A semi common refrain I hear, myself included, is the audiophile trying to recapture the moment when the passion first struck. My moment was in the early 70’s at 11 years old or so when listening on some crappy 1960’s all in one to a couple of albums my then brother in law gave me - “Best of Cream” and “Led Zeppelin IV” were the hooks.
Four or 5 years later I experienced my first Mary Jane buzz and my music passion was fulfilled by a crappy Audiovox car system. In some way the thousands of subsequent hits were futile attempts to recapture that first buzz and I’ve been wondering recently if every listening session is an equally futile attempt at recapturing those earliest moments.
My modest system is engaging and light years ahead of what I was listening to in the 70’s but those earliest moments have yet to be matched let alone eclipsed. I hit my dead brain cell limit years ago so the quest to relive the first buzz is long dead and I’m wondering now about those earliest moments.
I can still listen to and briefly enjoy the abrasively bright car radio. My desktop system lacks a lot but sounds really good for what it is. The resolution and detail of the main system is satisfying but none of it adds up to those earliest moments.
It is said that you can’t relive your youth. In most cases I wouldn’t want to (though I would like to visit occasionally). But I sure would like to live those earliest moments.
The woman who sat on her first horse at age 5, and will never live without them. The dragracer seeking the thrill of his first 0 to 100 mph run on an empty back road. A fellow musician given a trumpet at age 10, who announced “This is me.”
I can relate to this nostalgia for the first experience, but also be so glad that music is part of my daily existence in even better sound than before.
When I first got bitten by the audio bug was when we returned from Swaziland (now Eswatini) in ‘71 and my Dad got his AR turntable/Dynaco pre, tuner and amp/EMI full range speaker system out of five years of storage while we were in Africa, and I got to play Miles Davis and Hendrix on it and got hit right in the gut with the best sound I’d heard as a teen. I did chase that sound for a while and now I have quite a bit better if fundamentally similar sound and get to enjoy that sound hours every day.
Right now Ella Fitzgerald is singing “Summertime” in East Berlin in 1967 and it sounds better than I ever dreamed I would have sound in my home. Life is grand.
I agree but have been thinking about this, more specifically the flip side. I backed into and retired from a 28.5 year career a couple of years ago that was completely unrelated to any passion but ended up being quite satisfying in most all ways.
A couple of weeks into retirement a neighbor asked if I missed it and I was somewhat surprised by my answer that is every bit as true today. Nope. Not in the least.
Though thankful for my/our good fortune along the way, I realized in that moment how blessed I had been and was. Freed from any identity, leaving it behind to do something else with no regrets was no big deal.
I have a chance to bring home the very first Receiver/turntable/pair of speakers system I ever heard. It amuses me to go back to the system that started me down this path. I was 12 when it arrived. I think I will do it but my wife will hate me for it. It is at my parents home, all I need to do if grab it.
