Against CDs

Below are some lines that I drew. Inhale them deeply, because the rest of this entry will be just plain text without images: for it is a scientific paper that I wrote in order to prove that CDs are worthless.

Against CDs

In the beginning, all music was stored on analog cassette tapes. Then, for my sweet sixteenth birthday, CDs were invented. (The acronym “CD” stands for “compact disc.”) This invention initiated the downfall of our economy.

Fools claim that CDs are superior to cassettes because of the clarity of their sound. But I am the first true scientist in history to prove that tape hiss is not a sonic deficiency: it is sound PERFECTED.

§ 1

All of the finest fast-food franchises purposely boost the background sizzling noise in their television ads for fried eggs. Would you like to listen to eggs on a compact disc? In that case, you might as well just vacate your home planet and move to a satellite and hire some astronauts to cook your breakfast in total silence; because sound itself is banned from outer space: it was deemed too risqué for our puritanical deity. What I am trying to say is that listening to CDs is like scrambling eggs with a vacuum.

§ 2

Now plug your nose and take a sip of the choicest tequila: you don’t taste a thing! (This, by the way, is the reason that swimmers wear nose plugs: water worshipers frown on public drunkenness – and, just for the record, true science is against all religion.) That’s because taste is actually born and raised in the nostrils.

The same goes for satiety: it can only exist within warm sound; so, if your environment is acoustically restrictive (like that of CDs), then, although you might be able to taste your cuisine, it will not be possible to enjoy it: for it is cold and bland – and no nutriment thusly muted can sate the human frame.

(Recap)

Since CDs lack atmosphere, they are deprived of good taste; and therefore, in the world of compact discs, no matter how much food you eat, you always remain hungry. Life becomes hell, and you dine alone at the moon base.

But do analog cassette tapes possess any flaws at all?

No. When the delicate tape unravels from the interior spools of a cassette, you can use a regular pencil to wind it back up; because the mouth of each spool is bedecked with several milk teeth, which love to bite things.

Even if the tape gets crinkled, the music corresponding to the damaged part of the tape will sound distorted – this, too, is an asset; not a drawback. Here is why:

§ 3

CDs become scratched the very first time you handle them, and these scratches result in the skipping of the music’s rhythm – entire portions of the song become nonexistent, thus making the track undanceable: the maracas jolt from the groove, and time is lost: it’s like your memory is being sporadically erased! This racket is not fun to nod your head to, and no swaying helps.

However, when we maltreated our analog cassette for the purpose of this experiment, its tape only got a little bit crinkled, remember? Let’s play it now, to see how its contents fared:

Ah, it sounds like the band is performing live at Noah’s flood! The instrumentation is momentarily muffled, while the water level rises over each player’s head. Meanwhile, the gurgling of our damaged tape simulates the musicians’ notes with a degree of soft accuracy, and no rhythm is lost! . . . Soon the waters subside, and the band emerges triumphant: just as the Kraken rises up out of the ocean to vanquish Heaven’s Tyrant.

§ 4

And what exactly is so compact about these discs? They don’t fit in a skirt pocket. They don’t fit in a glove box. There are no hinges upon them, so they do not fold up. And I’ve never been able to secure a CD inside of a fortune cookie.

We can therefore conclude that if you arrange an assortment of contraband atop a disc as if it’s a serving plate, and offer it for sale at a discount to an undercover policewoman, you should not expect the courts to dismiss your crime on account of the fact that the evidence is “just too small.”

§ 5

As I said before, I use cassettes to mark my place in the books that I’m reading. This lets the juices of each book’s poetry intermix with the aromas of each cassette’s music, like savors of beef and potatoes inside of a crockpot.

But if you ever use a CD for a bookmark, then say goodbye to all of your precious songs; because a sublime poem will leave more dents and scratches on the surface of a disc than grizzly bears can inflict on a first-rate salmon. (I assume that bears hunt salmon by constantly jabbing the water with their claws, thus leaving slash marks all over the fish’s body.)

§ 6

Let’s say that you have dedicated a room of your house to pleasure. Fine paintings cover the walls, and there are comfortable couches, low chairs, and soft carpet. This is a place where you and your friends can lounge: a peaceful sanctum. You can shave each other’s chest, and change each other’s pain patches.

But now imagine that the aforesaid refuge suddenly becomes transformed into a hospital room. All of the same pictures are on the walls; yet the furniture is gone, and there is harsh lighting and totally subpar acoustics – everything is tiled white and sanitized. This new environment is exactly like CD sound. Hang up paintings in a morgue to make a museum.

SUMMATION

All genuine science abjures this age’s penchant for crystal clarity. We have proven that a modicum of obscurity acts as salt to enhance the flavor of any artwork. And by “flavor” we mean “personality.”

It’s the fault of compact discs that our time is so boringly quantized. None but vipers adore the certainty of math and logic: the true saviors of humanity prefer souls who act according to their passions.

Organization spoils impulses: it is better to have spontaneous, one-on-one arguments (which conclude quickly because tempers soon subside) rather than all of this glacial, systematized warfare produced by CDs.

CONCLUSION

Sweethearts no longer know how to feign attraction for one another. When the movie director says “Kiss,” the players freeze: they won’t proceed until they have been informed of the act’s duration, their precise motivation, and exactly how much lip-pressure to employ. Lovemaking recorded on CD arouses only robots.

Audience Q&A

I have time for just one question from the studio audience. All right: Someone has requested to know my opinion about the use of records and computer files as music storage alternatives.

Despite the fact that they are round like CDs, records are tolerable, because they’re made from vinyl: thus they can be melted down and shaped into boots, some of which are even thigh-high. Also platinum or gold records can be made into buttons and snaps for rubberwear.

Computer files, on the other hand, are the most disgusting things on the face of the world.

P.S.

Today I saw a gas-powered leaf blower abandoned in a parking lot, and its engine was still running. The thing had been left to lie there all alone and growl one angry note forever.