Archaelogy
Yesterday I was thinking about Chris Hornbostel and his unique ability.The stories he writes about regional/ignored/forgotten bands and/or musicians are tremendous. Getting a new story from him in my in-box is an appointment moment. He's changed how I listen to music.
Chris, in many ways, is a musical archaeologist, looking at ancient ruins and extracting meaning.
What's amazing about music, though, is that the past is still brand new.
Even today, if you want, you can listen to Please Please Me, the first album of The Beatles, originally released over fifty years ago. It's readily available in many formats, and if you have enough money, you could even buy the album and listen to it on a record player, which would reproduce the original sound almost exactly.
What if you could go to the Egyptian pyramids to study them, but instead of crumbling, they were still as new as the day they were completed? You could walk through them alone, seeing the majesty all around you, seeing them in their pristine form.
Three thousand years from now, people will still be able to listen to The Beatles, and the albums will sound just as good and as clear as they ever did. Almost nothing else--buildings, governments, languages--will still exist from this era, but music will.
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