CDs sell, and everyone’s buying

Saturday night’s Amazon binge is beginning to show results. First through the letterbox this morning – the new ¡Forward, Russia! album, Life Processes. A record I’ve been keeping an eye on for a while, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, because I like what I’ve heard from ¡Forward, Russia! in the past, and secondly, because it was recorded with Matt Bayles handling the production, the man who has produced some of the best heavy metal albums of all time by the likes of Botch, Isis and Mastodon. Exciting stuff.

Seeing as this is the first CD I’ve bought during the experiment, I was interested to see how I’d react when it came to seeing it but not being able to listen to it. And even though I knew I wouldn’t be able to put it on, I still went through the usual routine of ripping open the cellophane and looking at all the packaging, almost as if I was looking for clues as to what to expect when I do finally get to hear it.

By contrast, the other day I downloaded the latest free Nine Inch Nails album, The Slip, again, knowing full well I wouldn’t be able to listen to it. But even though the download came with all the usual trimmings, admittedly in digital form, I felt absolutely no desire to look at the artwork in the same way as I did when Life Processes came through the post. I’d heard it said before, usually by friends, that this is the very reason that people still by CDs – you get the whole physical package, to do with as you please. It’s almost as if buying a CD is a “proper” experience, and for some reason downloading music, even legally, still doesn’t have the same magic.

I guess the music buying experience was just another one of those things I was taking for granted, having been buying CDs for as long as I can remember, and I just didn’t realise how ritualistic the whole process is, or how much the process of listening to music is as much a physical thing as it is psyochological.