An observation

So, this year, when I started running again in earnest, ie 10km, I got hip to the world of the ipod. (I am always late to technology, my mobile phone is about 4 years old, but it still works so why would I get rid of it? )

Anyhoo, the concept of downloading music was at first liberating, but now I am not so sure. Liberating because I didn't have to amass physical CDs, cluttering up my shelves with their fragile cases, because I could just grab that one Gwen Stefani track instead of the whole album, because I can shop from my comfy home, and not venture forth into loud crass music shop land.

However during recent weeks I have been reminiscing over some of my most beloved CDs; Funkadelic, Triosk, Weather Report to name a few, and my observation is this -

I LOVE LINER NOTES

When ever I buy a CD I pore over the liner notes, I want to know who wrote the song, in what year, who is getting shout outs, where was it recorded, how many outfits are they wearing in the photos of said notes, are the lyrics included, does it fold out this way or that way???? So many delicious facts to be gleaned from those oft overlooked liner notes. And if they are crappy and only one pathetic flimsy paper insert well that sucks. But if they fold out with stickers and stories and drawings and photos and lyrics and the whole thing is so well considered and detailed, well I'm a happy purchaser. They don't call it value adding for no reason.

So with itunes I am sans notes, and I feel like I'm only getting half the experience, and thus my downloading has decreased somewhat in favour of the actual fragile cased, shiny disc object. Sigh, my shelves are destined to be cluttered. Sorry Sam!

Listening to: Del the Funkee Homosapien - No Need For Alarm