FROM COOL TO BALLS

This is probably going to sound like an advert. But don't hate me, I'm not sponsored by Logitech! I have just bought a Bluetooth speaker.

My new speaker looks like a small blue ball. It's called a Wonderboom 4 and I bought it to play random MP3's from a playlist of 500 tracks I've now loaded onto my cell phone.

Make no mistake, for over 25 years I've been saying cell phones suck, and refusing to even use one. I can honestly say, this is the first time I've ever had the thought "Maybe those mind control devices can be useful". They can in fact be quite decent MP3 players.

I suspect 90% of my half dozen regular readers will now start wondering if I'm Amish or something, but back in 2002 I made a conscious decision to avoid using phones and have never previously used one for playing music.

I've switched to the dark side because I'm currently painting the house and having some music pumping out from a portable sound system comprising of just a small indestructible speaker and an old cell phone, is the perfect technology for the job.

I borrowed one of these trendy little Boom speakers and tried it out before buying one myself. I was initially fairly skeptical because I thought a speaker that small would be a gutless little toy with a tinny sound and a lame bass output.

But after hearing one I had to eat my words, it's actually a grunty little bugger with a surprising impressive sound. In fact it really can kick some arse, and I've been rocking out to some 90's house music in the back garden.

 It's tough as well, both shockproof and waterproof. I've rapidly warmed to it and now I think my new stereo, which is actually only a mono, is really pretty cool. And it also runs for 13 hours on a charge, which is better than my power tools.

Initially I planned to treat it like a power tool, and if it got paint and dirt on it, too bad, but I must admit after deciding I quite like it, now I'm keeping it in a zip lock bad while painting so it doesn't get all abused looking.

I'm not very happy about radiating myself with Bluetooth EMF's, but for a work tool, not having an audio cable is actually really handy. 

And then I got to reminiscing. Back in the 80's everyone aspired to own a huge and expensive high tech stereo. I still have mine, and every once in a while I get out my record of Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon" and listen to sonic perfection through my Rega Planar turntable, Yamaha amp, and Goodmans speakers the size of small refrigerators.

Back in the day, music equipment was big, impressive, and stylish. These days I'm using a set up that looks more like a Nee Doh ball in a plastic bag, lying beside a cell phone. It's cheap, efficient, and bomb proof, but I don't quite know what to make of all this rapid change...