Even though I've got 'em backed up digitally, it's hard to let 'em go.

So…the real CD pain begins today.

After some thinking, I’ve decided to give up my CDs – alphabetically, a couple o’ letters per month.

The A’s seem easy. There aren’t too many of them – but believe me, I’ve already sorted out the B’s and C’s – much, much more dramatic.

Looking at these makes me think about the “collection” mentality I have with music – once I own one CD from a band, I tend to want to collect all their work if I like it.

Years ago, when mp3’s came on the scene, I made a bold prediction that this would bring the music labels back to the good old days where they’d have more one hit wonders – that, without the need to check out the rest of the album/cd, music fans would only purchase that one song they’d heard…that they already loved. Even though, at that time, I never could’ve predicted what iTunes would bring to the party, turns out I was kind of right.

For every Lady Gaga or Justin Bieber (ugh!) – there’s a TON of artists who show up on iTunes top tunes, only to fall a week later…and never be heard from again.

It’s a shame in some ways, I think this (at times) makes it harder to appreciate the full range of an artist…but, in the interest of not sounding like the cranky old man telling the kids to get off my lawn…I’ll let it pass.

Goodbye CDs that are from artists that start with “A.” I’m glad I listened to ALL of you.