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Tuesday, June 21, 2005
Take the shuffle challenge
My Land Rover's been making some very strange noises of late and I've not managed to get to the bottom of them yet. As a result, I've been driving in silence for the last week or so, listening out for any new noises/clues to where the noises are coming from/dramatic explosions. Today however, I figured if it hasn't exploded yet, it's pretty unlikely to happen (although it's not impossible). So I plugged in my iPod and drove along listening to my music. It's much better that way.
iPods are cool because you can take lots of music with you wherever you go. There are other makes out there but they're not quite as good. If you're not familiar with the Apple music revolution, here's a brief summary:
Apple made iTunes, a really easy way to organise your digital music library
Apple made the iPod, a really easy way to listen to all your digital music on the go
The Walkman craze started all over again, but this time with much more music, better quality, and a slight but significant shift in the way music is created, distributed and sold.
This isn't the definitive history of it all, and it's not really got anything to do with what I discovered today on the way in to work whilst listening to my iPod.
So here's the whole point of this post: if you set your iPod to 'shuffle' (plays your music in random order), it's very difficult to resist the urge to skip past songs you don't like. But if you do and just let it play, it's actually quite rewarding: you hear songs you hadn't heard for ages (that you would normally skip past) and can free yourself from having to make decisions (which is actually pretty taxing).
So I heard some Pixies, Beach Boys, Doves, Beethoven, British Sea Power, Madder Rose, Strokes, Rooney, Plaid, Beck, Brian Wilson.... A real mixture of stuff, all of which I'd put on there myself but not all of which I would have listened to. In fact I would normally have skipped the Beach Boys, British Sea Power, Madder Rose, Plaid, Brian Wilson....
And what I found was that by removing the option to skip, my brain wasn't preoccupied with making choices, and I could listen properly, and hear better. Without my ears being (metaphorically) clogged up with decisions and opinions and trends, they were able to hear clearly. It's a bit like watching TV without having the remote control: it feels horrible at first, but once you give yourself over to the inevitablity of it all, it's so much easier to pay attention!
You could apply this to life: the 'music' will keep on coming, whether you choose it or not, so don't try and control what's coming next, just enjoy what's 'playing' now.
.....posted at 9:12 am permalink
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