Saved from Science

Quarter after six.

Six hours ago I listened to another CD by Herb Alpert, and really loved “You Are My Life.” It is so late Sixties, with the big string orchestra, the old Fender bass with flat wounds, and the full chamber ambiance. Alpert’s voice was pretty good, though he was a better trumpet player than a singer. They also do a version of a Bossa Nova called “Anna” that people might recognize, and a sweet song titled “Good Morning, Mr Sunshine,” a quick paced little waltz. It’s always a pleasure to hear real musicians on real instruments as opposed to the synthetic crap we’re stuck with today. I guess I’m just an antiquarian, maybe an old fogy or a sentimentalist some of the time. The progress of technology usually has pitfalls for our ecological wellbeing. It seems desirable to regress to a more primitive state in order to save ourselves from science… I have to take out the trash this morning, then go to the store. I’ve got a meeting with Rebecca at nine o’clock. I just deleted the email with the news from my inbox without reading it. The clouds outside are tinged with magenta as the sun slowly comes up. Aesop gives me the eye and settles down again. 

Advertisement

Telepathy

Five twenty.

I awoke at four o’clock and knew I was done sleeping for the night, so I got up and listened to Herb Alpert. I noticed that the bass, an old Fender with flat wound strings, sounded close to an acoustic upright bass, but then I heard the frets. The tone was incredible and the player was very good. He was very loud in the mix for the first three tracks, which I liked. The album is called Warm, and the Tijuana Brass recorded it after they re banded around 1970. All of the instruments are real, nothing is synthetic, and that means the musicians had to work much harder. Alpert actually sings on two songs: “Without Her” and “To Wait for Love.” Usually he plays trumpet, feeling every beat, every note that goes by…

I must be a weirdo, having music playing in my head all the time like a human tape recorder. People ask me if the music I hear is at least good and not annoying, and I don’t have a good answer for them. It’s something I’ve had to live with all my life. And sometimes, wouldn’t it be nice if we really could show our “nerves in patterns on a screen” to know exactly how each other feels and thinks, to share our interior experience with the world? Maybe someday we’ll possess the technology to do that, if anyone cares to know.