Growing up I had a rule when I listened to albums – no covers and nothing live. I don’t know why at 14 years old I made myself a suburban Robert Christgau, but those were my rules.
Covers was an easy one. I didn’t like fun.
No, I didn’t like hearing a song I like change format. Whenever the cover came out, I had issues with the revision process. Of course, what I was really feeling was I like this version of the song, this is the one I fell in love with, not some weird cousin of hers that looks vaguely similar, but has bangs instead.
Now, this theory has since been debunked – though I am still fairly particular with the version I like. But some times, covers are the only version I’ll listen to. For instance, LCD Soundsystem’s “All My Friends,” like many I only fuck with the Franz Ferdinand version. And then there are some obvious versions too – Red Hot Chili Peppers version of “Higher Ground,” Hendrix’s version of “All Along the Watchtower,” and The Fugees’ (really Lauryn Hill) take on “Killing Me Softly.”
I still am particular as to what I want to listen to, but I’m more open-minded to trying out new takes.
Live albums to me deteriorated the quality of the music. Inevitably with the mixer and sound engineer in a perfectly acoustic studio things would sound, well, live. Drums could overwhelm guitar. Vocals could be lost in the noise or not up to par. The goddamn crowd could ruin the whole thing.
I didn’t like the unpredicatability of it.
Of course, there is something further to investigate here. In some respects, live music is the most pure form of it. Up until very recently – music was only heard through a live performance. This recording thing is new. Just because that is the way we have come to listen and experience music, doesn’t mean that is its original intention.
Music is supposed to be communal. It’s the thing you play around the campfire at night to celebrate, entertain, just get by. It’s what you use in the military to move the people forward – think “Taps.” It’s what you sing to a woman to show your love. It’s how you pray.
There’s incredible documentary Amazing Grace where Aretha Franklin is singing a gospel music to a hot church full of people in Inglewood, Los Angeles in 1972. It’s directed by Sydney Pollack (left field), Mick Jagger and Clara Ward make appearances in the audience (wild), and features Aretha Franklin at the peak of her powers (yes please).
But the thing that really matters is how the audience responds to it. How special of a moment this was for them. How much they enjoyed it and how they danced and celebrated to her music. It was less about the music and more about how it moved them.
That’s how we were listening to music for hundreds of years prior to recordings. We just couldn’t listen to much. So that maybe sucked sometimes. Maybe for some tribes or groups, Gary sang Kumbaya for 15 times a night. I’m sure there were less creative tribes. They weren’t creating music every which way, they were farming and stuff.
Alright I’m deep in my own scenario, I’ll pull back. The point is you kind of need the people.
Remember Tower Records, and going in and listening to the new albums with the big bulky headphones? Remember that feeling you’d get when you would just put them over your ears and suddenly block out the world? I did it when I was a kid before they went bankrupt, I always felt so strange. Just blocking out the world to listen to some music. Now that’s all I do.
Time to go big. There’s a lot like that today. A lot of entertainment especially. Things we used to enjoy as a group that is now a solo act. Theater turned into movies , which at least were only shown in a public place, which transitioned into home videos, which at least you had to go to a store to look at, which turned into phones/streaming.
So much of our life is designed for quality of product over connection. We are getting art in some cases at its finest and most mature, but we are not watching it or experiencing it or living amongst people. Half the reason why people used to like shit was because of how the people around them reacted. Taste is so malleable and manipulated.
Think about what musicians always say, “The audience was incredible.” They provide an energy and an experience. It’s great to love the songs, but the power is taking them round town. Getting the reaction.
The fact that music allows us to be isolated is one of the big ironies of modernity.
I was driving down the freeway the other day listening to B.B. King’s Live At the Regal album, on track three “It’s My Own Fault,” where King is slowly building the audience until pure, unbridled pandemonium is let loose on “How Blue Can You Get.” My windows were down and I noticed the Tesla in front of my roll up theirs. Go back into their bubble. Choose to not experience one of the most amazing albums I’ve ever listened to in my life. But less personal, choose to retreat rather than partaking in the chaotic joy of that audience as they listen to King in anticipation. They are the stars of the show and the performance in every which way. King is incredible, but how they build and follow and engage is something truly special.
Don’t retreat from people with art. Connect. That’s the point. That’s the power.
The Beacon Beats 