Rainbow Chaser
I picked up a copy of Uncut today. Y’know the ‘Music, Movies, DVDs, Books and True Tales of Rock’n’Roll’ magazine that always has a free CD on the cover.
Anyway, the CD this month is a rather delicious amalgam of psychedelic classics from the UK underground. Syd Barrett, The Move, Kevin Ayers, The Nice etc., with tracks such as ‘Granny Takes a Trip’, ‘Once Upon the Seas of Abyssinia’ and ‘My White Bicycle’.
All guaranteed to make you ‘Tune in, turn on and drop out’ and all free ! I can remember when CDs were like investments (apparently they last forever). ‘Throw away your ancient vinyl’ they cried, ‘CDs are the future. They’re indestructible. Throw them on the floor, walk on them, toss them to one side without the cover on. They’ll still be good as new in a 1,000 years’. Yeah they should be as well. The price we are paying now is bad enough compared with other parts of the world, but, back in ’84 – ’85 when they first appeared they were astronomically priced – in real terms.
I very rarely buy CDs from anywhere but the web these days. Its not as much fun though, as being on a restricted budget, systematically going through racks and racks of LPs, trying to find the one that was worth the cash you’d scraped together. Many a time buying stuff you’d never heard. Taking a chance and sometimes losing – a crap ‘Faust’ album springs to mind. But sometimes winning: Zappa, Hugh Masekela and Tom Waits for example, all became staples of my listening pleasure as a result of similar leaps of faith.
I can feel myself coming over all ‘Good-Old-Days-ish’, so I guess I better button it and open my MP3 player and get down to the groovy sounds on my hard drive. Y’know, not long ago, none of us would have a fecking clue what that last sentence meant. Progress eh ?
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