Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
::Today's soundtrack: The Beatles "Because" ::
In this day and age, the one of the latest and greatest advances available for mass consumption is the ability to download media right to your home computer. Just about everyone has a computer these days and what could be more convenient than standing in a line than to get the latest song or television program at the touch of a button? So simple and painless. Not to mention clean. Virtually no waste product is generated such as plastic bags and paper receipts like a conventional transaction. Yes, sir, the wave of the future.
The thing that troubles me the most about this all digital hardcopy-less society is…. Well, let me put it to you like this. Look below.
Yep, that’s the Beatles Abbey Road album right there. Also:
Oh hello there, Metallica’s “Black” album! And
Greetings to you, Nirvana’s Nevermind!
Do you see where I’m going with this? I’m a little bit of an artist and it troubles me that in this download your music age that the art of the album cover will be forever lost in the shuffle. The above three record sleeves are famous. They are instantly recognizable to practically everyone. How many times has that Abbey Road image been parodied, copied, or paid homage to? It has permeated our pop culture, that image has. Now, though? How long until the industry decides to cut its losses and strictly sell mp3s online? And then decide to not even cut whole albums anymore? Will the music industry decide the way to keep up with the downloadable age is to record “singles” only and sell them each by each? So long to the potentially iconic images of album covers that could have been!
Don’t get me wrong, I download music, too. It’s convenient and fast and it lets me “test drive” new artists without having to spend 15 USD or more on an album to do it. But you see, I don’t just compile a playlist with my songs, I’m into compiling them into an album of sorts, cover art included. It is very rare that I will burn music to a CD with only a hand scrawled track list to go with it. No, I’m going to get a series of complimentary images, colour schemes and fonts and put together the whole package deal. I even use fancy paper for these things. Sure, I’m something of an artisty-type, and you may think that this is just another art project of mine. It’s not just that. I like to treat my music with respect. I make some art like looks nice for it is the least I can do, plus it makes it easier to find and distinguish from all the other hundreds of CDs I own.
I’m saying that even as a fan of the digital download experience, I do think it would be a damn shame if it became an “all available by download only” medium. I love holding the album in my hot little hands of a band I really dig and taking it all in while I listen to it for the first time. Please, you’ve already declared vinyl records legally dead, don’t take CDs and cover art away from me too. That’s all I’m asking. I mean, wouldn’t it be sad if no one had ever seen this?
Keep that in mind for the future.
William the Bloody (album art aficionado)
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