The most important thing about owning a record is having it for myself, forever. Streaming services are at your fingertips when you need them, but owning a physical record gives you a space and a library of music that streaming or a digital track does not. This musical space, where the sound physically rings out around me, is important as I’m sharing and placing myself in the midst of the melody.
Today’s spin is Pang by Caroline Polachek, first listened to in 2020. The record is a tactile experience — all labels and edges, never the grooves — and flipping it over to the B-side before placing the needle in the middle provides pause, letting me absorb “Hey Big Eyes” before “Ocean of Tears.”
This intermission does more than let me absorb what I’ve heard, though — it is a natural pause in the narrative, a contribution to the afterlives of an album and its longevity. What I listen to and am affected by stays in my actions and in the way I experience art, and gives me a chance to think about an album and what I’ve heard. Flipping a record really does enhance the listening experience — the anticipation, the division between songs on side A and B, and the power of the artist to pause their music all drive a message home for me.
Someday I’ll get more into jazz — for now, I enjoy Olivia Dean’s classical cadence or Sophie’s hyperpop beats. This is how music lives on, how its staying power carries through generations — when it is in your hands and entirely yours.
