skinnerbox

notes
archive
latest
host


2001-06-07

I'm listening to the new Air and it made me think about the fact that there are so many variables in whether I like music I�m hearing for the first time. Good music should be good music but I have to admit the outside world influences me. Like a good meal being even more pleasurable when you�re eating it while sitting on a comfortable chair. So there might be a perfect environment for me to listen to music and I�d like to find out what it is ( I'm talking about cd's and tapes, cause for live music it was seeing the Magnetic Fields do 69lovesongs at the Old Town School of Folk Music last year.). I think it might be with headphones, walking around the city on a warm day. Maybe on a Saturday. Maybe not. And what kind of headphones? What kind of shoes? Am I with anyone else? Walking North or South? And how many listens? Sometimes when I make a snap judgement about music I remind myself how I was disappointed with Wilco�s Summerteeth on my first listen (From Logan Square to the Loop on the Blue Line EL. Cheap Sony earbud headphones.) But I can�t remember when I actually fell in love with Summerteeth (which I did). Lying in bed with headphones on? What was the weather like?

I�ll get super scientific about it this weekend. Maybe I�ll end up building a listening booth in the basement like a Skinner Box but for optimum listening pleasure. With special scents and a jumpsuit just for listening to music. I think there�s a new Wilco coming out soon!

Hmmmm, I bet listening to music on headphones while on my motorcycle riding down a quite, leafy moonlit Chicago side street on a Summer night would be pop music bliss. Don�t worry, I�d never do that. I�m filing that under �fantasies� and forgetting about it. But on a bicycle�

previous next