During my high school and college years, one of my favourite activity on my spare time was listening to the music. Listen with capital ‘L’.

I dug the songs so much, listened to every bit of snare drums, guitar riffs, and keyboard chords while reading the lyrics and other musical information that came with the record’s information sleeve. My remembering of each personnel of my favorite band, and every album they produced to date was the legacy of this hobby.

After I got married, that hobby somehow disappeared. First of all, my wife can’t stand of my type of music. Secondly, I like to hear it LOUD, through earphone or stereo seat, which make her more and more *hate* it. And lastly, all of these family and work activities force me to be more considerate with my spending of those free time. 

The only time I have great chance to listen to my kind of music is when I’m driving and working on my PC. But on those occasions, music does not appear as the “front man”, it creeps as the “background singer” of my main activity.

How I’m happy now to rediscover my hobby with my iPod. I bring it everywhere, and whenever there is free time (i.e. waiting in car wash service, or while my wife is shopping), I turn it on, and really concentrate to LISTEN to the music. It does make a lot of difference when we’re so attentive to the music we hear. I, for example, find many musical arrangements that was imperceptible for all of these years. Well, iPod sound quality does help too. 

However, at first, with this digitalization of music, I thought I was missing those cassette information sleeves. My iPod only show the album’s artwork. No lyrics, no musicians photo, no “thank you to..” lists from the musicians.

But this weekend I just realize how this hobby becomes better with help of my PDA. Connected wirelessly, now I’m not only able to read the lyrics, but also to seek for album’s reviews, artist’s interview and their latest pictures which are posted everywhere in the web.

I start to mine for my favorite musicians’–who mostly was “old-time rocker” who had seen their glory days past them, latest information. I realized that Eddie Van Halen (my “past-time idol”) is a normal father like me; I learned about the meaning of “concept album” in progressive rock; I discovered why Metallica’s sound was so powerful in their ‘Black’ album, and many more. Just “Google” your artist name + information that you’re looking for (e.g. interviews, reviews, etc), and you will be overwhelmed with information. 

So I’m a happy man. Where have I been? 🙂

Credits: www.apple.com, www.google.com, www.metalreviews.com, www.progarchives.com, www.lyrics.com, www.heavylyrics.com