It’s the time of year for saving money!
About six months ago I had a minor disaster. I heard a moderately loud “thump” that I didn’t think much about, since I do live in the city of Denver, where random thumps often occur. A couple of days later I discovered the source of that thump – three racks of DVDs located in my downstairs storage closet had fallen over, scattering about 700 DVDs all over the floor. I righted the shelves, and repopulated them haphazardly, knowing that the re-alphabetization would require at least an hour that I didn’t have. That was six months ago. I still haven’t reorganized those DVDs.
Why?
Because I simply do not watch movies multiple times as I do with music…
I know my publisher, Jerry Del Colliano has all his movies transferred to a server, so he can access them quickly and easily, and I have done the same thing with a good portion of my CD collection before I placed them all in boxes for deep storage. But even if I had a media center that could support a library of DVDs and Blu Rays, I don’t think I would bother to rip them into it. I much prefer to watch “fresh” media when I have to devote all my attention to a screen or monitor.
This is not to say there aren’t some movies that I have watched multiple times over many years, but they are no movies that I’ve seen as many times as I’ve heard my favorite musical tracks…not even close…
I tried, back in the 1990’s, to be a cinephile. I failed. I had a discrete five-channel system and while even back then it saw far more two-channel music than movies…especially when I had access to a Meridian front end with its ambisonic decoding, which on some music can sound more detailed and involving than the original two-channel mix.
Nowadays I’ll admit that even though I have a Sony projector with a big screen and a very nice 65″ direct view monitor, I do most of my movie watching on my 27″ Samsung monitor attached to my Mac Pro desktop. The sound from my desktop system is as high-quality as what I get from any of my room-based systems, and with instant access to Hulu, Netflix, and other video sources, I’m rarely at a loss for content.
The funny thing is since switching from Direct TV subscription to over-the-air and Internet content I consume the same amount of video, but I do it in different ways. Instead of a watching a program on a weekly basis I often wait and watch several episodes in a row, or with some movies and series I wait until well after initial release, because there is no earthly reason why I must see anything (except news) when it is fresh and newly-released.
Now I consume movies and video on my own time and schedule.
Also, these days I find far fewer movies that I consider “must see.” Remakes of movies that weren’t that good in their former incarnations are not likely to spike my interest in their latest and usually more spectacular versions. This has, a couple of times, made my contributions to conversations about the best new movies at a cocktail party non-existent; but I’ve found those times ideal for taking bathroom breaks…
And while new movies may not be high on my must-see lists, I still comb through the new releases each week on both Tidal and Qobuz. And even though I do qualify as a social-security card-carrying old fart, I listen to almost everything for at least five seconds (often that’s all it takes to discover that a track is not my cup of tea) and usually come away with at least a dozen new tracks each week that I will add to playlists for future enjoyment. I usually follow-up on singles I like by listening to the album it came from – and end up adding a couple of albums as well.
But just like when I was young, some things have not changed one iota – Theodore Sturgeon’s law still applies to all new creative output – 95% of it is garbage. And while what you and I consider as disposable hopefully-never-to-be-heard/seen-again dreck may differ on specifics, the percentages are probably similar…
Bad music and bad movies have always been with us and always will be large part of what we humans produce…
But no matter how bad I may find a large percentage of the latest movies or pop music tracks to be, the good stuff is as fabulous as any of “the good stuff” from the past. That is what keeps me going…
So, the next time we meet, if you want to talk about new music, I’m all ears. But if you want to talk about new movies, I’ll be looking for the men’s room…
There’s a TV in the upper corner of the mens room showing Snakes On A Plane and Cowboys And Aliens back to back!
Are you going to stay and watch them?
Looked up Sturgeon the other day – it’s 90% (I was thinking it was 80%, but apparently not). And I was applying it to music. Most new music bores me nowadays, by the way, so:
You do music, I do movies, same things except I do the opposite… I’ll only watch movies and tv on a big screen with the whole a/v rig going, and music often gets relegated to the crappy speaker in my computer and if I find something I like, I might buy the cd and listen to it on my old portable cd player… eventually if it’s really special it will make it to the a/v rig, but usually it’s too busy playing movies and tv.
I often, by the way, run into the best “new” (to me) music from some of the movies I watch, end credit (rock/pop/folk/etc) music as often as not. A few clinkers here and there though. (And Grim, regarding soundtrack music of the nature you are referring to, a lot of it is worthy of a really good sound system…)
My latest end credits find, by the way, was Susanne Sundfor’s Ten Love Songs album, courtesy of the track Fade Away. That’s gotten a lot of play for some reason, and that’s something I rarely do anymore.
Good to know I can bring up some new music I’m finding the next time I see you. But there is something about bad movies not present in bad music. I’m still game to watch Fire Maidens from Outer Space, Planet 9 from Outer Space and The Beast of Yucca Flats just because they are so bad its comical. Bad music I just turn off.
My tolerance level is rather low for bad movies these days. So many good movies to watch yet, and only so much time, I’d rather spend it on the better ones. (And I have a threshold for bad video or audio for older movies that makes me move on to the next one. Bad acting is another factor that can sometimes turn me away.) That said, I’m sure a number of my “good” movies would be considered junk by some/many.
I find a lot of humor in bad movies and audio journalism. So many similarities.
In a way, it’s a good thing I can only afford one system for both music (two-channel plus sub) and movies (multi-channel plus sub) because both appeal to me – although not in equal quantities. I watch whatever I watch (DVDs, streaming from various sources and TV from satellite and OTA), and I listen to music in the evening after watching, during which, if I’m in the mood, reading with music as background or just music. Using only one or the other sources makes no sense to me. When I was growing up you had to make a choice – either TV or “hifi” – not necessary now and I wouldn’t have it any other way.