Some Random Thoughts for Friday

I few thoughts of a musical variety:

1. The other day I was listening to Lou Reed sing "Dirty BLVD" and it got me thinking. Reed doesn't have the finest voice and he speaks more than sings his songs. My singing voice is okay and I can speak lyrics as well as anyone. So really there isn't much difference between Lou Reed and I.
   
   Well, expect for the killer skills on guitar and the gift for writing stone cold brilliant lyrics.
   
   I guess Lou does have that over me.
   
2. My kids give me grief about the radio stations and select of music I choose to listen to (as I expect all children do to their parents), but I don't let it bother me. Where else can I go from listening to Social Distortion singing a cover of Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" to enjoying Johnny Cash's own rendition of Nine Inch Nails' "Hurt".
   
3. For as much as I enjoy buying any song, anytime, through iTunes or Amazon.com and then loading up my iPod up with a ton of my favorite (and quasi-favorite) songs, I miss the experience of buying full albums.
   
   The rise of digital music has all but killed the album experience. When you can pick and choose which songs you want at a relatively inexpensive price, there is less need to buy the whole album. Before iTunes, my criteria for buying new music was that I had to either already be a fan of the artist or I had to have heard - and liked - at least three songs from their album. Then I would lay my money on the counter. That doesn't happen nearly as much anymore. If at all. I have plenty of full albums from back pre-iTunes. Many of which I've include songs that I now consider some of my favorites only because I bought the full album and listened to the whole thing. I often wonder how many non-popular songs I'm missing out on discovering because now I am more prone to just grab the one song from a new artist's album and never go back to try more.
   
   Seems a little like a disservice to the artists putting out the music.
   
   Also makes me feel a little like a lazy listener of music.