I have a subscription to eMusic.com. It is one of the best ways for me to keep up on certain artists and dig into the oddest of oddities (they also happen to have a KILLER world music selection in addition to blues and jazz). Interestingly, I’ve downloaded hundreds of albums in the years I’ve been a member; there was no better way to peruse the entire Zappa catalog- it has since been removed. However, now that I’ve downloaded these albums I find myself with 50 GB of music on an external hard drive and 15+ GB on my laptop.

After leaving for the most recent I Heart Lung tour I backed up everything to my iPod and deleted the entire iTunes library on my MacBook. Then, one by one, I added albums (not individual songs) back on based on how much I really listen to them, their relative value to each other and their place within the context of all the other albums. I tried 20 albums, then 30 and then decided on 3GB which is one fifth my old allowance. There were some tough choices and I’m POSITIVE this list will change soon but here’s my Desert Island With A MacBook List:

Alan Braxe- The Upper Cuts
AZITA- Life on the Fly
Badun- Badun
The Beach Boys- Pet Sounds
Big Star- Radio City
Big Star- #1 Record
Bill Evans- Sunday At The Village Vanguard
Bill Evans- Waltz For Debby
Brian Blade- Brian Blade Fellowship
Brian Blade Fellowship- Perceptual
Brian Eno & Harold Budd- Ambient 2 The Plateaux Of Mirror
Cassandra Wilson- New Moon Daughter
Chris Whitley- Hotel Vast Horizon
Chris Whitley- Soft Dangerous Shores
Devo- Duty Now For The Future
Digable Planets- Blowout Comb
Ensemble Ambrosius- The Zappa Album
Fennesz- Venice
Fleetwood Mac- Rumours
Frank Zappa- The Grand Wazoo
Frank Zappa- One Size Fits All
Genesis- Selling England By The Pound
Glenn Gould- A State Of Wonder [Disc 2]
Joni Mitchell- Hejira
Joni Mitchell- The Hissing Of Summer Lawns
Larry Young- Of Love And Peace
Led Zeppelin- Led Zeppelin III
Omid- Beneath The Surface
Pat Metheny- Bright Size Life
Paul McCartney- Ram
Sam Yahel Trio- Truth And Beauty
Soul-Junk- 1957
Squarepusher- Hard Normal Daddy
Steely Dan- Citizen Steely Dan
Steve Reich- Music For 18 Musicians
Strategy- Future Rock
Tahiti 80- Fosbury
Tahiti 80- Wallpaper for the Soul
Talk Talk- Laughing Stock
Talk Talk- Spirit of Eden
Thelonious Monk- Monk Alone
Van Morrison- Moondance
Van Morrison- Tupelo Honey
The Who- Who’s Next
Yes- Fragile

*All tracks encoded at 192kps
*Full albums only
*Currently at 3.09 GB

Yes, I know I’m missing some big records: A Love Supreme, Second Edition/Metal Box, (turn it over), etc. I’m working on it! I also ended up getting rid of all my playlists. Now I just use the CoverFlow feature and flip through the albums by cover and search. This is a much more pleasurable aesthetic than my previous “each playlist is an album” method.

Oh, I just realized I need to get that Siah & Yeshua Da PoED 12″ in there somehow too.