Domo arogato, Mr. Roboteaux.
The theme of this week’s episode of Rick Pecoraro Talks to Himself, where I have the honor of being musical director, is digital clutter.
I'll admit I wasn't especially inspired when Rick told me about this one. Digital clutter just isn’t something I think about these days. Way back in the '00s, I had tens of thousands of mp3s and countless jpgs—and my backup habits were borderline negligent. Now, everything is in the cloud or available via streaming, and you don't have to keep things organized—the services are searchable, the backup systems basically automated. You don’t have to sort your (virtual) records like Rob Gordon in High Fidelity ("What is this, though, chronological?" “Nope... Autobiographical.”) because they’re all searchable. Our digital lives may be cluttered, but there’s a helpful librarian named Google to help us find everything.
Also: I wasn’t quite sure how this translated to music.
So like I said: I wasn’t inspired. But then I hit on the idea of songs by (and for) digital beings: songs by (and for) robots and computers. It ended up being pretty fun, and prog-y as all get out. I hope you enjoy.
The conversation also inspired me to explore my own trove of digital clutter, where I found these two ultra-grainy, horribly lit, totally wonderful photos taken the night my wife and I first met. No algorithm would know what these mean to me, or how to find them in a pinch; I had to dig them out myself. It turns out Rick was right: our battle against digital clutter still matters.
Don't go looking for the Velvet Spade, either.
Listen to the full show:
Rick Pecoraro Talks to Himself airs Thursdays at 2pm Eastern (1pm Nashville time). You can listen live over the airwaves on 101.5 FM, or stream it at wxnafm.org.