Til Death Do Us Part

Did you know? The humble art of the mix tape is illegal in Australia. So is copying a legitimately bought CD onto a tape to play in your car for personal use. So is ripping your legitimately bought CD onto your computer and of course so is transferring that legitimately bought music to an MP3 player for personal use. So is taping something off the TV for personal use. No Tivo for us. That's because our copyright law lacks a "fair use" clause and almost any duplication is illegal. I guess the booming sales of MP3 players -- more than a million iPods in a population of 20 million -- are all for people listening to original compositions they recorded in their own home studios. Obviously these things are never prosecuted, and most Aussies are probably completely unaware they are actually breaking the law when they set record on Desperate Housewives because it clashes with the cricket. But still, you shouldn't have a law if you aren't going to enforce it.

Anyway, that is by the by really and I hope you don't mind the digression but I like to bitch about it. This may be old news for you sophisticates in the Northern Hemisphere but it's a brave new world for me. The music shops have finally figured out a way to get a slice of downloading revenue. Go into the shop, select X amount of minutes worth from a digital collection, burn and leave. Of course, people inclined to do this will probably just prefer to sit at home and do it on the computer, but points for trying I guess.

I submit that this system -- and digital downloading in general -- is of some momentary use to the music geek but only so far. My kind of music geek, anyway. It's not some idea that the purity of the musical experience being corrupted by technology or that reproduction means diminution. I'm not an audiophile either, I'll happily listen to compressed files on an MP3 player.

But. Despite all the highway metaphors in Americana, loving music is not a straight, flat road. It's entirely by-ways and dead ends and perilous cliff top tracks. I've dabbled in downloading and will continue to do so, but if I like something I generally buy the CD. Using iTunes makes me feel a bit empty. Happy to have the music, but like there's a whole part of the experience I'm missing. Sometimes, I just like to take out my Johnny Cash Unearthed box set and touch it. You can talk all day about the philosophy of attachment to such objects but, geez, it just feels nice to have it.

Sure this way you might avoid "the B-sides, the album fillers or the vanity tracks only the singer's mother could love" but what else do you miss?

The hidden treasures, the deeply personal, and the sense of taking a life-long journey with the artist. For better or worse, through novelty songs and smack-fueled indulgences. In Christmas albums and duets with Julio Iglesias.

I was 12 or 13 when the first Traveling Wilburies record came out and a Roy Orbison freak but this Bob Dylan bloke? What the .. ? One he sings solo, Congratulations, is the first song on the second side of the LP. I hated it and him. Like, he can't even sing! God. I always used to start the stylus from the second song. Always. For ages. Then one day I started it from the top. Then I listened to that song again. Then I listened to the other bits of the album which feature Bob. Then, suddenly, it was 10 years later and I was flying to Germany for the sole reason of seeing him live. That's how music works. If I hadn't lived with that album and only downloaded Handle with Care and End of the Line ... well, I hate to think.