Friday, January 06, 2012

To Van Halen or not to Van Halen?!?!


That is the question.

It was a late Christmas gift I received when I logged onto facebook and saw an announcement from the official Van Halen website about tickets for a new tour going on sale in mid January.

Lets back this up for a moment.  Van Halen is my favorite band of all time!  In fact I pretty much dont even listen to music if its not Van Halen. I saw them twice on their last tour, and at least once on every tour since 1995. If you are keeping track, thats 5 shows, plus the Daive Lee Roth/Sammy Hagar show dubbed the Sans Halen tour.  I even once painted my computer to look like Eddie Van Halens guitar.   I should find photos of that.

But I digress

I am left with a dilemma.  When I bought my first Van Halen album back in 1991, I had two  options: Cassette or Compact Disc. Having just received a CD player for Christmas that year I opted for CD.  Come to think about it, I think I got that one through one of those Columbia house deals in a magazine. Do they still have those?   You get your first 7 CDs for a penny, then you buy 3 more at regular price, unless you sign up a friend, then you get two more at half price.  But if its a Tuesday and you are wearing green pants theres a bonus disc you get for half price if you buy two more at regular price

What can I say It was the 90s.  Thats the decade when Nirvana was popular.  A lot of bad decisions were made.

But I digress again.

Times, and technology have changed.  I honestly cannot remember the last time I actually loaded a CD into any type of device for listening purpose. Come to think of it, I dont remember the last CD I purchased in physical form!  Why? Because ever since iTunes, I can download music faster and cheaper than it would take me to drive to Wal Mart, purchase it and even if I play it in my car, let alone bring it home to play it on my Bose system.

Speaking of playing CDs in my car.  The Neil Diamond Christmas (do you get the irony?!?) album has been the only disc in  my car stereo for at least two years now.  

But I digress...  Oh you should be used to it by now.

At one point I had a shelf with every Van Halen album sitting on it in order of release date.  So aside from greatest hits compilations in which I only downloaded the newest songs,  I have the complete set.  But what’s the point of physically owning music? Will “A Different Kind Of Truth” be the first Van Halen album that wont be on my shelf not that I still have that shelf, all my CDs are in a box in a closet.  But I do like to read liner notes.

What do I do!?!?!
Please vote in my poll!




Van Halens new album A Different Kind of Truth will be released on February 7, 2012