My adult kids like to tell me I’m old and not very hip. But as usual they’re wrong, and I have evidence in the form of the book “The Revenge of Analog: Real Things and Why They Matter,” published earlier this year by David Sax.
I could kiss this man. His book is all about how old stuff is not only hip and cool again but it’s in many ways superior to the stuff that has replaced it.
Like vinyl records and record players. They’re apparently selling like hotcakes (which is a ridiculously old and dumb expression by the way. I doubt hotcakes ever sold like hotcakes. Because they’re hotcakes.)
I like record albums much better than CDs and digital, and always have. It’s not the music quality. Digital and CDs have it all over albums as far as music quality.
What I like is the other stuff, the intangibles. There’s a ritual to putting an album on the turntable that is wonderfully satisfying, perhaps because there’s a certain slowness to it: Pull out dust jacket; hold the album with forefinger in the hole, thumb on the edge, so as not to smudge it; place it gently – almost reverently – on the turntable like it’s made of glass; drop the needle, wait for the first “pop” to know it’s caught the groove correctly. Crank up and enjoy. Ahhh.
I also like album covers. Big, square album covers. In the past, album covers were a big, big deal. They said something about the band and the music. Now, album covers are an afterthought, and there’s no such thing as liner notes or a lyric sheet.
Kids, you don’t know what you’re missing. I’ve mentioned this before, but my two favorite album covers are Queen’s “News of the World” and Poco’s “Legend.” The Queen album cover features a robot that has just murdered the band by sticking his finger through their chests, and the Poco cover is a simple line drawing of a horse made by Phil Hartman, the guy who later starred on Saturday Night Live. I don’t know why they’re my favorites. They just are.
Sax says books are back, too, which is good news, but to me they never went away. I’ve dallied with digital books. I’ll say this: they’re OK. But paper books are way better. Here’s why: 1) Books smell better 2) A book never runs out of juice when you’re in the middle of a good chapter 3) You can dog-ear books – I’m a big dog-ear guy, and 4) Books look great on a shelf and tell the world what an erudite fellow you are, even if you’re not.
Even paper and pens are back as well, which I would never have guessed. According to Sax, there’s a subculture that prefers taking notes at work using pen and paper vs. a laptop. I am among them, and always have been. I work at a place with lots and lots of millennials, who loooove their tech. I am usually the only one in meetings taking notes on paper. I used to feel a bit self-conscious about that.
But no more. This book has set me free. I am hip once again. Take that, kids. You owe your old man an apology.
Now if only newspapers would get cool again.
I don’t think I’m hip but I may soon get a new hip. Will that help???
A new hip qualifies you as hip in my book.
I’d tell my kids”I rest my case,” but they’d likely tell me to go lie down and rest. “After all that excitement, you must be tired, mom.” Ingrates! 😉
I know, right? Damn kids. I’m quite sure we never fossilized our parents.
I still will choose my landline telephone over my cell phone when I am at home. Can’t break that habit. My two year old granddaughter jumps when it rings and thinks it’s a remote control!
I would pay cash money to see a millennial try to answer a ringing landline.
That’s funny!
Thank you!
After just commenting on the dresses seen on TV and shopping, I was watching an old Carol Lombard film from the 1930s and they were wearing low, low cleavage and backless tight dresses.
The only thing that was not worn in public back then was the wearing of pajamas anyplace.
There are times when it nice to use my cellphone to read a book when I am waiting some place for someone or at a doctor’s office while waiting to see the pill pusher. At my age it seems like they are trying to push more and more pills on me. When I am home like to read a real book. Like Andrew said, you can fold down a page to mark where you left off..
Another that is making a comeback is an old fashioned typewriter. There are people that like the real old models that are pre-electric. Then there are those who like to use the electric models. I still have a land line simply because I like a landline. There are times that a cellphone will not work. You sometimes have to go outside to get a good signal. That is not any fun when it is raining, snowing, too hot or it is too cold outside. Then there are times when it is a pain to go outside. The bishop at our church made an announcement today about people trying to call him. He told them the phone number he had was a landline. Please stop trying to text or message the phone number. He just had an old fashioned message machine.
“it seems like they are trying to push more and more pills on me. ”
I wonder why.
It has taken a while to remember who Fred reminds me of. He sounds like far too many I have known since the late 1960’s onward who were spaced out and doped out on illicit narcotics. They quite often were high on marijuana, hashish(mainly in Europe while I was in the army) and various other narcotics.
They would accuse me and others that would join in their drug parties as somehow inferior to them. They inferred comments that were not nice about us. If we were to do a hair drug test between Fred and I, I wonder who would pass and who would fail. For your information in 1974 the 7th Army initiated mandatory drug testing. 7th Army announced that the drug testing would be done using the last number of a members’ social security number. Unfortunately 7th Army only used 2 social security numbers to do the testing. I had one number and a another man in the unit had the other number. No one else in the unit matched the social security numbers. I sometimes gave 3 to 4 urine samples a week for 4 months before I left the army.
Anyone who gets multiple prescriptions from various doctors needs to online and look up the side effects and whether the new drug does not play well with the old drugs that you have.
You think you got me all figured out, huh?
Just like you dream that you have me all figured out. The difference between you and I is that I did not start the name calling. You act like a schoolyard bully. Only you are far beyond that. Someone disagrees with with point of view, you starting the name calling and marginalizing them . You cannot refute all the points that I bring up. I will admit that a couple of times something slipped through that was not entirely correct, however, a lot that I bring is accurate. Right now I am confident you will figure out some way of skewing what I write.
The tactic of skewing data, of name calling and otherwise marginalizing someone is that same tactics that the nazi’s used to justify the “final solution” to murder Jews and others that they determined were inferior. When the determined someone was inferior the nazi’s put them into gas chambers. Your tactics are right out of the nazi handbook.
You didn’t start the name calling? That’s funny. Tell me another one.
A couple times?
You don’t make any points. You just spew alt. right garbage. There is nothing to refute.
You would be the one to know all about Nazi tactics.
Jim 3: Stop taking up all the space here, please. Your three looong posts are boring, and they discourage others from posting.
For about 20 years I have been picking up vinyl LP records at garage sales for almost nothing. I keep about 5% of them and sell the rest back to vintage record shops and eBay. The net financial impact is a big profit for me and a growing collection of Rock and Roll vinyl. I keep the ones I really like. I love vinyl LP records as well because I get to hear the entire album. I don’t just hear a single hit. Some of my all time favorite songs are the non-hits that are almost never played on radio.
One key element to great sound on an LP is to make sure you use a good need. I personally replace them about 2X per year. Don’t use worn, old needles. They provide inferior sound.
Trying to find the supposed “backwards masking” track content is a riot as well.
I want to reassure all of you that Harvey Weinstien never sexually harassed me.
Unfortunately I can’t say the same. Choke. Sob.