It’s two o’clock in the morning and I’m in my office.
Point. Click.
Point. Click.
There’s a knock at the door.
“Honey?”
It’s my wife!
I scramble.
An “Uh, yeah,” stumbles out of my mouth as I fumble with the mouse trying to close the browser.
“What are you doing?”
“Oh, not much . . . I’m just . . . just . . . looking at porn.”
Silence.
“Well, as long as you’re not on Beatport.”
“Oh, c’mon, baby, you know I said I wouldn’t be doing that anymore.”
It’s a silly scenario, but not altogether without truth. With the easy access of digital music tracks, time well-spent on gay midget bondage videos is now going towards scrolling through genre after genre of the latest in electronic music. In addition, with the scores of formally out-of-print back catalogs being added, there seems to be no end to the deluge of dance music one can scan through.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I love vinyl. The feel on the fingertips, the cue under the needle. But vinyl, alas, is expensive. And more importantly, in limited quantities. I can’t count how many tracks I’ve heard and then ran down to the record store to find it only to hear it’s not in stock when I know there are five copies underneath the counter saved for the “crew.” A morally devastating routine, to be certain. But it’s also understandable for the record label to print a limited quantity – it costs a lot of money and time to master, press and distribute vinyl, and even the biggest hits can be in high and hard-to-find demand.
But with the advent of the digital format, no track will ever be out of stock again. That, as a DJ, is simply brilliant. I will never have to suffer the knowledge that I won’t, eventually, be able to acquire a track. I mean, I just downloaded the Surgeon’s “Magneze,” almost ten years after I first heard Jeff Mills backspin into it on his classic “Live at the Liquid Rooms” mix. I’ve dreamed of owning that track and suddenly I can have it forever, without fear of warping, scratching, or theft – only my hard-drive crashing.
The other by-product of on-line digital shopping, with it’s easy access and low-cost, is that now anyone can acquire what was otherwise a strictly DJ-only form of music. That track you heard on your favorite DJ mix can now be yours – in its entirety. And for me, as a DJ who loves all genres of music, I can now afford to buy music that at a record store I would have to put back because I could only afford records that I knew would eventually be used for live performance. I mean, I started buying drum’n'bass again, almost seven years after I stopped spinning it! And I’m all the happier for it.
As a music junkie, I can never get enough. I have to have it, and I have gone to huge lengths to acquire certain tracks – like special-ordering from Germany – for an import price I’m embarrassed to mention now. But, now, since I have unlimited access, I can’t seem to stop. I just know on the next page is that little gem hidden amongst the rows of WAV files that will finally fulfill me. Oh, but, wait, there must be one more on the next page, or the next page, or . . .
Knock, knock . . .
“What are you doing, honey?”
