Inspired by True Events on Movie Screens

I am a music junkie. I want to qualify that statement because it is not a claim I want to make lightly. I’ve known and befriended many a music aficionado in my day, but I doubt very few would consider listening to music as an addiction. They probably consider it just a pleasant way to pass the time or to enhance his/her enjoyment of life. However, I show all the signs of obsessive behavior. The advent of digital downloading has only compounded this compulsion. I am constantly looking for new music, adding to my collection, and expanding my exposure to new sounds. When I hear one album, I’m on to the next. I don’t just listen to one release. If I like what I hear, I go for the whole discography. If I really like it, then I’m onto the influences and contemporaries of that particular selection. When I’ve exhausted that, I’m on to the next thing and the cycle starts all over again.

I had a buddy in college who understood this addiction more than any one else I’ve ever met. You see, he was also afflicted. We spent many an hour in long conversation regarding the topic of music appreciation, and while our tastes often differed, we both had a mutual respect for each other’s passion. However, there was always a friendly difference of opinion on how one should store his/her music collection. This difference of opinion was known as the “Crate vs. Rack” debate.

My buddy Nate had a lot of CDs. I mean A LOT of CDs. He stored these CDs in a number of plastic milk crates. In order to find a CD to listen to, one would have to sort through all of the crates until that individual found the desired selection in which he/she wanted to hear. Personally, I found this to be a huge pain. Nate, however, loved the randomness of it all. Instead of searching for a particular CD, he would think “Hmmm, what should I listen to?” and then dig around until something struck his fancy. Kind of like a physical disc “shuffle.” Or to paraphrase Forrest Gump, “life is like a crate of CDs, you’ll never know what you’ll find…”

Now, a system like that (if you want to call it a “system”) would drive me completely nuts. I’m the kind of guy who has to have a specified order and know exactly where things are when I need them. If my brain all of a sudden gets a hankering for “Strokin’” by Clarence Carter, I don’t want to have to spend a half hour digging through CD crates. I want to go to my rack, find the letter “C” and then pull out the disc in question. Yes, I put my CDs in alphabetical order, then chronological by release date. I know that according to High Fidelity that cataloguing in this fashion is extremely amateur, but again, I want to know exactly where things are when I need to find them. Sure, I miss out on being able to roll my eyes in snobbish exasperation when I explain that my albums are placed in the order of the studio name in which they were respectively recorded starting with Abbey Road, but really, I’d take convenience over that rarely-occurring pleasure of elitism any day.

So which way is better? It is all subjective, I guess. Neither Nate nor I ever came to a conclusion of our debate, but we could both recognize the merits of both. I supposed with the advent of the iPod and the digital music revolution that the point has finally been rendered mute out of obsoletion, however, I would still like to hear everyone’s opinion. So sound off. Which is better: the “crate” or the “rack”?