Phonographies

Abstract

It's Beginning to Feel Like . . .Prolegomena Beginnings and introductions are occasions for sonic events or apparitions-and song intros are no exception: the soft, mid-tempo, yet insistent drum-machine rumblings and water tap sounds of Mtume's ''Juicy Fruit'' that prolong the wait for the grand entrance of the bass, especially in the extended twelve-inch version; the lengthy cinematic string section of Phantom/Ghost's ''Perfect Lovers (Unperfect Love Mix)''; the looped invocations of ''love ya babe'' in conjunction with the crisp, syncopated snare drums and sampled bird sounds that introduce Aaliyah's ''One in a Million.''I could continue this list indefinitely, but I trust that you get the picture, or the sound as it were, of the allurements that lurk in the crevices of sonic beginnings, those sonorous marks that launch new worlds, holding out pleasures to come while also tendering futurity as such in their grooves.My all-time favorite in this category is Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes' ''Wake Up Everybody,'' which gently burrows into the tympanum with its harp swooshes, a tambourine, and two different piano motifs, to then guide us into the pièce de resistance: a very subtle bass solo that never reappears in the duration of this 7:33-minute masterpiece.These fifteen seconds invite repetition by virtue of denying the listener recurrence and as a result haunt and shadow the remainder of the track, compelling him/her to return the needle to the first grooves of the record, rewind the tape,

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