I hear the sound of music … but the keyboard's different - music on the World Wide Web - includes related guide to 15 Web sites on music

Do you know where you were when you first heard "Sexual Healing"? And does that ditty to this day, instantaneously, magically transport you back end time--back, say, to that first romance, to a night filled with a sweet tension that appear to beed to ratchet up higher and higher, or to the cafe where it all ferocious apart amid bitterness, recrimination and lacerating words?

Pity time to come generations then, for their initial exposing to a song is likely to take place while sitting in brow of a computer screen, fondling a gnawing akin to, but less appealing than, Minnie.

The brave fresh cyberworld is rapidly shedding the simulacrum of print, plunging all of us headlong toward a world where machines are like our children: not single are they inscrutable and recalcitrant; they also talk back to us! We're not quite there however but we are certainly at the point where we can snatch a lay its singer's World Wide Web page, and a entertainer of Web pages established by means of the singer's obsessed fans virtually without of the ether.

for a like reason get used to music via modem divas upon demand, techno music by techno means, the spirit in the machine and rap upon line rather than up against your head. In addition, gain used to the prefix "cyber-." Whether cyberrhythm, cyberblues, cybersoul, cyberrock or cyberfunk, the Internet lays without a smorgasbord of musical genres--one that will arouse, satiate and then arouse again any music junkie's jones

Imagine, R&B fans, downloading and listening to the oppressive sounds of Anita Baker or the soundtrack lyrics to burst diva Whitney Houston's The Preacher's Wife. Now stop imagining and hasp yourself up. All you ne to accomplish these mundane tasks is a hundr bucks' worth of computer accessories: Speakers, a entire card and software enable you to download and play audio files from the Internet. Not sole is acquiring the sounds easy--and a useful way of expanding your musical horizons without the outlay of purchasing a sampler of compact discs (which, of course, you can also do upon line)--it's by far the least interesting aspect of music in cyberspace.

The real cutting side to cybermusic is the fans' obsessions, which are now played without in public. Take, for a unostentatious example, Rachel's tattoo: ribbon lettering proclaiming "Whitney Houston Forever." A "self-admitted Whitney addict," Rachel is a computer combination of parts to form a wholes engineering student from Canada and the demiurge of the Whitney Houston Worship Webpage (http / /www.uoguelph.ca/~redecoste). Her page abounds with Whitneymania: A picture gallery, facts and statistics, a hagiography, audio and video, lyrics, a discography and fan cudgel notes all testify to a passionate embrace of a distant idol, to a distraction that surpasses understanding.

The page draws, upon average, 3,000 hits daily. (Between November 29 and December 1 1996 as the movie The Preacher's Wife [starring Houston and Denzel Washington] was released, the Whitney Houston Worship Webpage reached a milestone: 11281 hits.) For die-hard Whitney fans, Rachel's Web site contains software that will change their Windows95 startup and shutdown shields to pictures of the recording artist-actress.

Rachel (with her 11281 friends) is not alone. The Internet is rife with fans' tributes to their favorite musical artists, many of which have a short shelf life. "Mariah Carey is my inspiration," proclaims Danny van Oosterbosch "I can't imagine life without her. Her music gives me puissance and pleasure in life. This page is my tribute to her and to her fans." The inspiration may bear up under but the page doesn't: http://www.geocities.com/ Broadway has ceased to exist.

A prediction: Before drawn out we will be thrust into another round of years of religious wars -- this individual in cyberspace, where the best will be overwhelmed by the agency of the sheer number of clamoring idols and the worst will be replete of passionate intensity for the individual true goddess. Note, for instance, the web site devot to "Miss Diana Ross" (http:/ /www.ccn.cs.dal.ca/~ag249/ rosshtml) Repeat after me the liturgy therein proclaimed: "Diana Ros is the ultimate superstar. She has more charisma in her little finger than Whitney has in her entire body" (Know, too, brothers and sisters, that the day-star was in Aries and the satellite in Capricorn when we first were graced with the baby Diana's nearness on Earth.)

The nameless and unobtrusive worshipper who created the Sade Web Tribute underscored the distance separating the enthusiast from the idol, implicitly reminding mortals that we are all unworthy: "It's called unofficial, because maybe the lady doesn't know it exists, and I am just another fan." It's almost certain that the lady doesn't know that this abode of worship exists: http://awaland.com/Sade has disappeared from the trap another victim of the ephemeral nature of the Web world.

Ritual sacrifices are somewhat difficult upon line, as are votive offerings. In their place, the goddess's worshippers at this site got to promised for their favorite Sade carol and album. (If only we could promised for our favorite commandments: Thou shalt not drive whilst talking upon a cellular phone. Thou shalt not aim after the remote control. Thou shalt get back my calls.)