NAPSTER Memories

I think I had LimeWire. At the time I had a ton of CDs (well, I still do, but I don't listen to them in my computer ) so I didn't download a ton of songs, just a random mix of old shit I didn't have and newer songs off records I wasn't sure I wanted to buy. I remember being stoked to find "Leather and Lace" by Stevie Nicks & Don Henley and "I Love You" by Climax Blues Band. Then I'd listen to "The Middle" and "Last Night." That was a weird mix. Alas, the viruses fucked our desktop up something fierce so I was done with downloading pretty quickly.

 

I think there will always be a bit of a niche interest in physical media. LPs were dead for decades and now they're a cool hip thing with younger listeners. I can see CDs having a similar comeback, especially as younger listeners get older and realize that LPs might be cool but they suck because you've got to get up to change sides every 15 minutes. Pop 10 CDs into a changer and you're set for a day. I also think there's a large enough segment of the population that will always appreciate owning a CD b/c in a small way, it delivers some permanence that rewards the artist. It's not nearly large enough of a population to make platinum records a thing again, or to make actually making a record financially feasible for the non-Swifts of the world, but it's enough to keep the CD as a niche thing.

I'm going to miss the iPod though. I have an older one and like you, I've briefly considered buying another one just to have it when the older one goes kaput. I don't need songs draining the battery and data on my phone. That's for soul-sucking Twitter.

 

Among some audiophiles, there already is a CD reformation of sorts. You can go down that rathole, and a gazillion others, on the Steve Hoffman Music Forum. Avoid the LP vs. CD debates at all costs. You will find some of the most pedantic motherfuckers to breathe air on this Earth.

I went into a record store in a college town I get to a few times a year. I noticed they moved their used CDs into the more prominent spot in the store where the LPs had been.

I'm currently into catching up on LPs myself, but there is a price bubble on used LPs that is overdue for a pop, but because they're priced so high, I think it's turning casual buyers off. I can't blame them. I still have my CDs though.

As for Napster? It was the shit. I remember the early days thrill of burning the songs to a CD. (Ooh! burning! I made my own fucking CD!) I remember I finally pulled the trigger on buying a CD player for my car because of Napster. Fuck off mix tapes!

The cool thing was you could get official shit and bootlegs. Because ... illegal, of course. There's still stuff I had on Napster I haven't had since.

I was pissed when Napster was forced out. Letter of the law, blah, blah, in spirit, I never thought it was anymore illegal than making a mix tape was, it was just different technology to do it. When I recorded shit off the radio in the 80s, it certainly kept me from buying the actual albums. Metallica and Dr. Dre can eat my right ass.

I think I did go to Kazaa for a bit, but like others, was scared off by the potential litigation ... and viruses, there's a good chance my early downloading killed the computer that had my Napster files downloaded on to it.

Was it Napster or another service where an individual teen or some poor shit was actually fined by the feds? A sort of random example to scare people? Or was that a bullshit urban legend?

 

The RIAA would regularly sue people. It looks like there's a YouTube video (21 minutes!) about two of them here. I didn't have time to watch right now, but it sounds like one was ordered to pay, while the other "got out of it" by filing bankruptcy. If you search the web, apparently most people were able to settle lawsuits before they got to trial by paying anywhere from $0.50 to $2.99 per song downloaded, depending on when it happened.

 

Remember the days where you had to Google lyrics if you heard a song and wanted to know what it was, and then hope you could find it? Thank god for Shazam. One of man's greatest inventions.

 

Regarding record stores … the rebounding popularity of LPs as cool nostalgia items for teens and young adults has jacked the prices of used albums way out of proportion. The prices are so high, you’d think a carton of eggs were included.

I was in a record store recently (which of course included a bunch of garage-sale quality 1960s and 1970s stuff piled everywhere, a la Starsky and Hutch lunchboxes), and used LPs started around $15 for obscure groups or unpopular releases by middling artists.

You’re looking at $20-25 and up for, say, “Master of Reality” by Sabbath or mid-1970s Thin Lizzy. Any iconic album such as “Dark Side of the Moon” is $30 or more, even though there are about 100 million used LPs of it floating around.

And reissued LPs of the classic rock records? Better break open the piggy bank, youngsters. And get off my lawn!

 

I got a turntable for Christmas, and my girlfriend's mom gifted me a bunch of vinyl. There were some good finds in the record collection. I still need to set up the turntable.

 

After blowing up not one, but two laptops that I smooshed downloads onto, you were definitely on to something.

 

Back in the pre-iPhone/iPod days, you were somewhat (mostly?) immune if you had a Mac.

 

I'm sad that my car no longer has a CD player. I used to love when I would go on road trips or long drives by myself, to bust out my old mix CDs of random things I downloaded off Napster / Kazaa / Limewire and listen to them. It's like a snapshot of what my tastes and life and mental state was in my teens / 20s.

I still have some of the songs I downloaded in my music library. You can tell which ones they are because there are brief skips in the music where I previewed to see if it was the song I actually wanted to download.

 

My computer got a virus once from Kazaa or Limewire, complete with an animated cartoon face that suddenly popped up and took over the screen. It was like I was hallucinating at first, seeing that thing appear and go through a few transformations.

I'm not a techie at all, but somehow I figured out a way to search for a suspect file, can't remember how, but I was able to find the coding and delete it. By that time I had built that big catalog of song files, so the virus scare and the haunting thought of RIAA tracking me down got me off the file-snatching habit. Glad to escape with all the booty I got, though.

 

I love Spotify, I enjoy making playlists. Not as satisfying as a mixtape but still personal. And I play my playlists on a drive just like a burned cd.

After Napster, the next advancement was burning mp3s on a data CD so now I had hundreds of songs and multiple folders on one cd. Multi-CD players no longer needed.