It is safe to say that the luster of the late-2000s to mid-2010s tech boom has faded in recent years. Google has changed its engine to cater to advertisers above the needs of its users, Amazon is valued at a level equivalent to the annual GDP of Belgium, yet they still lose my packages, and services like Airbnb and Uber have drastically ratcheted up prices to turn a profit. I like to consider myself a relative bystander to these changes. I don’t shop online very often. I am decent at circumnavigating Google, avoiding sponsored content, and not using services that charge excessive service fees. However, there is one streaming service I cannot live without: Spotify. I look forward to my Spotify Wrapped every December, consistently use my monthly 15 hours of audiobooks, and live in fear of the eventual decline of the platform.

This is why an exit strategy is necessary. If a building is burning down, you need to know how to get out of the building in question, using information that can only be learned before the fire catches. Before subscription rates are hiked and I cannot get a break from the ads, I need an exit strategy. Therefore, I will be collecting CDs to use in place of Spotify should the time come and reviewing them, and I will be doing it at HALF the monthly cost of a standardy Spotify subscription. This gives me a staggering budget of five dollars. With all said and done, I only spent four and got five CDs, four from Goodwill, one from Barnes and Noble. As a side note, the only access I have to a CD player is the one built into my car, which will provide a direct point of comparison to Spotify, which a also like to listen to while driving. I will be rating each of these albums on a one to five star rating scale: five stars being life-changing and one star being comparable to auditory assault and battery.

Track One: Dine

Dine was advertised as an experience, rather than a mere piece of music. It was a supplement to a meal, meant to heighten the experience of both eating and listening. Naturally, I listened to this piece while on my lunch break. While Chipotle was already great, Dine — which I bought for $1 at the Barnes and Noble clearance bin — in no way enhanced my experience. However, it did not actively detract from eating a beef bowl in the front seat of my car, so Dine gets three stars out of a possible five.

Track Two: Clean Pranks: The Funniest Prank Calls of All Time (Volume 1)

Clean Pranks: The Funniest Prank Calls of All Time (Volume 1) was an exercise in misery. I listened to the first two pranks, both of which were clearly staged: Roy D. Mercer’s “Barber Shop” and Junkyard Willie’s “Corrupt Admissions Director.” Both prank calls were drawn out and relied on stereotype to be funny. I did not go far enough to listen to the comedic stylings of “The Jerky Boys” or “Touch Tone Terrorists,” but I imagine that they would be more of the same. Clean Pranks: The Funniest Prank Calls of All Time (Volume 1) gets one out of five stars.

Track Three: Meditations for Peace of Mind

In the opening track of “Meditations for Peace of Mind: Relax and Appreciate Your Uniqueness” Dr. Bernie S. Siegel suggests that the listener play this tape multiple times a day. I will only do so once, meaning that my immune and endocrine systems may not receive the benefits that he aspouses. “Meditations for Peace of Mind” posits that cells can receive “live messages” through auto-hypnosis. I am not sure that guided meditation can give cells messages of life, but it was nevertheless relaxing. Unlike Dr. Siegal, I would not recommend playing this CD for people undergoing anesthesia, but it was pleasant, albeit a bit corny. I give “Meditations for Peace of Mind” four stars.

Track Four: Breathe: With Alpha Brainwave Pulses

Developed by self-described “sound healer” Jorge Alfano, “Breathe” is a four track ambient album laced with 13-8 hz “alpha brainwave pulses.” The back cover of the album suggests that “your own brainwaves ‘lock’ onto the pulses and carry you to states of renewing relaxation.” Personally speaking, the music gave me a headache and the music lacked form. Of the albums, it was far from the worst, and far from the best. But due to the aforementioned headache, “Breathe” get two out of five stars.

Track Five: Gobs of Fun

The cover of “Gobs of Fun” by Stephen Fite features Fite and two children standing next to six buckets labeled “goo.” This should have served as an indication that the titular gobs were literal, however the lyrics still came as a surprise. “They’re gobs of fun, I think I like it… I’m searching for extra gobs, especially at school…” The title of each song was accompanied by the date they were recorded. This is how I know that the recording for “What’s on the list” an RnB song about the joys of shopping came into being on September 29th, 2005; nine days before I did. Seeing as this album and I are almost exactly the same age, I feel no qualms about rating an album for children three out of five gobs on the basis of immaturity.

The single greatest takeaway I had from my musical tribulations was that while some advancements in technology do not fundamentally better things for their users, others (including music streaming services) absolutely do. It is extremely difficult to replace these services while saving money, even if you exclusively use Goodwill as your personal emcee. The argument could be made that buying physical media supports the artists, but Stephen Fite et al did not see a dime from my purchases, so the second hand market is equally detrimental to artists and first hand products are too expensive to be practical as a primary source of music. I give this experience 3.5/5 gobs.