a satisfying crash into the dumpster!

so yesterday, while the football games were on, i took the opportunity to throw away all the jewel cases in my cd collection. When a person is young, a music collection is a tangible, visible expression of personality. I remember being in college and dismissing a person based on their music collection (god how utterly daft and incredibly narrow-minded that is, i realize now).

A music collection is a mirror of a person, sure, but it's more like a fractal than a mirror. music ebbs and flows according to your circumstance in life, the other major players and characters in your life, and even things like your job commute and the job's location play a role in selecting the cd's in your stacks.

my collection has it's share of crap. i admit, i was a victim to the high school hair band era, Though most of that was on cassette, and those have all been in cold storage for years. i have Appetite for Destruction and Kix to remind me of my formative years. then it moves to the college days, i have the van halen, queen, Creedence clearwater that i used to listen to with my friends in college. Russ loved the classic rock. specifically he loved Led Zeppelin, but all the others fell into that group as well. from college i moved to emo, punk and brit rock. What a strange demographic. i collected en masse (truthfully i like this stuff the best). the clash, and the bouncing souls, weston, ah, the suicide machines. love it! since then, i've settled down to regular rock and roll, leaning toward punk rock tenancies. it's gotta be rockin. and have proper guitar riffs and adequate tempo to drive too fast.

I threw away all the jewel cases because once you reach a certain number in the collection, the amount of space they consume in the apartment is too great. i don't think i'm a real collector of music per se, not like that guy rob gordon from the nick hornby book high fidelity. i'm sort of more a collector of my favorites. i haven't got too many, around 500 or so.

so i threw away all the jewel cases and kept just the disc and the insert booklet. i even threw away the crates that were holding them. they landed with a satisfying crash into the dumpster!

so here's the best part of this post (it's good of you to keep reading this far).
my desert island discs !
(i've changed the rules, and i can bring as many as i want; they're in no particular order.)

the clash, foo fighters, and bouncing souls their complete sets. Oasis, blur, U2, pete yorn, the replacements, millencolin, butch walker and the marvelous 3: complete sets for everyone.

I would like to bring the metallica black album, Appetite for destruction, the bravery, and hot fuss. I would like to bring With Teeth, franz ferdinand and my mary chapin carpenter discs. i would also like to bring some sheryl crow. i would like a greatest hits album from: Aerosmith (just the columbia years please) the rolling stones, led zeppelin, elvis costello and garth brooks.

i would also like to have an unlimited power supply to listen to them and i would like the option to get replacements if they wear out. this is only today's desert island discs, it may change tomorrow, with the exception of the complete sets. those are the constants.