The Film, Avalon

If pressed to name my favorite movie of all time, I’ll either answer Rear Window, Hitchock’s 1954 suspense thriller, or Avalon, Barry Levinson’s 1990 family biopic. The latter barely registered at the box office when it was released during my final semester of college, but its absence from Best Picture contention a few months later was – in my mind – a glaring omission. I thought it was cinematic perfection, the very reason we have “the movies.” It’s also the kind of film that is no longer made. But back in 1990, Levinson, riding high after his Oscar win for Rain Main two years earlier, was largely given free rein to write and direct whatever he wished, and drawing from his own childhood, he struck gold with Avalon, a tale about the fragmentation of the family – and perhaps of society itself – after the rise of television and suburbia.

My roommate Mark and I had seen a preview for the film on TV, and we decided to devote a weekday evening to watch it at the theater near the capital in Madison, Wisconsin. The addition of a couple of young women – one of whom was transporting us to and from the movie – initiated a mild debate about which film to see: Avalon or Welcome Home, Roxy Charmichael. The latter wasn’t without merit: the poster offered an enticing Winona Ryder dressed in a hot pink dress, revealing quite a lot of leg, but cooler heads prevailed, i.e., Mark and I had made our decision and we weren’t budging, a dangerous position given the potential ridicule we might have garnered if the movie was a dud. Fortunately, by film’s end, all four of us were either suppressing tears, or – in the case of one of the women we were with – outright blubbering. It was one of those movies that struck a chord, with its themes of family, loss, and legacy.

No less important than the film itself was the haunting score by Randy Newman, which, although nominated, didn’t earn Newman his first Oscar win, however deserved (he could have just as easily won for his score for Awakenings that year, but that wasn’t nominated, and his first Academy Award win wouldn’t occur for another eleven years). The music from Avalon stayed with me for months afterward, actually waking me from dreams, all without the aid of additional viewings. I’d heard the score once, and my subconscious remembered it. It was that good. 

I didn’t see the movie again until the fall of 1992, when I recorded a VHS tape it off of cable, and I purchased the soundtrack on CD around the same time, eventually transcribing some of the themes from the score into a “piano highlights” piece that I still have. Nearly thirty years later, while shopping at a record store in Columbus, Ohio, my son came across a vinyl copy of the soundtrack, and I came to learn that Reprise Records released the record in 2020 as part of its “The Sound of Movies (…and Television!)” series, a noble endeavor for the movie/vinyl enthusiast. I now own Avalon on CD, DVD and vinyl, and the movie poster adorns my basement wall. I’ve seen in probably twenty times or so, and over the years I’ve enjoyed showing it to my children and a few friends who I felt might respond well to it.

In 2015, Levinson and Newman were interviewed about the film during its 25th anniversary, and it’s well worth a read if you’re a fan of the movie or the score, or both.

Here’s hoping the movie gets more recognition in retrospect than it did upon its release.

An Ode to Compact Discs

Just a few weeks after I touted the benefits of owning physical LPs, author and journalist Rob Sheffield writes in Rolling Stone this week about the resurgence of one of the most assailed forms of music media: the compact disc. The redheaded stepchild of music formats, Neil Young has equated listening to digitized music to sensory deprivation and torture. Ouch!

But while I’ve never understood store-bought cassettes, even back in their hey-day and especially today as they make a perplexing comeback in used record stores, I totally get why CDs are still a thing, Neil Young’s assertions aside. As Sheffield writes: “Compact discs were never about romance — they were about function.”

I and most other music connoisseurs spent years in the 2000s converting their CDs to easily stored MP3 files for use in iPods and the like, but unlike many, I stopped short of actually removing the physical products from my home. Thank goodness, because I really do like having physical CDs to play, especially when I’m driving in my Mazda, which will unfortunately likely be the last car I’ll ever own that’s equipped with a CD player. I still own the 400 or so that I amassed over the years, including my first purchases from 1986, and I still kick myself for having sold or gotten rid of around fifty CDs back in the 2000s. There’s still something alluring about playing a CD in its entirety, uninterrupted. In terms of functionality coupled with pretty damn-good quality, CDs can’t be beat.

Unless you consider streaming, which – let’s face it – wins in the functionality department and can sound pretty great if you want it to, but Sheffield echoes (and states more eloquently) some of the same arguments I made last week about streaming. He writes:

“…streaming is not a ‘place,’ but a barrage of constant options that many fans find less optimal when you’re in the mood to actually concentrate and listen. You’re probably also streaming on a device that’s nagging you about messages you need to answer right now.”

It’s the same premise that people have made all along: that there may simply be something very human about the need for tactile interaction with one’s environment, and in a culture that’s downgraded music and other media to something disposable, it’s natural that the pendulum would slowly shift toward owning physical products. CDs aren’t perfect, but they at least include liner notes and cover art. As if that’s not enough enticement, I saw scores of them at a used furniture sale last week for 25 cents apiece!

And for all you vinyl purists who lean toward environmental causes, Sheffield notes that for all the hubbub people threw at record companies for housing CDs in grotesque longboxes back in the 80s and 90s, “…the tables have turned – now if you buy an LP online, it’s shipped in a package that’s basically six longboxes.” 

Well played.

For those who aren’t familiar with Sheffield, he’s a hell of a writer, and among music geeks is revered alongside other venerated music-themed artists such as author Nick Hornby (High Fidelity) and filmmaker John Carney (Once, Begin Again, Sing Street). Sheffield resonates to a certain type of person: often male, semi music-obsessed, a bit insecure, and one who occasionally likes to bathe luxuriously in his own heartache. His books Love is a Mix Tape, Talking to Girls about Duran Duran, and Turn Around Bright Eyes are mainstays for many music nerds. I highly recommend each of them.

Is Collecting Vinyl Pretentious?

Last week Katie Edwards of the Independent had a little fun with a provocative essay on how pointless ownings records is. She writes from the viewpoint of a fed-up wife whose vinyl-collecting husband has taken over a third of her dining room. To which I say, “Hey, at least it’s not half.”

But seriously, I think Edwards was writing partly for the thrill of poking the bear, knowing that geeky audiophiles would blow a gasket, because midway through her essay she actually answers her own question of why people purchase vinyl. She writes, “Perhaps it’s the experience of vinyl that’s the clincher? The same way I like to hold a physical copy of a book and turn actual pages rather than read an electronic version.”

I can’t speak for all vinyl collectors, but for me, that’s it, exactly. I’ve never bought into the claim that vinyl sounds better than other formats. I’ve also never owned records that I’m reluctant to play – as Edwards’s husband apparently is – for fear that they’ll get damaged. And I don’t eschew streaming music; according to Spotify, I streamed over 139 hours of music in 2021, 55% more than the average Spotify listener.

But streaming doesn’t just make music portable, it also makes it disposable. I’ve invested nothing into downloading the latest Sammy Rae EP (but you should do so – she’s amazing!). Not money. Not time. Not changing the dial on the radio. Worse, I don’t know who plays on her album, who produced it, where it was recorded or who wrote the songs. Her songs exist in the ether, as if they just appeared one day through no effort of gifted musicians. Vinyl and other physical formats force the listener to reckon with the music, to establish a relationship with it, and to devote physical space to it.

Katie Edwards concedes all of this, but then wonders if the real reason people buy vinyl is to flaunt their tastes over those whose musical knowledge they consider pedestrian. Edwards writes, “Having a showy collection of vinyl – that owners have to pull out and parade in front of uninterested guests stifling yawns – is a display of pretentiousness that turns me right off.”  She also writes, “ I just can’t be bothered with the inevitable scoffing by self-described music buffs who consider themselves authorities on taste just because they’ve got a couple of obscure LPs.”

Okay, I cry bullshit here. If she actually has friends who’ve scoffed at her musical tastes, then she needs to find new friends. More likely, I think Edwards is writing to provocate (as she apparently did me!). Either that or she’s projecting her own insecurities on her music-loving friends, the same way any insecure person might do to describe any other human endeavor.

For example, I have a friend who has a very impressive wine cellar in his basement and likes to present good bottles of wine for gatherings. I don’t really know anything about wine except that I like to drink it. Now, I could be intimidated by this and accuse my friend of arrogance, but really – I just think it’s cool. He’s into something I’m not into. I have no aspirations of becoming a wine aficionado, but I’m glad he is, and I’m happy to ask a few questions so that he can share his enthusiasm with me. The next time he comes over to my house, I will have no problems opening up a $12 bottle of cabernet. I don’t think he’ll judge me for it. I think he’ll ask for a glass.

Similarly, Edwards should have no problem streaming the Heart song “Alone” for her friends, as she claims she’s reluctant to do. If they truly look down on her as a result, then shame on them.

But methinks she doth protest too much. She must know that “Alone” blows.

Ha, I actually like that song. Two can play this provocation game!

What we keep. What we discard.

It’s been a while, but I’ll start knocking out blogs on a more regular basis in the months ahead. There are a lot of things percolating in my head that need an outlet, and one just came to light this morning as I read two articles in The New York Times about collecting – or discarding – stuff. 

I’ve written about this topic before. In fact, one of my first blogs (July of 2010!) was about my “saver” father and my “discarder” mom, and how these two diametrically opposed characteristics shaped me into the person I am today. Since the pandemic started nearly two years ago, there have been many articles written about decluttering and how it can improve people’s lives. After all, clutter has been shown to increase anxiety, put strain on familial relationships, affect sleeping habits, ruin household incomes, and the like. But discarding possessions also carries an emotional burden. My father and my wife’s mother are both contending with discarding in fairly short order that which they spent a lifetime accumulating, and it can be an overwhelming process: it’s hard to know where to begin, hard to know how to part with something that you feel defines you or is a part of the grand narrative of your life’s story, and on a more practical level, it’s not often apparent what to actually do with the stuff one’s chosen to discard. Who’ll take the collection of fishing lures? The seashells? The artwork? The National Geographic magazines? Should you just throw them out? You can’t, can you? After all the care you’ve given these objects for so many years?

Sadly, a dumpster or recycling bin is where a lot of our stuff will go – whether it’s before we die or after – and I imagine that this realization gives us visceral feeling of our own mortality, recognition that all that we’ve accumulated will be gone when we are gone, that most of what we leave behind is people’s memories of our existence, and that in a generation or two, even that will be gone. We will have never existed.

Weighty stuff!

But dang, I love that collectors exist. I need then to exist, even if it means that they lead stressful lives because of it. I love that the pandemic inspired Iowan barber Brian Hogan to build a video rental store in his basement! I love that there are record stores and vintage clothing stores, and that my friend has a collection of tickets stubs and signed programs and photos of the concerts he’s attended over the decades. I love that another friend of mine recently purchased an antique Coke vending machine to accompany his jukebox of 45 rpm records. I love that I have a program, pennant and tickets stubs from the 1957 World Series hanging on my wall. I love that my paternal grandfather saved so much stuff that I could practically write a novel about his live in the 1920s. I had to discard much of what he saved, but I kept enough. Enough to have an idea of what his life was like, what he was like.

In 2012, I quoted Rabbi W. Gunther Plaut about how views on possessions change over time, and what was once cherished garners nothing more but indifference later in life.  This is likely the natural order of things. 

I’m not quite there yet. The pandemic forced me to go through some items, and while I was happy to discard clothing, storage bins, framed artwork and old furniture, the stuff I’m keeping – the record albums, the photographs, books, letters, memories of my children – this stuff I’m holding onto with gusto. This stuff is a manifestation of who I am. My kids may hate me for it. Their kids may one day hate me for it.  But for now these possessions still define me. There may be a day when that changes, when I can freely discard what I own without – as Rabbi Plaut wrote – an ounce of regret. But if my father is any indication, that ain’t gonna happen!

And I may one day take a cue from Brian Hogan and open a record rental store in my basement.

Using a Password Manager

Keeping track of logins had become a source of stress and frustration for me years ago, but since I’m a glutton for punishment, I did nothing to change the situation: I kept a six-page list of usernames and passwords that I’d printed from an Excel spreadsheet (deleting the file, of course) and on which I had scribbled in a multitude of additional logins over the past several years. Goodness, I had a lot of passwords to keep track of.

But no more! I finally bit the bullet and subscribed to a password manager – Bitwarden in my case – and after a day of figuring things out and entering all of my information, I’m happy to say that I am positively giddy about my decision.

I’m no expert, so I encourage you to read more on-line, but in a nutshell a password manager keeps track of all of your logins, allowing you to change passwords quickly and safely (and to ones that are more challenging to hack into).  All you have to remember is one master password to log into your manager.  That’s it. If all goes according to plan, I will remember just one password for the rest of my life. This will no doubt come in mighty handy as I age, as there have already been times at Target when I froze because I couldn’t immediately recall my 4-digit PIN.

If the thought of having one service storing all of your data scares you, you are a wise person!  Read on.

It was tricky to know which password manager to use; I spent hours going down the rabbit hole of professional reviews, user reviews, ratings, features and costs, and it quickly became overwhelming. Ultimately, I decided to go with the one CNET described as the best free password manager – Bitwarden.  I have no problem paying for a service, and I may eventually upgrade to one of Bitwarden’s premium subscriptions, but I figured I had nothing to lose by just trying out the software and seeing what it’s all about.

I set up my account and immediately didn’t know what I was looking at. YouTube to the rescue! I don’t know the guy’s name who posted the following videos for the Password Bits channel, but his instructions were impeccable:

Bitwarden Beginners Guide https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30QqIeb1Pu4
Using Bitwarden on Android https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nyqxR20I1NY

I followed these instructions almost to a “T”, deleting my saved passwords on Google, as well as my stored credit card information, and proceeding from there. I first got everything working seamlessly on my desktop and then set things up on my mobile device. Things don’t run quite as smoothly on my Android – I often have to do an extra click or two, and occasionally have to copy and paste a password – but it still works quit well, and I can open Bitwarden with my fingerprint. I suspect I’ll eventually get a finger scanner for my desktop so that I don’t have to use my master password on that either. (But keep in mind that if you NEVER have to enter your master password, you will likely forget your master password. This could come back to haunt you.)

Speaking of master passwords, if you lose yours you are screwed. Seriously. Your password manager will not be able to get it for you. Because of this, I have a copy of mine saved in my safe deposit box just in case. You could also ask a friend or loved one to keep a copy for you someplace safe. As for the rest of my passwords, for now I still have the six-page sheet in my house, but as I start to change passwords to safer word/number/character combinations, that sheet will become obsolete and shredded.

As for the legitimate safety concern of storing all of your passwords in one place, I encourage you to read this article and several others to help guide you to a decision that’s right  for you. 

ALSO, keep in mind something called the Double Blind Password Strategy.  This is a fantastic idea, and one that will ensure that your most sensitive login information – perhaps for banking, investments, email and social media – are never breached, even in the unlikely event that someone manages to access your password manager account. I will be utilizing this strategy once I get everything set up and synched with my wife’s account.

With Bitwarden, you can share logins with your partner for free, or with your family for a very reasonable fee.  So once I get my spouse set up, we will have shared access to some of our common logins, like travel and shopping websites.

If you’ve been on the fence about using a password manager, I strongly encourage you to hop off and give one a try.  It sure beats the alternative stress-inducing password management system: one’s brain.