“I grew up the youngest of 7 kids. The musical and stylistic influences were inescapable and I was driven at a young age to be taken seriously as a peer to my older siblings and their friends. With this came the need to do my homework on the movies, lingo, and music that they were into.”
“I spent a lot of time learning how to cue up vinyl copies of St. Pepper, Ghostbusters soundtrack, Billy Joel’s Piano Man, and my dad’s Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass Whipped Cream (when I was curious).
These experiences dimmed as CDs quickly became the standard for musical intake and cassettes being reserved for shared mix tapes. The boxes of records in the basement were quickly upgraded to shiny compact discs and were long forgotten and discarded.
It fell silent for some years and it wasn’t until the emergence of iTunes that I got my own record player. It was the year that everyone got iPods for Christmas, but I received a Sony turntable. I ended up finding an old Akai amplifier and no name speakers that a neighbor friend was giving away. I was set up.
The only places selling vinyl (besides my dad’s basement) in Provo at that time were Deseret Industries (like Good Will) and random pawn/ antique shops. Fortunately for me, this was prior to the college vinyl resurgence, so the local BYU students hadn’t scoured the stock regional.
I ended up sitting in the corner of Deseret Industries for hours sifting through thousands of Barbara Streisand, Kenny Rogers, and MOTAB records to find some gems. I walked away with the Beatles’ Let It Be, Rod Stewart’s Every Picture Tells a Story, Bartok’s Concerto For Orchestra, Lionel Richie self titled, and some scratched up blues record with no label that still is my favorite blues recording to date.
It’s been good to see a rise in vinyl consumption. Since studying production/ engineering, I’ve been a witness to countless debates over sound quality of digital vs. vinyl. I, however, find more of the quality of the vinyl to lie within the experience of playing it. Sitting down in a chair and listening to an album. There’s a focus and attachment to the music that doesn’t happen with Pandora in the earbuds at work.”
—Spencer Petersen
Sego’s “Long Long Way From The Fringe” EP is in stores now via Dine Alone Records.
