Dear 33⅓ RPM,
I have been unfaithful. I flirted with, and repeatedly succumbed to, the seductive ease of your younger, cloud-bound siblings. They stream in an instant and never hold a grudge when I change positions mid-song. Yet, they are plagued by intrusive ads—most egregiously, that youngest sibling of yours, Spotify. To hell with those hollow, open relationships. I am ready to settle down and commit to you.
I long for the thrill of the hunt—swiping through Discogs like a dating app or sweating in the claustrophobic aisles of cramped record shops, surrounded by the low, competitive chatter of fellow scavengers. I long for the mystery of blind dates in Plattenläden in Hamburg, leaving with unexpected gems—secondhand records carrying the ghosted memories of their exes, like a former lover’s name penned in faded ink across the jacket corner. These grooved time capsules double as perfect pillow-talk fodder, like my most expensive lover: an original pressing of Passenger’s All the Little Lights.
I long to caress and sprawl out your unadulterated gatefolds, transforming my living room floor into a private art gallery. I crave tracing heavy printed artwork like fresh tattoos on bare skin, feeling the matte texture beneath my fingertips. I pull out thick lyric inserts, studying and voicing the words like sacred incantations. I even admit to using AI to decode the alien Japanese characters on imported obi strips, desperate to unlock your every last secret.
I long for the ritual—a meticulous foreplay preceding the first note. Unlike the passive algorithmic feeds of your siblings, your experience demands a tactile choreography. It begins with the rhythmic fingering of row after row of album jackets, searching the body of my collection for a record that mirrors an intended passion—be it the hardcore brevity of garage punk or the gentle romantic build-up of Gino Paoli’s Italian sighs. I massage the jacket while it rests like a hip bone in my hands, inhaling its faint scent of aging paper. There is a breathless anxiety to sliding the 180-gram circular slab of wax from its inner sleeve, praying my fingernails leave no permanent scars on its delicate skin. Balancing the vinyl masterfully by its outer edges, I brush away any faint veils of dust and slide it down the spindle. I gently lower the diamond stylus into the outer grooves, turn the knob to 33, and wait. First comes a faint crackle, then pure bliss capped by a shared climax. At the end, I physically flip your body over to Side B just to finish what we started.
I long for the sound—the rich, raw, and uncompressed moaning. Your digital siblings crush the music’s peaks and valleys, compressing it into loud, impotent digital files. They get away with murder! With you, every instrument is afforded its own spatial landscape to breathe. A saxophone and a xylophone stand fully distinct—like searing chili and coconut in the same broth—in a musical array that unfolds in an uninterrupted sequence as originally intended. It is a purist’s wet dream. And what about your other suitors—the DJs? They prefer it rough—pure kink. They scratch while I savour.
You entice me into endless costume changes—succumbing to the temptation of translucent coloured wax, cosmic splatters, and picture discs that look as scandalous as they sound. Ours will never be a marriage of convenience, but rather one of devotion. I will shield you from dust storms—tucking you away in archival sleeves to serve as armor against ring wear. And when you’re jittery—clinging tightly to your inner sleeve until a sharp static snap—I will simply renew my marriage vows, thoroughly wet-cleaning you to tame the electrostatic tension before it swallows our love whole. Even when you grow old and wobble, rhythmically bobbing up and down like a ship riding gentle swells—whether caused by summer heatwaves or a lazy former lover—my devotion will endure, ensuring that the stiff carbon-fiber tonearm remains locked in your curvy grooves, thereby preventing a premature ending.
Sometimes, I long for occasional 45 RPM flings—quick, intense romantic sprints far removed from our long, deliberate encounters. And 78 RPM? A total drama queen: a tempestuous lover from my grandfather’s youth, a reckless 10-inch storm that spins far too fast, demands specialized attention, and threatens to break my heart—and itself—at every turn if I so much as dare direct my gaze back to you.
The financial toll of our romance is undeniable—a beautiful financial ruin. The cost of our first date alone, from buying sturdy shelves to serve as your reinforced bed, was extortionate and indulgent. Yet I pay the price for this privilege without a shred of regret. As the old adage goes, love is blind—and perhaps willfully deaf to flaws. I don’t mind your physical limitations: your soft, inaudible nature and desperate need for preamps; the engineering compromises that tame the wildest, deepest basslines so the needle won’t jump out of your grooves before climax; or the way you tire near the center spindle, fighting inner-groove distortion as the music tightens and strains in its final moan. Those surface imperfections, pops, and crackles aren’t noise—they are merely the snores and racing heartbeat of a needy lover who is beautifully, humanly flawed.
Even when the final notes fade and the stylus spirals into the dead wax of the run-out groove, I linger, tracing the secret messages and master numbers etched into your dark margins. Every encounter is a welcome seduction that demands submission but guarantees pleasure. You spin slow, but you hold me longer.
Yours in the groove,
John