by Suanne Strider
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I was born in 1976, so I have listened to my share of records. “Records?!?” says the college co-ed. “What’s a record?” Hold on to your skinny jeans, hipsters—I am not referring to ALL younger people. I know plenty of people in the younger generations who listen to records. But it also seems that there are many of your generation who are not familiar with the fine art of phonographic records, so this one is for them.
Did you know that there is a huge difference between analog sound (the kind that comes from a record), and digital sound (sound emitted from an electronic device using binary code)? Analog sound has a wavelength that flows in a continuous motion, like a wave on the ocean. When it reaches your ears, it laps upon your eardrum like a smooth wave laps the seashore. Digital sound has a wavelength that starts and stops, in a way, because it is transmitted through binary code (sequences of 1’s and 0’s). Therefore, scientific research has shown that listening to a record through a record player is soothing to the brain, putting it in an almost meditative-like state. Digital sound seems to “short-circuit” the brain—putting it in a state that is not relaxed at all. So, in essence, we are scrambling our brains by listening to digital sound via electronic devices.
We have a record store right here in Oxford that provides these brain-soothing dinosaurs we call “records.” It’s called The End of All Music, and it is located on North Lamar Avenue right across from the NAPA store. Here you can find all kinds of records, old and new. Not only can you find them, you can listen to them right there in the store in the “listening room.” Inside is a really great turntable with a great pair of headphones. How cool is it that you can test out the product before you buy it? I spend a lot of time on that comfy couch in that listening room, trying to decide which album to buy. I usually end up getting all I can afford for that day.
Greenwood, Mississippi native David Swider founded The End of All Music in March of 2012. Since then, there have been scads of independent debut albums released by local musicians at the store. It seems to be the general consensus among all the local bands that they start out debuting their first album at a record store like The End of All Music. Just recently, on March 26th, local musician Morgan Pennington debuted her first EP called Wolves at the store. She picked this date to correspond with her live “big-time” debut at Oxford’s Double Decker Arts Festival.
It seems the new trend—these independent record stores becoming “en vogue.” According to a Forbes magazine article from 2011, “[I]n 2010, 2.8 million LPs were sold, up 14% from 2009–and more than any other year since Nielsen SoundScan began tracking sales in 1991.” Although vinyl still only accounts for less than three percent of all music sales, this is a big increase since the trend only began around 2011, where for the first time sales of records could even be factored into the equation, and the amount accounted for in total records sales was one percent (with legal digital downloads accounting for 26%, and CD sales accounting for the rest).
There are many theories as to why this trend is happening. One is discussed above—that analog just sounds better. Analog has a more “warm” sound to it, according to avid record collectors and sound engineers. Sound studios often use devices to transfer digital sounds through analog equipment in order to “unscramble” the digital sound and produce the warmth that analog provides (also called “distortion”).
David Swider describes the new trend this way:
There’s definitely a trend but I’m also in the camp that thinks vinyl never really went away…especially with most indie labels. But yea, there are lots of folks discovering vinyl for the first time, or rediscovering it after iTunes ruled the 2000s. Like a lot of trends happening right now, there’s a sort of backlash towards the Internet and a reach for the tangible…something you really own and can touch and display and show off. Vinyl is perfect for this. Books are the same [way].
Swider also addressed the issue of analog vs. digital by discussing why he prefers analog:
I prefer analog to digital for sure, but I think it’s a preference- type thing. I definitely know people that think CDs and flac files are the superior way to listen to music…and they’re obviously more convenient, but there’s just something about the way a record sounds. You often hear people mention records as having a warmer sound and I tend to agree with that. Not to mention the experience of holding an album and seeing the artwork is far superior… [to] any digital file or CD jewel case.
Saturday, April 19th was National Record Store Day. The End of All Music celebrated this national holiday along with many more independent record stores across the country by having a big party. People showed up before dawn to secure their places at the front of the line so they would not miss the opportunity to buy special album releases that were being dropped on that particular day. I was one of the people who showed up to buy great albums, but I got there about forty-five minutes after the store opened. So, I did not get a copy of the Grateful Dead’s release of Live At Hampton Coliseum. This 2-LP set consists of most of the band’s first show ever to be played at Hampton Coliseum in Hampton, Virginia on May 4, 1979 (and the third show ever with keyboardist Brent Mydland). This release is the first ever known from this show in any format, and if you are familiar with the Grateful Dead, you know that this is a pretty amazing thing—that there was a show out there that almost no one had ever heard, except for the people who attended that show in person. What I did get, though, was pretty amazing. Here is a list of the albums I acquired that day, in no particular order:
The Grateful Dead: Workingman’s Dead
Robert Johnson: Robert Johnson, King Of The Delta Blues: The Complete Recordings
Various Artists: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack [to] The Big Chill
Various Artists: More Songs From The Original Soundtrack [to] The Big Chill
T-Model Ford: Pee-Wee Get My Gun
Muddy Waters: Muddy “Mississippi” Waters—Live
Townes Van Zandt: Delta Momma Blues
Al Green: Green Is Blues
Carole King: Writer: Carole King
Assorted Artists: Delta Swamp Rock, Sounds From The South: At The Crossroads of Rock, Country and Soul
Peter Gabriel: So
Kenny Rogers & The First Edition: Ruby, Don’t Take Your Love To Town
John Lennon & Yoko Ono: Double Fantasy
The Doors: The Doors: Curated By Record Store Day, No. 2,959 / 7,500
Little Feat: Down On The Farm
The Gants: Gants Galore
Elton John: 21 At 33
Linda Ronstadt: Greatest Hits
My fiancé, Leigh Taylor, and I (and all of our lucky friends) have had the best time listening to these records, looking at the album art, and allowing the gentle analog sound to soothe our musical souls. And, yes, that Doors album was created specifically by The Doors for National Record Store Day. We got number 2,959 out of all of the 7,500 that were released. I feel truly blessed.
Bill Boyle is a Professor of English at the University of Mississippi whose concentration is Creative Writing. You can find his newly released book Gravesend at Square Books in Oxford. He works part-time at The End of All Music, and he had these words to say about the event held at the store for National Record Store Day:
I love Record Store Day. It has gotten bigger and bigger every year. It was a really good day revenue-wise. I really liked the fact that it was a party all day. It was really cool having a big group of people hanging out and eating and drinking and having fun here at the store. The community aspect of it is what made it the best for me.
The record store had coffee ready for the early birds who camped out for a spot in line to get the most rare albums. Then, at 2 pm, there was free beer (of all kinds, and sodas and water, too. Oh, and cookies!), and Cole Furlow (front man for Dead Gaze, guitar player for Dent May) spun records outside while people mingled and talked and bought and listened to great records.
Bill Boyle also commented on the nature of the album as a music medium as opposed to CDs or downloading from the Internet:
I definitely think there is a difference between the act of listening [to either albums or digital mediums]—the act of listening to an album is much more interactive. You have to take the record out of the sleeve, and then there’s the album art to look at. So I think of listening to records as therapy in that way. It’s much more of a kind of ritual as opposed to downloading digital tracks.
And there’s definitely a difference in the sound. If I had to think of a word to describe the sound of an album as opposed to, say, a CD or a digital download, it would be that it is more ‘human.’ The sound is definitely ‘warmer’—you feel more of straight-line from the artist to the listener because it so much of an interactive experience.
Boyle, like the store’s owner Swider, believes that it is the interactive experience of an album that has made this medium become more and more popular by the year. He explains it this way:
Personally, I think it’s wanting a physical copy of the thing. Most people listen to music on their computer now, and when you are really into the music and you want the physical copy of it, you want the most beautiful copy possible… [An album] is like a book: if you love that book, you want the most beautiful version of the thing, and that is always going to be a record when it comes to music.
I really like the way he explains the album listening experience. Human. Warmer. We could all use a soothing reminder of what it really means to be “human” and to surround ourselves with a “warmer” environment. No pun on Global Warming intended.
Do yourself a favor and go to The End of All Music and just sit in the listening room for a while, picking out your favorite album. Swider, Boyle or any other of the helpful staff can assist you in picking out a great record player, if you don’t have one in your parents’ attic. Check there first. If you are lucky, you also might just find their stash of old records.
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This article was originally printed in The Local Voice #203 (published May 1, 2014). To download a PDF of this issue, click here.
