The spring thaw is upon Shepherdstown and I am in the mood for new music.
As I reach for the door, I peer out at my muddy truck and ponder a path that will leave my shoes the least filthy. I am ready to seek sound.
My search knows no particular criteria, only the usual benchmarks: meaningful lyrics, plenty of gorgeous beats, and no gratuitous vibratory high notes strung out to demonstrate that you have obviously had vocal training — which pretty much rules out any current live versions of the Star-Spangled Banner. (Does anyone remember when you could sing along with the national anthem?)
These are not constrictive conditions, merely principles. But the principles of buying music are not the dilemma. They have been hashed out over the many years of playing, listening to, and living with music. The nub of my quandary is that I have no idea where I am going. A record store?  The electronics store for XM or satellite? The pawnshop for some vinyl or cassettes? Or am I going into to town to a friend’s who has a wireless hookup? Should I bring cash, credit or am I off to sail the seas of music piracy, a modern day Captain Black plundering the catalogues of artists on the new online waves, using Limewire to ward off the scurvy. Maybe I am Abbey Hoffman bucking the establishment, protesting the record industry man by downloading only the unsigned on the net. Or perhaps I am a modern day Bryon, satiating my lust for uprising by joining the MySpace revolution. Confused, I say aloud an affirmation and I am reminded of Descartes: Ipod therefore I am.
The truck starts, which is a blessed omen lately, and I am off.  I do not make it very far when I take a lead from Hey! WAYLT (pronounced WALT) and decide to ask someone to recommend some new music. On my way I stop by Grapes and Grains to pick up some exotic beer for the headphone session later, and to share some of my original music, which I have downloaded onto my Ipod, with a friend. Just like that my search for new music ends. There amidst the fine alcoholic wares is another town composer with CD in hand. As the CD passes between us she says,” you can check me out on MySpace and let me know what you think.”  I nod my head confidently, yet inside I know I am out of the loop. I have never MySpaced anyone. Undaunted, I press on realizing just how innocent I have become in a world I used to know so much about. Like Dylan “I was so much older then, I‘m younger than that now.”
I would like to say that I went immediately home, got online and sipped a brew, but the truth is I drove to Borders and bought two CD’s, a music rag, two Biscuit Books, and a fancy—named cup of coffee without the jet-thrusted lactose injections. If you have not noticed,  let me be the first to tell you that the record store as an entity that sells only music does not exist near Shepherdstown. We are not alone. Even the famed Tower Records closed their doors recently.
My Borders experience is as close to the record store environment that I remember, yet it is still miles away from the ideal record store portrayed in the movie High Fidelity. One look at the receipt and I become less skeptical about pirating music. Have we not been pirated by the record industry since the introduction of CD to the marketplace? I have always resented the spike in price from vinyl to CD and “the how much will they pay for it attitude” of the record industry. Just desserts is what I would call today’s online music sharing. And for those who say, “What about the artists?” I distinctly remember Tom Petty on the cover of Rolling Stone in the early eighties standing up for fans. His crusade to keep record prices low fell deaf on the ears of musicians and their labels. Too many artists have been complacent on the topic of gouging fans. Only Neil Young was brave enough to challenge the notion that the CD was superior in audio quality when the truth was, and is, they were cheaper to make, and easier to fleece fans for a few extra fins. The notion that CD’s last forever should always be accompanied by the disclaimer: as long as you never touch the under side and forever handle them like your finicky cousin who only touches his CD’s by the edges using the fleshy part of his thumb and the upper most part of his middle finger. Necessity is the mother of invention, and what a mother the internet has been to the invention of creative music distribution.

A couple of days pass and I grow tired of the new Jaco Pastorious re-release I bought and I rediscover the black CD with silver squares given to me earlier at the Grapes and Grains. Inscribed on the up-side in cursive and in silver ink are the words Caitlin featuring Collin Rocker –Euphoria- 11-4-06. I remember her suggestion that I check out her MySpace page and I proceed. The result: Let’s just say I have my new music but I no longer have my innocence. I may never buy music again. As I write, there are over a million bands on MySpace trading songs, getting heard, and making friends. MySpace —it may well the new final frontier.