The Joys of iTunes

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There’s nothing like a broadband wireless connection and a laptop to fully explore the beauty of Apple’s online iTunes store. At quarter of eight in the morning, ensconced in the third floor room of the Wilmington/Newark Days Inn (you know where it is, just across the street from the mall, next to the Hilton, and in between Chili’s, Applebee’s and Michael’s) I find myself downloading an album that has been out of print since before my oldest brother was born.

Yes friends, I am listening to the sublime oratory of William Shatner’s debut album, “The Transformed Man.” For a mere $6 I downloaded the entire album to appreciate for myself what it was that Ben Folds heard when he agreed to produce Bill’s sophomore effort, “Has Been,” an album that easily made my Top 10 list for 2004. Sure, Tori Amos and David Bowie may have declined Bill’s invitation to appear on the album with him, but Henry Rollins understood what it was all about, an average guy unafraid to share his dreams and fears with the world.

Yes, there are perhaps far better tracks and musicians to discover through iTunes, but for a mere $6 I can download an album that I have never once seen in years of poking through stacks of dusty LP’s at flea markets and thrift stores.

Now if they’ll only carry Leonard Nimoy’s spectacular album “Mr. Spocks Sings the Songs of Space.”

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