rockinlibrarian (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rockinlibrarian) wrote2012-10-26 12:07 pm
rockinlibrarian) wrote2012-10-26 12:07 pm
Entry tags:
Car Sounds: More In My Continuing Yet Random Series on Music and Mood
Are you the sort of person who sits in the car with the keys on auxiliary so you can listen to the rest of the song on the radio before you get out?
People joke about such people BECAUSE WE EXIST. And it's not illogical a bit. I was pondering that this evening* as I sat in my garage with "Tonight Tonight" blasting out around me, even as I knew it was already late and I had to relieve the sick husband and get the kids to bed though first making the incredibly stubborn 3 year old take her medicine... one could argue that that was why I was procrastinating in the car, but it wasn't really. I just didn't want to leave the car. I wanted to stay there surrounded by Smashing Pumpkins. And I'm not even that into Smashing Pumpkins. IT'S DIFFERENT IN THE CAR.
I'm not technically an audiogeek. Partly because I'm too cheap, but mostly just out of practicality. Rarely do I let myself just sit and LISTEN to music-- though it does happen sometimes, and somehow nearly EVERY time I put on Abbey Road, (okay, even then it's not JUST sitting but involves a great deal of air drumming. Some day Lovely Rita and the Meter Maids WILL exist, and I WILL BE READY!) -- but mostly I need to be moving around or working at things that can't be positioned at the perfect acoustical angle from my (crappy old, cheap radio, or mono-computer) speakers. And headphones annoy me. I don't like being tied to a cord. Even if I had CORDLESS headphones, they'd still be sticking that music right in my ears in a gratingly pushy way. I prefer to give music space in the air to dance.
This is why the car is the perfect place for music. Like listening on headphones, you've got stereo-surround-sound swirling close around you as you sit still and let it, but with more FREEDOM for you-- not only cordless and NOT right-in-your-ears, but you can also technically GO somewhere WHILE you're sitting still! And there are no distractions: just driving and music, which apparently use such completely different parts of the brain that you CAN focus on both simultaneously. Granted I DO have a certain mix CD that subconsciously causes speeding (it's something about playing "Ecstasy," "Rock and Roll," and "Barracuda" right in a row. TRY IT. On a long straight open road without cops). It MIGHT be that the passenger seat is REALLY the best place to listen to music, but WHO'S DRIVING? Do they like the same music as you? Would they prefer the radio at a RESPECTABLE volume? Would you be required to CONVERSE with them?!
I like to drive by myself, with the radio filling the space. I like the freedom to flip radio stations obsessively, trying to find the Best Thing On Right Now (those who have driven anywhere with me know that I don't entirely restrict myself in this respect with other people, either). I like this opportunity to just commune with the music, in a car-shaped cocoon of sound. It's, ironically, my Quiet Time, a time to recenter and catch my breath, changing the chaos of the world into the order of harmonically-arranged frequencies in pleasing patterns. You ever have one of those transcendental moments where the colors go brighter and you feel like you're seeing in a sort of 3D that makes the old world that you thought was already 3D feel strangely flat in comparison, and the whole universe is in harmony and you're ALIVE? I'm pretty sure every one of those moments happened while I was driving and listening to music.
But I don't have to be driving. Just sitting in a parking lot, being absorbed by the music, is more than enough for me.
How do you like to listen to music? Are you a stay-til-the-end car listener, too?
*Obviously this was composed last night, as it's being posted in the middle of the day.
People joke about such people BECAUSE WE EXIST. And it's not illogical a bit. I was pondering that this evening* as I sat in my garage with "Tonight Tonight" blasting out around me, even as I knew it was already late and I had to relieve the sick husband and get the kids to bed though first making the incredibly stubborn 3 year old take her medicine... one could argue that that was why I was procrastinating in the car, but it wasn't really. I just didn't want to leave the car. I wanted to stay there surrounded by Smashing Pumpkins. And I'm not even that into Smashing Pumpkins. IT'S DIFFERENT IN THE CAR.
I'm not technically an audiogeek. Partly because I'm too cheap, but mostly just out of practicality. Rarely do I let myself just sit and LISTEN to music-- though it does happen sometimes, and somehow nearly EVERY time I put on Abbey Road, (okay, even then it's not JUST sitting but involves a great deal of air drumming. Some day Lovely Rita and the Meter Maids WILL exist, and I WILL BE READY!) -- but mostly I need to be moving around or working at things that can't be positioned at the perfect acoustical angle from my (crappy old, cheap radio, or mono-computer) speakers. And headphones annoy me. I don't like being tied to a cord. Even if I had CORDLESS headphones, they'd still be sticking that music right in my ears in a gratingly pushy way. I prefer to give music space in the air to dance.
This is why the car is the perfect place for music. Like listening on headphones, you've got stereo-surround-sound swirling close around you as you sit still and let it, but with more FREEDOM for you-- not only cordless and NOT right-in-your-ears, but you can also technically GO somewhere WHILE you're sitting still! And there are no distractions: just driving and music, which apparently use such completely different parts of the brain that you CAN focus on both simultaneously. Granted I DO have a certain mix CD that subconsciously causes speeding (it's something about playing "Ecstasy," "Rock and Roll," and "Barracuda" right in a row. TRY IT. On a long straight open road without cops). It MIGHT be that the passenger seat is REALLY the best place to listen to music, but WHO'S DRIVING? Do they like the same music as you? Would they prefer the radio at a RESPECTABLE volume? Would you be required to CONVERSE with them?!
I like to drive by myself, with the radio filling the space. I like the freedom to flip radio stations obsessively, trying to find the Best Thing On Right Now (those who have driven anywhere with me know that I don't entirely restrict myself in this respect with other people, either). I like this opportunity to just commune with the music, in a car-shaped cocoon of sound. It's, ironically, my Quiet Time, a time to recenter and catch my breath, changing the chaos of the world into the order of harmonically-arranged frequencies in pleasing patterns. You ever have one of those transcendental moments where the colors go brighter and you feel like you're seeing in a sort of 3D that makes the old world that you thought was already 3D feel strangely flat in comparison, and the whole universe is in harmony and you're ALIVE? I'm pretty sure every one of those moments happened while I was driving and listening to music.
But I don't have to be driving. Just sitting in a parking lot, being absorbed by the music, is more than enough for me.
How do you like to listen to music? Are you a stay-til-the-end car listener, too?
*Obviously this was composed last night, as it's being posted in the middle of the day.
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There are people who DON'T do this?
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So aside from grudgingly going to classes and failing at social interactions, I've just been watching movies and COMMUNITY (and having, surprisingly, THE MOST DEPRESSING DREAM EVER about it today, which kind of made me miserable for hours) and reading books and comics (mostly comics) and playing the ukulele and the tin flute and thinking about what I should do with my life.
Also got this amazing letter from Devin you should totally read.