Hello There Everybody!
The two threads on the Main Topic page regarding the band Thinking Plague - had me give a quite modern day pleasant listen to In Extremis and Decline and Fall.
Typical listening session here at the Buckley Place... a buzz, popcorn and a flavored seltzer, and a couple hours of absolute listening bliss.
Something(s) in a way of thought - occurred to me this evening. First, what a wonderful last 50 years of recorded music that appeals to me. Second, I personally started 'serious' listening around 1970 or so. I stated the second, just as a means for the reader to make perspective.
As much as I have thoroughly enjoyed Thinking Plague .... and all their releases, I just don't think I listened to or absorbed the mentioned two releases in the same perhaps complete way as I may have the releases from my youth and earlier on. Don't get me wrong, I absorbed what I listened to quite well with TP indeed but I sense that 'something is missing'.
Here's what I came up with. I think this may lead to interesting discussion. And certainly.... let's talk about what may be going on overall.
I'm going to use Mr. Jean Luc Ponty in example. Here's a kid in 1975 or so, a kid playing quite well in some school and local Orchestras, and had cut some 'listening teeth' with any and everything I could find on a transistor radio. All of a sudden this Ponty musician somewhere crosses my listening. WOW!
I was hooked big time! hooked enough in whatever year my memory serves, to find out everything I possibly could about the artist Ponty. Same happened with Jethro Tull, Pink Floyd, Genesis, Return to Forever .... and a host of usual and perhaps not usual suspects. Somewhere in this time era I had also begun assembling decent quality stereo equipment. Once in place, whenever that was and with whatever JLPonty releases were available, I wanted each release on vinyl going backwards. I found out about his association with Frank Zappa ( that was a gift in itself) I went to record stores and looked at the covers front and back. I learned absolutely everything I could about the musicians, the cover art...and eventually the music itself. At that point, again whenever that was - I went right along with Ponty and each of his releases, had the great opportunity to see him and band live several times over the years, and peaked out at one of his live performances in Cleveland Ohio where I met the man and thanked him for his music contribution.
Alright! Back to Thinking Plague...and Thinking Buckley
As much as I think Thinking Plague is also a TOP TIER band, satisfying one of my musical interests, and agreeing with Mr. Scrotum S., in my adult life I have never quite adequately absorbed everything about TP the artist..... Never mirroring those same way of relaxed exposure and discovery like those years ago. There plain and simple has not been enough time around my OTHER interests - and perhaps a worse problem...
Too Much Good Music - I'll NEVER get to it all. Nor especially in the same way again!
It has effected my overall full enjoyment of the current era(s) music.
Chris Buckley
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