you've pretty much answered the question yourself. Time was I'd sit poring over album sleeves / liner notes / lyric sheets until an LP was indelibly stamped on the bit of the brain that deals with music. CD's couldn't recreate that, even with the onset of that symptom of middle age, the 'reading glasses'. Digital files have got no chance; a) they don't have sleeve notes, and b) I'm sure I'm not alone in tending to listen to stuff while otherwise distracted on here. Tsk, kids these days, etc etc...

I've thought about this myself a lot recently.

Obviously, as a kid you spend hours listening to new albums over and over again. I knew all the lyrics, who composed each track, who played specific instruments, the lot.

Now, I rarely know the names of tracks, either.

Part of that comes from listening to music on the move and the curse of the shuffle functionality, the other part of it comes from not having as much time as I had when I was a kid.

The only press on my time was homework and that was it. I could hide from my parents in my room and lie on the bed with the sleevenotes in hand, listening to the album and nothing else.

inlay CD booklet these days, even if I do have 'em. Half of them are designed by sadists.

Similarly it used to be that

1. I knew what tune followed what so as soon as I heard one end I automatically expected the other to start

2. I used to ration the times I played a new album per day in order to ensure I didnt get sick of it too quickly

No chance of that now!

I recognise the symptoms - it's surely got to do with the demise of the album sleeve. The CD booklet just does not have the same pull.

From Greetings thru Tunnel of Love I could have relayed the songs in order

Things changed a bit with CDs - getting the bloody booklets out for a start, and I have so many broken plastic cases that fall in two when you pick them up as well.

The teenager at home doesn't know song titles either though, and in fact when we last moved house she chucked out all the cd cases and kept only the discs !

And I was amused to hear daughter and friend discussing dancing to the song called "I got chills" (meaning You're the one that I want)

I still prefer CD's to downloading though, refusing to break that link with "ownership" and the fact that once on laptop or IPOD stuff just seems to disappear amongst the thousands of other tracks

in the distance at the end of I Feel Fine is still there on the remaster. It's one of those accidental essentials, like the version of Buddy Holly's True Love Ways were Norman Petty asks if everyone is ready, Buddy clears his throat, and a brief count-in... Hauntingly beautiful.

Yep, I can identify with lying on the bed with an album and headphones on after school, pretending to revise for my O-levels.

During that period, 1979-1894 (2nd year to 6th form at grammar school) I learned the track lists and lyrics to inter alia every AC/DC, Black Sabbath, Ted Nugent, Saxon, Iron Maiden and Deep Purple song. I used to write down lists of all my favourite bands and their members. This was serious anoraky stuff but it was just the sort of education this boy needed to prepare himself for life at university and beyond.

And I agree it was probably because of the magic surrounding a new LP with sleeve notes and all, and being into every aspect of one's favourite bands. Not sure the i-Tunes kids reap the same benefits or have the same detailed knowledge as the LP generation.

with everything you all say. It's actually quite comforting to know that its a combination of technology and age issues rather than just me getting lazy or senile...........now, can one of you guys point me towards the way out of here please....

Agree that move to CDs then downloads has made a difference, but could it also be that as we get older we don't think it so important to know every detail of an album ..... just listen and let the tracks we like sink in. Maybe there's only room for so much detail in our brains, and we've used much of it up by the time we hit our 30s.

most of my listening has been 'on the move' - whether in a gym, walking dogs or driving to work therefore the names of tracks and familiarity with (actual) lyrics is scarce.
The only cd I've gone out of my way to find out more about for a while now was the Decemberists' Hazards of Love.

Each album was eagerly awaited because (I know this is received wisdom and has been covered in the Podcast) there is just so much more music around now.

The release of an album by one's favourite bands was an event because it didn't happen every week, and probably buying it made a relatively large hole/dent in your earnings.

The effort that went into sleeve art and liner notes probably now goes into videos and promotion.

When people make threads like this, it makes me happy.

So many of my favourite albums have ben released in the last ten years.

And I couldn't tell you the names of the tracks on them.

It feels so, so wrong.

If I bumped into the lads from Midlake down the pub, told them that the Trials Of Van Occupanther is a work of genius and then tried to expand on it..

Is it because I can afford to buy much more music now? Is it maturity and the passing of the years?

I'm going to listen to some Steely Dan just to let me know that, at least, I know a little of my favourite music.

I can still picture my record collection when I was 14 or 15 : I knew every note, crackle, skip of all of them. (I still own most of that set).

I was without a record deck for about 5 years, until about a year ago. I kept all my vinyl, but I had lent my deck to my father-in-law because his had packed in and I pretty just got by without a deck : CDs & iTunes were the substitute.

When I finally organised a working record deck, I put on Electric Ladyland to see how the deck sounded. When the slight crackle and surface noise started, it was a Proustian moment - I was transported back because I knew the surface noise on my copy as well as I knew the songs.

I had a lot more time when I was 14, and listened more intently to a much much smaller collection. Now, even recent albums I really like rarely stick as thoroughly, whether it's the Hold Steady or Mulatu Astatke, or Midlake. I think it is partly (as suggested by others above) I am doing other things when listening to music, less absorbed in it.

Would I rather have a handful of treasured albums that I know every hiss of ? Or loads and loads of albums that I am vaguely familiar with ?

Ideally I'd like to be best friends with all of them - there's not enough time.

If I listened to just what's in iTunes, there's 124 days of solid listening. WAAAAY too much, obviously.

I'll try to make more time to let new favourites become as firmly established as the Old Guard.

of tracks and even books seem less relevant as I get older and older.

As it happens for financial reasons I have hardly bought a new album this year, the only one really being Running For The Drum by Buffy Sainte-Marie. Boy have I enjoyed this CD. With so little new music I have got acquainted with it like I haven't done for decades. OK I still listen to lots of other music from the past but this has been a very refreshing experience.

Next, Cottonwood Farm by Jimmy Webb & the Webb Brothers.