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Originally Posted by The Soup Nazi

Continuing the physical vs virtual discussion. From Robert Christgau's newletter (bolding is mine):

"disoriented by its lack of materiality": what is "materiality"? (a big fucking dick xD)

to me, in the case of recorded music, the speaker ends up being the most "material" (materially dense?) element of the delivery chain. it's what makes the air vibrate, just like an instrument. so its physical properties are what makes the most difference to my bones and eardrums and such

music in itself is *cough* "information" i guess. what is information, oooff, then begs the question: what is consciousness? call the philosophers...

more practically, most music these days is recorded digitally anyway. that ship has long sailed. the packets of bits christgau likes in his "cd changer" (it always was an ugly and clunky device) can be equally arranged in a simple playlist if he only knew how to operate the software. we have lossless now, not mp3. hell, current hi-res lossless is way better quality than cd audio, which makes the old medium even plastickier by comparison. just ask neil jung and his pono player (haha, jung)

not to say that objects can't be nice. they often are. i like some objects (like my coffee grinder). but they are something else. the "psychological" effect christgau feels is just the aura of obsolete plastic coasters staring at him from his shelves, screaming of fire hazards and depreciation

...

anyway re:moving, there is a really great movie about book collectors. i think it's called "the collectors"? it illustrates the way a certain group of people suffer for their vice/fetish


NO! actually it's not the collectors, it's THE BOOKSELLERS

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9355194/

very good if you like the subject (i do). watch if you can. streaming ok! (no film strip or projector required lol). glorious and desperate at the same time. the parts that deal with moving, oh, i can relate... but only in memory. those new york apartments crammed with books are a must-see!

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hey, you know what's actually material? the sun. and sunlight. so happy solstice

(eh, all matter is also information... information, i forget who proposed, might be a third or fifth or some kind of matter. maybe it's all there is... https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/articl...n-fundamental/ )