I must admit, getting shot of the spaghetti like mass of dusty plugs, leads and cables was a joy. Losing the stack and speakers seemed to make the lounge 25% bigger too.
Once upon a time, back in the days when whores were
almost as cheap as chips and a piece of fish was substantial, there was an era when wires were never an issue. The ‘stereo’ was the only thing in the living room with wires, except a small box-like thing (known as a ‘television’) sitting on the sideboard or in a corner somewhere. The kitchen had an electric kettle and the bedroom maybe had an electric blanket or one of those ridiculous contraptions known as a teasmaid which was supposed to make a cup of tea and didn’t.
Computers were the size of a large room and only existed in special industrial installations. They were surrounded by large spinning wheels of magnetic tape and machines that spewed out miles and miles of ticker tape.
No-one ever really thought about wires.
My old man’s ‘stereo’ was an enormous cabinet of polished wood. No-one was allowed to touch it. One side, when the lid was lifted, housed the gramaphone. Alongside it was an area not to place the sleeve of the record being played (that would go on one’s lap to be admired) but two spools, each about 9” wide, to make recordings. The 12”s were housed in an attractive compartmentalised cupboard in the lower section and in the middle section were some large knobs to switch the thing on and control the sophisticated refinements of bass, treble and balance, plus a couple of knobs for the radio receiver. A feint glow indicated the vast array of ‘valves’ inside which processed the signal from the gramaphone miraculously into sound.
Even when I took possession of ‘separates’, no one ever thought about wires. Electrostatics, shimmering golden surfaces and slightly curved, were the most beautiful piece of furniture imaginable. I’m sure they were each connected with a ‘wire’ — but such things were a small detail, noticed only in the initial layout of the room. None of my friends owned or wanted to own a mind-numbing ‘television set’.
Tape recorders were replaced by cassettes. These were kind of cool. You could make one to impress a girl, or take it travelling with a pocket cassette player. The sound was pretty shit but that wasn’t the point. Then came CDs. Now ‘music’ was disorganised: vinyl, cassettes, and CDs. Tape made a come back somewhere in a variety of competing systems for recording awful tv programmes and later I think as a substitute for people who couldn’t leave their homes to go to the cinema.
Fortunately live bands were still cheap. Concerts like ‘Glastonbury’ were FREE ffs!!
Suddenly everyone had to have a computer. And things to plug into it. And a mobile phone. And plugs for that too. A massive industry arose in bits of wire. The bits of wire were now expensive, all with different types and combinations of plugs on the ends. And stereos to connect. And things to charge or connect the phone and somebody else’s phone. And systems to arrange all the wires. And a box for all the fucking useless ones in case they came in handy. Mostly they wouldn’t get used as everything had built-senescence. You couldn’t just change a valve or repair it. You had to change the fucking lot.
And it would need new wires!!Somewhere, I had an acoustic guitar. No electric. No wires. I could play it a bit. Friends would come over. Some played quite well. No background hum. No wires. Just the dynamic peace of human relationships.
