Well the universe is shaped exactly like the earth (or thoughts on mix cds)

I remember the fall I was 15 begging my mom to buy a new computer (given how reliant everyone in my family now is on the internet/their own computer it seriously astounds me that all through high school we had one computer for the whole house) that would be compatible with an external cd burner so that I could start making mix cds. A friend had recently shown me Napster and I was so excited about the idea of getting songs on Napster and then using them as tracks on a mix cd. After getting tired of my pestering her, my mom did buy a new computer, I put Napster on it (and proceeded to download Bon Jovi's Always and listen to it over and over - I swear, even then, my music taste was better than that but I still do like that song), got a cd burner, and began making mix cds. A tradition that continued until very recently.

Before I ever made mix cds, I was really into making mix tapes. In the late 1990s, the height of my mix tape making, the process of making a mix tape involved multiple steps. I used the stereo in our dining room (which we still have although rarely use now) to tape songs off of the radio on a blank tape, tape songs from cds onto a blank tape, and tape songs from other tapes onto a blank tape. It took some time (especially timing it right so as to be able to tape songs off the radio) but it was worth it. It was also so fun! I always loved choosing songs and trying to figure out the order I wanted the songs to play in. Plus, the cool thing about mix tapes were that they had two sides. I made a lot of mix tapes for friends and they always liked them. I remember one friend telling me that her older sister listened to the mix tape while she painted their living room and I felt so cool that a cool older sister liked the tape I made.

By the year 2000, I had made the transition to making mix cds with my shiny external cd burner. I made mix cds for friends on a regular basis through the rest of high school, university and after that. I loved making them and some friends very kindly said I had a talent for doing so :) Further proof (not to brag these compliments/stories just make me smile) is that I made a cd for my brother once and his then girlfriend (now wife) L. heard it, took it, and then played it a lot at her apt and her roommates all loved it too. In the fall of 2006 I made a mix for my friend D.  who was a PhD student I knew through my friend K. in Berkeley and was that fall starting a new job as a professor at a small college in a small town in Pennsylvania. D. told me he played the mix I made him at a party he had and multiple people asked him about it. He said (and I quote) "I relished telling them, fuck off [my first name] made it for me!" :) The only person who hasn't liked a mix cd I made for them was N. (I made him one during university) mostly because he said he didn't like Ben Harper, and I had put at least one (maybe two) Ben Harper songs on the mix. To be honest, N.'s rejection of my mix cd talent still bothers me to this day. I think it's because I pride myself on having a good sense of the types of songs/music that my friends would like. I must have genuinely thought N. would like the Ben Harper song and it irks me still that he didn't! This sounds so cheesy but figuring out which songs go well together is a bit of an art form, and one which I am good at 99% (N. being the sole exception) of the time.

One of my favourite part of mix cds is writing liner notes to go along with it. The first time I distinctly remember writing liner notes (or at least calling them that - I may have included written notes with some cds I made for friends in high school but I don't think I did) was in June 2004 when I was taking a summer course at Berkeley. I made a cd for my brother and I decided to include notes explaining why I had put the songs I did. I had so much fun writing notes about the songs (sometimes I would just include little facts about the band or a little anecdote about the first time I heard it) that I have since written liner notes for every mix cd I've made since then.

Example of liner notes except mine are always handwritten 

Whenever I think about making mixes for someone, I think of that scene in High Fidelity where John Cusack's character is making a mix for this woman he just met despite having a live-in girlfriend. I remember seeing that movie as a 16 and then 17 year old and wanting a relationship like John Cusack and his girlfriend Laura (her name in the movie). Even though for most of the movie their relationship was on the rocks, there was this one scene where they were both lying in bed reading and I remember thinking "One day I would love to have a boyfriend I could lie in bed with while reading."

This is an image of the exact scene I am talking about! 

I like giving mix cds a name. Usually the title wouldn't be that exciting just "Insert first name's Mix CD!" but sometimes cds I made had names. S. once made me a cd which she called Rainy Day Mix because I was so sad about G. turning out to be such a loser. I loved the title so much that I made her a cd titled (creatively I know) Rainy Day Mix Volume II. and then a year after that I made her another one called Rainy Day/Dreaming of Spring. (I actually have all three still in playlists on my itunes and I was just listening to Volume II. and was reminded of Modest Mouse's Third Planet and how much I like that song (and that's where the title of this post comes from). S. and I also made soundtracks of our time at Berkeley in May 2006 when we graduated. We burned two copies - one for ourselves and one for the other. I still have both of them saved on my itunes to as "my name: The Berkeley Years" and "S.: The Berkeley Years." I have made for and received so many from L. over the years too, many ofwhich I have as playlists on itunes too.

Mix cds are not the same anymore today what with most people listening to music digitally and not through cds. I haven't felt the same desire to make mp3 mixes over the past few years. Even though I have had itunes since 2004, I just feel like it's been different the past few years and that almost everything is digital now. The last mix cd I made was for D. last spring. I really enjoyed making it but I haven't made any since. D. made me a mix back but he just sent it to me as mp3 files over drop box. I really liked the mix and it didn't feel any mix-like or any less special because I never held an actual cd in my hands but as I am writing this I am thinking it maybe did make me feel a bit sad there was no cd. I think how D. made my mix is the way of the future, but I'm not sure I'm ready to embrace it just yet.

This is in High Fidelity too - it's when he's testing out songs for the mix tape he's making