MAgic 101: soft vs hard media

[jorn@chinet.chi.il.us (Jorn Barger)]

Chris and I are always arguing (or worse, avoiding topics we know we'll 
argue about).  Basically, our arguments always boil down to this:  I'm a 
"devout pagan" (to steal Karen Finley's term), and Chris is a devout (;^) 
materialist.

I think our society, today, is one big *trauma*, and a good part of the 
reason is that we've all been intimidated into disbelieving our hearts, 
on the grounds that any notion of 'sprituality' is outmoded sentimental 
superstition.

So lemme throw down a materialist absurdity, here:

I'm listening to a Mary Coughlan cassette that was very dear to me during 
a painful time last year, that I haven't hardly listened to since, and I 
can *sense* that suffering soul, my old self, imprinted on that tape, in 
a way I'm sure I never will on a CD.  *Spatially*, I feel it as retained 
on that plastic film, in the soft magnetic oxides, so that all my senses 
can focus there-- it has an *individuality* that includes an image-of-me-
who-listened-affectionately.


Now you might try to argue that I just got to know the clicks and 
dropouts, so they have a familiar, friendly, personal face for me.  But 
then why wouldn't I get the same familiar pleasure in, say, the clicks 
and dropouts of Del's engineering? (just KIDDING!  sorry, Del... ;^)

I think what's wrong with CDs as a recording medium is that, being 
digital, they're unable to *absorb any imprint* from you and your 
feelings as you listen to the songs recorded on them, the 'emotional 
scent' of the life you felt yourself living at that time.  So when you 
listen *now* to old analog media-- vinyl or tape-- you feel something of 
that time, something particular to *that piece* of vinyl or plastic that 
*you* vibed with then, much more sensually than you'll ever feel again in 
these CD-times, listening back a decade or two from now.

And some day *quantum mechanics* may be able to put a formula to this, 
because it could be a simple case of the observer effect: the physicist's 
perceptions contribute a flavor to the particle-waves in the physicist's 
measurements, that continues to echo loudly thru the signal-channel of a 
wax groove, re-etched with each playing, but dims to inaudibility when 
faced with the abyss of laserlight reflecting off fused plastic zeroes 
and ones.  The whole idea of their permanence is to make that abyss 
practically infinite.

(A simple solution: buy CDs but copy them onto analog tape, which makes
a convenient opportunity to design a compilation-mix of your faves...)