This is a Direct Reply to Hannah, but you all can read it.
First things first, 1990s faux-rap club hits.
I mean, club whistles. Club whistles.
Anyway. Now that’s been clarified.
I suffer from a not uncommon problem of having an over-abundance of music. My complete collection of physical media is documented, but as we all know, everyone seems to download everything. Then we all feel nostalgic for the 90s when we had to go to the record store and get the clerk to take that huge plastic halo off of our cassettes or CDs or whatever so we could get it out of the store.
I also had the uncommon illness of having to manage a (very badly failing) music store that I was only managing because I was the last heir to the throne. Having worked for BeavCo. at the same mall as my old store, I know exactly how far in the shit we were, and how I kind of hope that company I worked for learned a valuable lesson about the importance of staying sober during business meetings, especially when negotiating overly-long lease agreements. (Seriously, Malcolm, 5 years? In this economy?)
Anyway. Calling out my old boss’ bosses aside, and nodding to (one of my) my old bosses, and telling her directly that what I just said wasn’t pointed at her:
My Music Listening Habits, Circa 2012
First, I should say that I am a weirdo who still thinks that artists should make unified artistic statements with something called an album. If you have a few songs that aren’t congruent with a specific sound, I think you should probably call it an EP until you figure out what your sound is. Homeboy Matt (not me) points this out in not as many words in his review of Fox Jaws’ At Odds, in his now defunct “Unlikely Awesome” blog.
So as a result, I kind of feel like a dieter who cheats a lot of the time. I like to leave albums running because it’s a pattern of songs I’ve heard before and allow me to think straight.
I guess, Hannah, if I’m working on something that requires a lot of attention over time, I will listen to an album that would fit in your “the usual” category.
Right now, it’s ten to ten, and I’m listening to “This is Happening”, because it’s relatively appropriate to what I’m typing. If I’m typing out a particularly sturm-und-drang piece of fiction, I’m likely listening to something equally as sturm-und-drangy. My most well known (ha!) piece of writing was directly influenced by a Nine Inch Nails remix album.
That being said, “the usual” is by no means the usual. In the same breath that I say that I try to listen to albums, I also create playlists and will listen to a whole swath of things from a variety of genres, going from Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream” to King Tubby and hitting everything in between.
I don’t know, my only real “habit” is that I have no habit. I am usually listening to something, but it’s so varied and different, it’s hard to pin a specific genre to a certain activity. Glancing at my most commonly played playlist doesn’t give me any insight either—it goes from Foghat’s “Slow Ride” through a few tracks from the latest Drake album (Degrassi CanCon Holla) and through Panda Bear and Caribou (Actually, Manitoba-era Caribou +3 snooty pretension points) into your usual “College Rock” heroes like the Arcade Fire and The Smiths.
Am I crazy? Is this what all of my friends or like, or have I just embraced such a diverse variety of music that I have numbed my palate and now I have to give back my badge and gun? Is my carefully built house-of-cred falling apart? Will I have to give back all of my Pavement albums? (also, I love Pavement. Please don’t make me give those back.)
Anyway, a few albums I’m presently obsessing over:
Hollerado - Record in a Bag
M83 - Hurry up, We’re Dreaming
Kurt Vile - Smoke Ring For My Halo
Bon Iver - Bon Iver
Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross - The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo Soundtrack
I dunno. I started off with a point, but it just came out as another tl;dr. Oh well.