There are a few notable changes in downtown Amherst. For one, something new has opened in the former For the Record site (above). It is the newly expanded Souper restaurant which used to be located in a closet like space a few doors down.
I'm a soup fan, but I'm also a music fan, so I hate the way the internet is systematically driving the traditional record store out of business. While I love the infinite selection online, I fear the day is fast approaching when the idle flipping through the music selection in a retail setting will have become a thing of the past. The internet is great if you know what you're looking for, but without record stores, how will we be exposed to what's new or what we never knew we liked before someone turned us on to it in a record store?
The Internet: A great creator and a terrible destroyer.
Also new in downtown Amherst is this cool mural that was painted next to the Saint Brigid Roman Catholic Church, on the Food for Thought bookstore building.
It's certainly very colorful, some of it is even psychedelic.
I like this depiction of an alien visitation.
Unfortunately, this being Amherst, some political correctness had to intrude on the otherwise innocent art. Here an evil eagle dressed in corporate attire sucker punches Lady Justice.
In case you didn't get the blatant anti-American message, a nearby image of a computer spells it out for you. (click to enlarge)
Why do so many things in Amherst have to become a means for spreading Leftist propaganda? Fortunately, some of the artists who worked on the mural wrote personal, non-political messages.
In any case, here is the sign identifying the culprits - I mean contributors, behind the mural.
3 comments:
I understand your sentiments about the local record store. It is a shame to see them all going away. But like everything else that evolves, how we access music has, in my opinion taken a giant leap forward for both artists and listeners alike.
I have found that using itunes music store has made it a lot easier to hear snipits of songs I would never have listened to or been exposed to in the traditional record/cd store setting.
Tom,
There was nothing like killing an hour or so in a record store just browsing. Sure stuff is usually cheaper on line, books too, but record and bookstores provided something to do on lazy days didn't it? Life these days, surfing the net for stuff just isn't the same. Plus we're losing our small businesses and the thing that used to make small New England college towns interesting places.
Flying the American flag upside down is an accepted way of sending a distress signal—like dialing 911, or sending up a flare into the midnight sky; usually reserved, however, for military personnel about to be—or perhaps already—overrun by the enemy.
So I guess we’re even: I find that display on a downtown Amherst building…distressing.
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