the worn out factor

brittleblood

this thread is inspired by my mother-in-law who explains the fact that their exceedingly old tv won't get channel 2: "we watched it too much" - plain and simple.

there are some things you can't listen to anymore because they are just worn out. this probably happens alot around the holidays when you can't move without hearing....you know what...

mebbe that modern english hit that won't ever fade or such.

thank my stars i wore out kiss alive when i was 15.

i'll leave it to you to drag more current stuff into the theme...

elwoodicious

In my teens I played 70's era Yes incessantly. A couple of months back Amazon had The Yes Album on sale for $0.99 so I grabbed it but only made it through less than 2 minutes of listening. Their sound, in fact pretty much any prog rock sound of that era, is irrevocably broken for me. Interestingly, though, I discovered John Coltrane's Ole around the same time as Yes and that album is still as fresh and exciting today as it was 20+ years ago. Yes == Worn Out != John Coltrane

Katrina

Completely agree about Yes. In high school I hung put with a group that worshiped Yes. Ugh. I got a bargain-bin copy of Fragile, played the first track, and that was it. I made it through 8 1/2 minutes. But I still like a lot of music from that era...not so much the prog rock, but I could still give some Rush a spin.

wludwig

Billy Joel has not worn well with me, especially the Piano Man album.

elwoodicious

@katrina Rush is another band from my teens that has been worn down to a nub. I'm scratching my head trying to figure out why it is that I fall madly in love with some artists or sounds (Yes, Led Zepplin, Trance music) only to burn out on it a couple of years later while some smolder with passion seemingly forever (Coltrane, DJ Shadow, Japancakes). Its like I'm gripped by a blinding obsessive novelty that is tempered by deep love. o_0

CaptainWrong

This will be sacrilege to many but the Beatles. Was a massive Beatles fan in my youth, read every book I could find, collected bootlegs (back in the pre-CD days, mind you,) pretty much memorized every note of every song. At this point, I don't need to ever hear any of their songs again.

headcrash

@CaptainWrong: Hard to believe, for me, that any Beatles fan could get "worn out", but understandable I suppose. In my case, I've owned every album, in every format, from LP to CD, and just pre-ordered the new remastered box set coming out in September and can't wait to hear it. I might go months without playing any Beatles, but I've never gotten burnt out on their stuff.

Only thing I can think of that I've pretty much left behind that I used to play a lot of is: Grunge. Played Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Alice, etc. regularly for a couple of years, then stopped and I can't remember the last time since then I've listened to them.

brittleblood

i would think things like moby...the one that he put out about 10 years ago...will be hard to pick up, given all the exploration that has transpired from that initial point.

re: beatles - my guess is things which are "mccartney" might wear out faster than lennon. i know it's sloppy to throw out "ebony + ivory" but i can't think of anyone whose name has been linked to such revered status would slip that low.

ok i lied. elvis would do ultimate great stuff right alongside ultimate trash (poke salad annie...gator got y'er granny).

TimMason

i can't think of anyone whose name has been linked to such revered status would slip that low.

Even Homer nods.

I'm surprised by what holds up. Just downloaded "Wake of the Flood" down from Amazon, and it gave us part of a wonderful evening.

Many years ago (hi frogkopf) I was at one of the best rock concerts I've ever jumped up and down to: The Faces with Stewart, just after they'd formed. Stevart's served up too much warm soup in the intervening years for me to want to go back there.

But the real jawbreaker these days is most small-group jazz (set Monk and Coleman to one side) of the 60s. My solo, now your solo, now his solo, now his sola, finish. Boredom assured. I was so much older then ...

brittleblood

lol - i can't think of anyone who is more of a parody of himself than stewart. everybody - you can picture him doing his roboto dance while singing 5 discs of mellow

huh? some big label pulled his vids from youtube!

Dr. Mutex

My music player informs me that I have listened to most tracks only once. Of music I've replayed, I notice a pattern. I get a new album, listen to it a few times, then it's usually a year or more before I care to play it again. Take a peek at my last.fm charts. You don't get to the hundredth track before it's 4 plays since October, 2004. You want sacrilege? It's just as well that scrobbling wasn't around to witness as I slowly killed The Beatles, track by track, side by side, day by day, year after year. I gave the lads a long rest and found I hadn't killed them after all, but their sparkle hasn't come back and I count it loss.

I think that listening to a record more than a few times in a year is a mistake. Everything you do, see, and hear rewires your brain to some extent. Repetition reinforces the new wiring, and feeding the exact same information into your brain over and over is very different from reciting your ABCs, or seeing multiple live performances. When you listen to radio, over time whatever's in the playlist gets burned into your brain, reinforced more strongly than anything you've learned in school, more than the items you need to pick up on the way home, more than your first kiss. I no longer allow anyone to mess with my mind in this manner, myself included.

Substitute "burned in" for "worn out". Is it not the case that you can hear these recordings in your head? Do you remember the songs you purposely learned and sang in grade school as vividly? At all? When these worn out recordings come on doesn't something in your mind scream "Not again!--I have that." I used to think it was clever to recognize a record from the first few seconds. Now I think it shows something's terribly wrong! Reinforcing one thing requires that other things become less important, less accessible. Why is some piece of shlock from the 80's so readily at hand, while important events from the same period are hazy? I've been stupid. Most of my life I've allowed a stream of filler to be plastered over my experiences. I've played albums until all the magic wore off. When The Clash urged me to smash my radio, I should have taken their advice then and there. I shouldn't have built a record collection. I should have sold or traded albums I'd had a while and got different ones. If I had I could pick up an album like Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and get blown away all over again.

Daniel, Esq.

Heresy, but if I never -- ever -- hear The Beatles again, it will be ok.

Katrina

Dr. Mutex, I can only surmise you've had a really bad day or decade to write that post. I adore finding things I lost from my youth.
I think that listening to a record more than a few times in a year is a mistake.
I don't. Sometimes I hear something new in it, that I didn't catch before.

Everything you do, see, and hear rewires your brain to some extent.
True. This is true of seeing or hearing something only once, as well as repeatedly.

Repetition reinforces the new wiring, and feeding the exact same information into your brain over and over is very different from reciting your ABCs,
How? I don't get your point in this part of your post.

reinforced more strongly than anything you've learned in school, more than the items you need to pick up on the way home, more than your first kiss.
I can't wait until the dementia hits and I can remember my first kiss better than I remember what I had for lunch. Joking. Can't agree with you here...time's effect on the mind can take away many firsts. You don't remember your first step, or your first word, or your first doctor visit, either, I'll bet. You don't need to. But I do remember my first romantic kiss, thanks for reminding me about that.

I used to think it was clever to recognize a record from the first few seconds. Now I think it shows something's terribly wrong! Funny, I always thought it was a special talent of mine. Nothing wrong with it...I'm rather proud of it. Not everyone can do this, you know.


Reinforcing one thing requires that other things become less important, less accessible.
Not necessarily. People grow and change, and letting things go can be freeing. I wish I could let those cigarettes go, for instance. The time you spend doing things is what makes them important, to paraphrase The Little Prince.

Katrina

Oh, and if you want to unkill The Beatles, get in a convertible and point it to the highway and play "Drive My Car" really loud while imbibing on the sun.

Katrina

It's got cowbell, after all ~

Katrina

@elwoodicious
Rush is another band from my teens that has been worn down to a nub.
It was pretty exhausting playing that air guitar, wasn't it?

Katrina

wludwig, especially the Piano Man album
I only have that on vinyl, so haven't listening to it in a loooong time. I think it's strange that he even wrote that title song. It's an old man's song, yet he wrote it while young. It has meant different things to me over the years, and has merit. It reaches across the years; young people hearing it think they'll never end up that way, and older people know the sorrow of it.

Katrina

@brittleblood, aw, now I got hankering to hear 'Beth'. I never did get into Kiss, but that's a good ballad. Surely my local library has something of theirs with it on it.


Maybe Mutex is onto something - haven't heard it for years, so it's OK now.


edit - I listened to 'I Melt With You' also - just saw a rerun of Pretty In Pink.


I dunno, y'all. This never gets old when I have a happy memory of the song....the Yes songs I can do without, because those people and that situation didn't work for me. I'm glad I left them behind.

Katrina

but I could still give some Rush a spin.

So thought I, and I just did, and it brought back a bunch of bad teenager feelings. I'm off to listen to Morcheeba.
Fuck that Rush. They are just worn out.

brittleblood

well, i think mutex' post is an evocative sweep. you either went in one direction or the other - most likely taking a defensive posture for "it's normal to listen to things repetitively".

still the same, there is a harsh truth to his position...as in memorizing ABC's - that is actually a building block for opening many other doors. but collectively being able to identify "melt with you" in the first 3 seconds is...what? a huge social waste of time.

there are some crappy finite numbers out there that make you rethink everything on its present course - (for example, some really bad cable travel channel show rips off the 1000 places to see b4 you die idea - but gives the very telling statistic of "you have 88 weeks of vacation over your life - that's it") mutex alludes to the finite as well - you listen to the white album 100 times in your life + you've shunned 99 other rekkids you could have explored. or you could have used the time to learn to play an instrument...or this or that. it is all finite.

of course, there is the intertwined evil twin thread looming in front of mutex > what music will never get worn out. my guess is beethoven's 9th gets the high honor.

looming.

Katrina

but collectively being able to identify "melt with you" in the first 3 seconds is...what? a huge social waste of time.

It's not a waste of my time. I don't care what you say. A lot of people can't do this. Yeah, dismiss it as a party trick.
I got the gift.

Katrina

It's not a waste of my time, because I don't study it or spend time on it, I just KNOW.

Katrina

You're just feeling onery because I mentioned Beth.

elwoodicious

@Katrina

It was pretty exhausting playing that air guitar, wasn't it?

Ha! My dork factor was off the charts in high school and Rush, Yes, EL&P, King Crimson, Jethro Tull, etc were the near constant soundtrack for 36 hour marathons of Warhammer and D&D fueled by Mountain Dew and Taco Bell. To this day if I hear Jethro Tull I get reflexively reach for a 12 sided die, get heartburn, and go into a diabetic coma. :-/

Katrina

One dork can recognize another at 50 keystrokes, eh?
I'm so happy you replied - those doofy guys I remember fondly from my teens also salute you, I'm sure.
Warhammer? What's that?

Taco Bell is way healthier than McD, ya know.
My son is a gamer and Mountain Dew came out with some special gamer cans this year. Vile stuff. I took a sip.

brittleblood

k - i have that idiotic gift as well. my wife is amazed at how i can - not only name a song on the radio within seconds - but recognize the narrator's voice in commercials, documentaries, etc. - the flip side of her amazement is that i can't remember anyone's birthday...didn't know pig latin til i was into my thirties, still can't sing anything to do ray me and still have trouble with who wins out in rocks, paper, scissors.

"beth" is inconsequential to the kiss repertoire...so, of course i'm petty when you toss it out like a nite of good lovin'.

since y'er around + i need to bug the female types on this...as it's gone too far without explonation - namely > what gives with women in elevators??? seriously, i can understand getting forward in a bar - but the elevator??? - come clean.

TimMason

Listening to a record too many times is a bad thing? Sounds to me as if you want to taste that first kiss over and over again. Aah, but you'll never be eight years old again, and she's grown fat and you've gone bald, the once lean and nimble limbs don't have the same reach any more.

I know I'll never walk into the Marquee again and hear Eric lift me off the floor with this - but then since that night, I've heard this. I know I'll never quite get the lift out of this as I did on the day a mate brought it round to my birthday party, and we heard it for the first time. Tempus bleeding fugit, my good doctor.

thirstyear

I find that I hear things differently at different ages and that that keeps the music fresh for me. Like re-reading a favorite book every few years, I get different
things out of it each time. I'm sure there are things I just overdid and couldn't listen to again (although none come to mind right now), much like overdoing a favorite food (I can never eat fritos corn chips again). Still, for me it's mostly rediscovering something in light of everything I have heard since - the new stuff giving me new context for the old stuff. Or maybe I just don't like to admit to myself that I ever liked any bad music.

Televiper

If you really love an album, do listen to it repeatedly and just enjoy the enjoyment of it. But, this is a rare case and the rare is the reason for the indulgence. While I disagree with the technique of listening to an album repeatedly to soak in all the details, I do believe you should try and listen to album at least a few times and catch it from different angles and moods. Of course the second and third pass will allow you to relax more and focus on different details.

Things I've worn out: Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead, Rush, and Soundgarden. There are only rare instances where I can even be nostalgic about hearing these bands. Normally, I'll get through the first minute of a song before I feel fatigued and start looking for something else.

fduniho

Since some people have mentioned Yes, I'll add that Yes is a band that has continued to sound fresh to me ever since I first started listening to them in the early 80's, sometime between 90125 and Big Generator. For me, part of the appeal of Yes is that their music is too complex to easily go through my head, which leaves it sounding fresher whenever I listen to them. I also collect the live albums and listen to multiple performances of the same piece, so that it doesn't grow too stale too quickly. It also probably helps these days that emusic and other sources of affordable music have kept me preoccupied with so much new music that Yes doesn't get much chance to get overplayed. While on the subject of progressive rock, I'll add that Asia's older music has begun to grow a bit stale for me. Asia was once my favorite rock group, and I think I've managed to overplay their self-titled debut album. But Asia has faired better than many of the other bands I listened to. Outside of progressive rock, I have found that many rock bands and rock stars lose their freshness much sooner. I used to listen to Duran Duran, Human League, 'Til Tuesday, Tears for Fears, Spandau Ballet, Men at Work, and various other 80's bands but hardly bother with them anymore these days. U2 is the main band from that time period (and outside of progressive rock) that continues to sound fresh enough to me, not that I don't enjoy the others every now and then. When I first joined Napster, I found myself listening to a lot of 80's music I haven't been able to listen to since my record player stopped working. Some of my favorite music does get overplayed occasionally, such as Keiko Matsui, Renaissance, and October Project. Fortunately, I have enough other music to keep them from being overplayed too much. I think I have managed to overplay a lot of Tangerine Dream too much, as I used to regularly use them for exercise. Nowadays, I more frequently exercise to music in the Psy Trance genre. Turning to other music, Mozart's Clarinet Concerto used to be one of my favorite Mozart pieces, but it has grown too familiar to me. I think one of the reasons I keep buying more music is that if I keep listening to the same thing for too long, it will grow stale for me. By continually listening to new music, I avoid letting the music I enjoy grow too stale.

Billyjoebob

Stevie "Guitar" Miller

"The Joker"