Music I'm Downloading

Tonight, on a very slow night thus far, I got the idea to go through some of my cd's and rip some songs I have yet to transfer to my iPod.

Although there are some incredible songs I've been missing for a long time and have little excuse, my original iPod back in 2006 (I was a late bloomer in the iPod department) could only store about 1800 songs and I was suprised how quickly that went. For a long time prior to getting my new and improved iPod late last year, I was deleting really good songs off my old one to make room for new favorites. It was a sad day anytime I had to let go of some songs - I had a method in which I would arrange my entire library from "date last played" and delete the songs that weren't played in a long time in addition to only being listened to twice or less. I figured it was less of a loss that way.

Luckily it's the dawn of a new era and I'm in a position to continue adding another 2000 songs to my new iPod (hopefully not all at once or that would defeat the purpose) but I'm in a good spot right now, spacially speaking.

So far tonight I've been focusing on adding more Jimi Hendrix and The Clash (as inspired by a college course I'm taking on "Authenticity in Pop Music"). I had "some" of this music already including a few Hendrix covers but I have these entire cd's that I used to listen to and just now am getting inspired to go back to them. In addition, I'm revisiting Bonnie Raitt's "Luck of the Draw" and John Mayer Trio's "Try" which I've been meaning to add for a long time now.

I absolutely love Bonnie Raitt's voice and always recall John Mayer saying in an interview that seeing her live is a phenomenal experience. Apparently she knows exactly the right place to add a fresh word to a worn song and a little extra scat or emotional pause. She is pretty unbelievable over headphones too. "Not the Only One" is a song I should've been listening to consistently for the past ten years. It breaks my heart in the best way possible - and that is not even beginning to speak of the beauty that is "I Can't Make You Love Me" - holy cow. If you want to kill yourself, be sure to put that on the record player first. It's painfully elegant.

The Clash is a weird one for me. I will be honest and tell you that I don't know as much about them as I should. I know the titles of records and their biggest hits are my favorite of their songs. I'm not into the deeper cuts and "Rock the Casbah" was my ringtone right after high school. "Train in Vain" is one of my favorite songs ever and "Should I Stay or Should I Go" is really fun and a regular on playlists but other than that I can't claim to be a real fan. The only cd I ever gave a real, consistent listening to was "The Clash: The Singles" and I know that would be considered sacrilige to a true fan. Punk is something you have to grow accustomed to - like wine or Guinness. Oh but I must say "Spanish Bombs" is like a drug, I'm in love with it.

There's not too much you can say about Jimi Hendrix - or rather that I can say. I know some really die hard fans that would probably punch me in the nose for even trying to say anything about him. I really enjoy the sound of his music and I know he's a genius guitarist without being a guitarist myself. I can't read music and I don't know much about guitars beyond Guitar Hero but I LOVE - unabashadly love - the sound of good guitar playing. It's one of the most incredible things about music. Eric Clapton, George Harrison, John Mayer and Jimi Hendrix are all in my Top 20 favorite musicians of all time with the first three being in the top 10. I haven't given much time to thinking about whether or not it's generic to like those four but I will say I also love and greatly appreciate Stevie Ray Vaughn, Jeff Beck, Carlos Santana, B.B. King, and Robin Trower so maybe by proxy alone I'm not a total guitar idiot.

And of course there's nothing left to say about John Mayer. On April 12th the presale begins for his summer tour and you can bet I'll be at more than one of those shows although I've already seen him three times in the past five months. It's revolting, I know, but the greatest feeling in the world is being at a John Mayer concert. There is something about that music that feels like home.