To Lo-Fi or not to Lo-Fi

kperfetto — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 09:13:24 -0600

I've been on a quest to find a few new music blogs to my newsreader, plus reconnect with some of the ones I've been neglecting for far too long. I discovered Power Pop Review through Last.FM. It's penned by one of my friends/contacts (who goes simply by Power Pop Review), and is a joy for those of who still love flipping through bins of musty vinyl. From a recent post:

Since the introduction of the CD in the 80's and more recently the explosion of the MP3 (and similar) there is now a generation of young people who didn't experience firsthand the discovery of new bands as a result of perusing through vinyl. There are many who opine that the sound of vinyl is warmer than the digital option. Also with album covers being much larger you end up with a much bigger visual treat, a greater package and some genuine works of fine pop culture and yes, art!

Continuing with the lo-fi theme, Flux Rad points to a year-old article in Rolling Stone,The Death of High Fidelity, but adds:

All that being said, I do make the choice to listen to most of my music digitally — mostly for convenience’s sake. I try out new records in headphones on my computer - very rarely do I have time to sample a pile of demos in car speakers or on a good system. I have a hard drive stuffed to the gills with things I want to put on my iPod. Many of those files are classics that really deserve a better format. I have to accept that, and do my best to give things second chances when it might be warranted.

In my own experience, I listen more to my ipod these days, too. Again, convenience is a big issue, but it's so easy to hop on over to iTunes and download one or two (or twelve) songs, especially when you live in a city with relatively few brick-and-mortar record stores. Virginia DeBolt posted a great guide to buying your first iPod and using iTunes a few days ago on this very site. This intrigues me (and reminds me I really need to upgrade to the latest version of iTunes):

The latest version of iTunes has a new feature called Genius. This will create a playlist for you based on a song of your choosing. Pick a song, click the Genius button, and iTunes generates a playlist of songs from your library that go great with it. If you get a really good playlist from Genius, you can save it for future use. To use Genius, you must turn it on. It's in the Store pulldown menu in the menu bar at the top of your screen. It's in the Store menu for a reason. Apple will send you recommendations for what you might like from the store based on your Library and your Genius playlists. Don't turn it on unless you like getting tips like that.

Just like in the "olden days" of mixtaping. Sort of.

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To Lo-Fi or not to Lo-Fi