I grew up in a time when phones were attached to the wall and not to us.
When something called a “card catalog” was an essential research tool.
And when the best way to learn the lyrics to your favorite song was to go to the drug store and buy the monthly magazine that listed all the song lyrics.

Not that this was necessary for ALL songs. You could pretty much figure out the lyrics to “53 Miles West of Venus.”

But for some songs you definitely needed the lyric magazines. Because the lyrics may not be on the record, and probably wouldn’t be on the cassette. And in those innocent days in which we didn’t yet do ourselves a favor by unplugging the jukebox—and we certainly didn’t hang the deejay—the guy behind the turntables didn’t know them either.

Of course it’s a lot different today. The phone, no longer attached to the wall, displays lyrics from websites such as Genius, music streaming services such as Spotify, and lyric videos posted on sites such as YouTube.

But is information easier to find today?
Only that information that can be digitized.
If it isn’t easily digitized, then it is lost…like the analog imperfections from a “33.” (A vinyl record.)
