The Bootleg Commute
When I started working at CNBC in the early Summer of 2019, it was the first time in over 20 years that I had needed to drive to work. A merciful upgrade from decades of struggling with the NJ Transit system in and out of Manhattan, or the loneliness of the long distance remote worker. CNBC’s about 45 minutes from where we live, and when I first started there, I experimented a bit with audiobooks. I had grand aspirations of working my way through all of the Game of Thrones books, but it never really took hold, and the first book, with its 26 CDs, still sits in the glove box of my Mini Cooper.
The best fit was silence, especially returning from work, where I could truly decompress and just take stock of what had happened over the last 8 hours. But as time went on, I wanted to listen to some music, but not the radio. I’d been ramping up a lot of my vinyl collecting over the past 2 years, and that had felt great to get back into, especially paired with going to shows again after a long time away. I’d always enjoyed finding recordings of old shows I had been to, and of course, secretly expected to be able to hear myself in the crowd. Inspired by Radiohead releasing all of their OK Computer session recordings as a way of combatting online piracy, I downloaded them all and made CDs of them to listen to in the car.
From there I began to hunt down many more shows I’d been to over the years, most of which could easily be found on YouTube, and then made CDs of them to listen to in the car on the way to and from work. I’ve really enjoyed designing the covers, just as much as listening to the recordings, and I use this page to house everything in one place.
