There are songs I’ve been singing so long I think I actually sing them better now when I’m not thinking about what I’m singing. Roger Miller falls into that category. He was one of my favorite artists when I was a kid and I’ve likely been singing his songs since I was 6 or 7.
I was listening to him while in the car today and there were a few times I was really thinking about what note to hit next, what word came next, which phrasing he used next and I found I was second guessing myself and getting it wrong. When I would focus on something else and just sing, I hit it every time. It is funny how some things become second nature like that. His songs can really make me feel like a kid again, his music is a constant in my life and it can be one of those things that really lets me feel like me.
I still have the original vinyl records I had of his when I was a kid, but mostly I listen to cds now. Unfortunately, not everything of his has been released on CD, so I still have some vinyl that I need to find in stores and some that I need to rip to the computer. When cds were new, people used to talk about how great it’d be that nothing would ever go out of print since it was so easy to have it all digitally. Then as the internet matured, they talked about how everything would be obtainable at any time. Here we are in 2010 and there are still many albums never put on cd and many more that are out of print or completely unavailable. I’m sure some of them are available illegally, but even then not everything.