Vinyl albums
I hear that vinyl albums as well as cassette tapes are making a comeback. Actually, vinyl albums never disappeared, they only shrank to a niche market. But now they seem to be making a comeback with new appeal to a broad audience. Some vinyl albums might be worth money and have value as collectibles - renown for their technical importance, prized for their pedigree, eulogized for their rarity. Who knows?
The first album I ever bought was The Beatles’ “Long Tall Sally,” at a music shop on Macdonell Street in my hometown. It was the place I went to for music, for posters and for buttons of my favorite groups.
Long Tall Sally was mostly a collection of covers that the Fab Four played in their nightclub act before they were universally Fab. I collected The Beatles’ entire discography and memorized the hell out of it - every lyric, every note, every beat, every rhythm, every solo, every bridge, every chorus, every breath, every pause, every hiss, every photo and every production note - before moving on to heavy rock, punk rock and New Wave.
The thing about vinyl albums is that a whole menu of sensory experiences comes with them, creating a certain music culture that our generation now recalls with fondness. Square cardboard sleeves adorned with photographs or illustrations, and production notes meant that holding them in my hands and studying them was like engaging with a very interesting book. Double albums opened like books. Gifts inside like posters or portraits were like the prize at the bottom of a cereal box. A single vinyl album with, maybe, a dozen songs represented many, many hours of entertainment.
Like print books, or print newspapers, or print tickets, the cardboard album cover in my fingers felt substantial. More substantial than digital music, anyway. And I suggest that this feeling of substance enhances our lives more than more than the more modern media do.
I probably spent more hours listening to music and studying the album covers than I spent with my schoolbooks. Or not. What was the first album you bought?