The Pan Galactic Playlist
Disaster Area were so loud the audience listened from a concrete bunker thirty-seven miles away. A note on music, and knowing when to turn it up.
Music is the part of the galaxy I would least like to do without. Books can wait, art can hang quietly on a wall, but music insists on being experienced in the moment, at the right volume, ideally a little louder than is strictly sensible.
The Guide, naturally, has an opinion on the upper limit.
Disaster Area were, by quite a margin, the loudest band in the history of the galaxy, and indeed of anything. Audiences listened to concerts from the safety of a concrete bunker some thirty-seven miles away. The band’s accountant was so successful that, for his tax purposes, he proved the entire fabric of the space-time continuum to be not merely curved, but totally bent.
What stays on the playlist
- Anything that earns its volume rather than just demanding it.
- The track that makes a dull commute feel briefly improbable.
- A bit of everything, since a good playlist, like a good life, refuses to pick just one genre.
You do not need a Disaster Area sun-diving spaceship finale to enjoy music properly. You just need to turn the good stuff up, and know exactly where your towel is in case it gets loud.