I bought an original copy of Old And In The Way in 1986. If I had a dime for every time I spun that vinyl throughout the late '80s and early '90s, I'd be living in a pretty fancy house about now. But unfortunately there aint much money to be made in the record spinning business, so as I sit writing this in a crowded office space in my less than fancy abode here on 53rd Street, I am reminded of just how much money I haven't earned in my life.
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| It's probably time to retire this copy to the attic. |
This record turned 40 this month - on the 17th to be exact. While 40 years might not seem like a terribly long time, one has to consider that vinyl records age much faster than humans do, and like dogs they're time comes up faster than ours. Case in point, I pulled the ol' disc out of it's sleeve this past weekend and gave it a whirl on the turntable. It showed the abuse it's taken over the years, skipping like a school girl who just discovered her first crush, and while the sound wasn't terrible, the grooves had worn so deep on some of the songs that the sound came across as sounding warped and maybe even a little bit slow.
A small chip on the record's edge made it impossible to fully enjoy the first tracks on side A and side B, thus eliminating "Pig in a Pen" and "Panama Red" - arguably the two most kickin' tunes on the entire danged record. "Midnight Moonlight" has taken such a beating over the years that it skips right at the song's chorus - thus putting me in a transcendental mind warp each time it repeats itself over and over. I've gotten kind of spacey in my long life, and this weekend the chorus must have repeated itself 20 times before I actually caught on to what was happening.
The groove in "Land of the Navajo" is so deep that at times it sounds as if the song is slowed way down only to catch it's groove again, and like music on ice it spins out of it at a rate so quick that it actually sounds faster. It's kinda disconcerting considering that I haven't dabbled too deeply into psychedelics for about 15 years but when Peter Rowan starts to do that Navajo chant and it slows way down and then suddenly picks up again real quickly, it's like being on acid all over again.
Yes, 40 years is a terribly long time to be a record, especially one that has been spun as often as this one has. It's been a mainstay in my "active" collection for all these years, meaning that I haven't filed it away up in the attic yet with the thousands of others that are there, but I've discovered that maybe it's time to do just that.
In fact, my "active" collection is about ready for a downsizing anyway as I am forced to step over it anytime I need to enter that part of the house.
For instance, I don't know when was the last time I listened to Sweeter As The Years Go By by Blind Willie Johnson or Poverty's Paradise by Naughty by Nature or even Blank Generation by Richard Hell and the Voidoids.
But I did pull out Old & In The Way this past weekend and realized that it is indeed, old and in my way. Time for a trip to the attic...
N/p: The Disasteroids: "Cold Woman Blues"
First you will see a spot. The spot will become a crack. This is the crack between the nothing, and out of this nothing will come your unborn soul. - Edward Jessup
Bananas grow pointing up, not pointing down.
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