it was still expensive.
