“I can still remember the feeling of holding that very first Beatles album in my hands. I was holding a piece, a real tangible piece, of the soul of the band that changed the world.”
“The first record I bought was Meet The Beatles. It was an immediate next-day follow-up to watching The Beatles on Ed Sullivan in 1964; I felt with every ounce of my 12-year-old being that my life had just been changed forever! I knew what I was going to do for the rest of my life, play music for people. Help people feel alive and vibrant!
The energy around this synthesis of musical traditions brought forth by the four Liverpool chaps was transcendent for me. I was no longer an adolescent school boy from New Jersey, I saw myself in a new light—I was someone who could change the world with my music!
From that day on, it was not about celebrity or fame, it was about making people feel. It was about creating something that was so alive that it also made others feel it. It was about helping myself and others rise above the mundane; above the everyday grind and get in contact with the kind of joy that I felt emanating from the grooves.
When I would put my vinyl records on the record player and hear the needle scratch in anticipation I felt I was entering into an alternate universe of promise and joy. The vinyl discs became my friends. They were always there, always tangible symbols of this other world of possibility. I will never forget my first encounter with my first record. To have been initiated as a record collector at this moment in history was a life-altering experience that will always be in my memory bank.
I think that records, albums, vinyl has a way to capture our imagination and serve as a link between the listener and the performer that is tangible and concrete. Their larger album sleeves and covers were works of art. I felt cheated when I bought my first CD, “Is that really it, this little metal disc?” No grooves, no solidity, and the connection to the artist became much less real to me. It seemed simply to be a commercial product.
My experience with vinyl is still one of fond memories. I wore my first record out! I played it so much that a year later, I had to go buy another copy. I am glad vinyl is making a resurgence…”
—Walter Trout
