Memories........What made you catch the Audio Bug?

Great story Slappy! And funny in a way unique to you. They ain't done made no A'GoNer like our Slappy!

But I'm a bit disappointed with how you glossed over the military aspect of your audio discovery. Two and a half years ago I can clearly remember reading a story on the CNN website how a member of Delta Force nicknamed "Slappy" had discovered a huge stash of Martin Logan, Sunfire, Krell, and Adcom equipment in an abandoned cave in Jalalabad near the Pakistan border. The article went on to say that Cuban cigars and Afghani Playgirl magazines had also been recovered and was irrefutable evidence that Osama Bin Ladin was recently using this hidden location. I could swear the guy in the photo reclining in the rattan listening chair looked a lot like our very own Slappy!

I'll vouch for Viggen's fascination with what makes the stuff work. I've learned a lot from this strange fellar. And his interest in behind the scenes and inner workings extends beyond just audio. He's put together many of the most unique and creative audio systems I've ever seen. Definitely not a conformist.

I just remembered a few other little hifi stories from my past.

I remember Indian Reservation by The Raiders [without Paul Revere] being the first 45 I ever purchsed and Edgar Winters' They Only Come Out At Night being the very first album I ever bought. I used to play Frankenstein and Free Ride on my Dad's stero while we ate dinner, and my folks digged it! I also used to listen to Space Truckin' from Deep Purples Made in Japan album [the second album I ever owned because my cousin John gave it to me] on my Dad's BSR turntable while reading some of Jack Kirbys' earliest DC Comics creations. That song was 20 minutes and 20 seconds long, and I'd listen to it on full repeat for hours on end through my Pop's headphones while enjoying those comics. I'd also listen to Richard Pryor's Craps After Hours, Cheech and Chong's Big Bamboo, and George Carlin albums throught those headphones. My parents must have been wondering why I'd be rolling on the ground laughing while listening to rock and roll.

I remember when I started college in the mid '70's and a bunch of us always car pooled. We'd drop off this one guy at his house, but one thing we always had to do before leaving for our next stop was to go inside and listen to his SONAB speakers playing just one cut from ELO's Face The Music LP. Fire On High! It was treble fascination thing.

I can also remember when I first got my driver's license in 1975 and while driving my Mom's '69 Camaro around thinking that this radio sure sucked. So I went to my local Pep Boys and bought a pair of Sparkomatic speakers which were about 3 1/2 inches in diameter. I wired them into the factory radio but didn't know anything about installing them in the doors, since cars of that era only had a single radio speaker mounted in the center of the dashboard facing up towards the windshield. I thought I was clever and placed the speakers on the floor near the kick panels and went for a drive in some winding roads around my house. As I was driving, the speaker on the floor of the passenger side rolled over and was facing down because of all the turns I was taking. Soooooo, I decided to reach all the way across the car and down to the floor of the car to readjust the positioning of the speaker WHILE I WAS DRIVING! The next thing I heard and felt was a big bang. The car had hit a row of cement parking lot stops that had been placed along the side of the road to prevent people from driving up the side of the road and go careening into expensive homes. Well, when I felt and heard the big bang, I immediately looked up and saw what had happened so I tried to steeer myself back onto the road, but I because I was fighting against the stuttering effect of the cement tracks I over compensated and ended up turning the car completely towards the other side of the road...TOWARDS A CLIFF! People always talk about time slowing down during a time of crisis, and this an event where I experienced that very phenomena. Although I was probably still traveling at 30-35mph, it seemed like the car was being slowly pushed across the street. I could also clearly see the smile/laugh of the jogger who'd stopped to witness my stupidity. All of a sudden I was jolted into reality by the sound of the car skidding to a halt. Somehow I had subconsciously managed to slam on the brakes while I was "enjoying" my surreal stroll towards death at the age of 16. You ever see how a Japanese woman in a kimono walks with her toes pointed in? Well that's exactly how the right front tire of my Mom's Camaro was until I got it over to our local Mark C Bloome a few days later for a re-alignment. With the steering wheel set straight ahead, I swear that car could make a left hand circle within 50-60 feet. Driving it to the tire the car just kept making "Urr, Urr, Urr, Urr, Urr!!!!!' Sounds. Kinda like the sound a kid makes as they skid their new basketball shoes across an indoor court, but much louder! Ever since that day, I had been enamored with the DIY aspect of car stereos and their effect on my health and safety.

During the late '70's, I discovered such great old car stereo makers like Fosgat, Zapco, Isophon and Hart. I remember Harts being the very first "separate" speaker smade for cars. They were constructed of the cheapest paper cones that would make Bose owners blush, but their instructions were fully illustrated cartoons like the R.Crumb comics of the time featuring a robe-wearing sandal flopping guy patterned after Mr. Natural who guided you through every aspect of the speaker install.

Years later, when I'd graduated college and began my first graphic design job, I had a boss who was just as much a kid at heart as me. I knew this was the right place for me to work because my job interview was on a Saturday, and all we talked about was stereos, shooting pool, cars and guns. He gave me the job right there. That first office was in the Bonaventure Hotel building in downtown Los Angeles which resembles four hotdogs pointing to the sky. When designs wer out being considered by clients we sneak out over the bridge to play Centipede or Qbert ot go to the parking garage so he could check out my latest Alpine amp. An old friend of his who happened to work for the DEA was often in that area and he'd always tell me he could get me Rolex watches and stereos really cheap. This guy was quite a character and 11 years prior even had a bit role in Bruce Lees movie Enter The Dragon. He got beat up a on a golf course by John Saxon. Interestin gthing about this fellow was that a few years later his face was plastered all over the TV because he had stolen drugs and money confiscated by the DEA and had left the country. Eventually, he was found I think in Luxemborg and later extradited to the US. I think he's still in a federeal prison. One day I told my boss that I had a book on speaker building and it talked about how one could configure a crossover network by changing the value of the capacitors and inductor coils. It also said instead of buying new choke coils you could take some of the winds off the coil to raise the frequency of the low pass filtering. So what did my boss say? "Really? let's go downstairs and try it my car." So during the middle of the day, under a fairly busy work load we went downstairs into the parking lot and removed winds in the coils of the speaker in his Mercedes Benz!

Around this time I can also remember salivating over the weekend newspaper ads that Paris Audio ran in the sports section showing their latest home audio gear on sale. I thought the 400 watt Carver "Cool Cube" they sold was the neatest looking piece of gear I ever saw. I'd never heard it, but I wanted on so bad! I just couldn't afford it.

In the mid to late '70's I remember getting an old pair of Jensen Triaxl car speakers with multiple wholes in their paper cones and placing them in shoe boxes so I could listen to music while shootin' some pool on a hot summer day. I ran 50 foot plus long wires from the Sansui receiver in my bedroom to this high tech set up so I could hear Elton John singin about some 6'3" Island Girl scratching some guys back like a rake. I eventuall built particle board enclosures for the good ol' Jensens.

I was heavy into the car audio DIY thing during the mid '80's and decided if I can build subwoofer enclosures and speaker networks for the car, maybe I could do something fun for the home. I ended up taling my Dad's KLH speakers and placing them diagonally across from each other in my room. I had bought a bunch of 8ohm 10" woofers and built big giant boxes for them and wired them all in parallel with the main speakers all without low pass filters! I basically, surrounded myself a pair of two-way speakers with 8" woofers and four subwoofers like Gulliver standing in the middle of Stonehenge. Then I put on, Jean Luc Ponty's Modern Times Blues from his Open Mind LP and cranked away. Thinking back, I feel sorry for my neighbors and my Dad's poor Sansui. It must have been seeing close to a 2ohm load!

Well, I never had an amazing moment of discovery like the one in Chams_UK's great story. My audio memories always seem to revolve around goofy and weird events.

Dean, Please don't install that supercharger in your M3. I wouldn't feel safe on the 405 if you did.

Wow! You remember that Gunbei?

Man, i thought nobody noticed that little incident. It was actually a pretty embarassing situation, lets just pretend that it happened as you said!

Stereo gear really diddnt matter a whole lot to me in the military. I remember buying a Technics SA-TX50 reciever while i was in japan that was AC3 ready. Ran me about 600 bucks new. In fact, i dont think they ever sold that model in the US. I paired it up with a $400 pair of pioneer speakers i got from the BX, and as far as i was concened, i had the best stereo system in the planet. I had no idea there was better stuff out there.

I had a buddy who had a set of BOSE 701's that he let me use while he was deployed in Korea. I was real excited to get em hooked up. They were in my system about 2 days when i boxed em up and put my pioneers back into play.

I spent most of my time there getting drunk off of Soju and Asahi and doing tattoos for the enlisted folks for beer. There werent any tattoo artist up there so i ended up becoming one.

That Technics SA-TX50 and those pioneers stayed with me for about 7 years, when i finally replaced them with a set of Definitive Technology 2004tls after i got back to the real world. I gave those Pioneer speakers to a friend of mine (a decision i have always regretted) It was not too far down the road where i learned how good stereo systems could be.

I guess that is when i got bit by the mid-fi bug. I was outta the BEST-BUY gear and into something a bit better.
It still was not untill around the time i first started with audiogon that i really relaized what a good stereo system should be.

Funny thing, is my music taste has changed as i got more into high end audio. Instead of spending all my time listening to techno and industrial, i listen to alot of nick cave and diana krall. However, every now and then i put the old school back in play. Earlier today i was jamming to XTORT by KMFDM.

one of these days ill have a good rig again. Getting there very very slowly, but at least instead of selling gear im back to buying it again. In fact, i plan to buy a new amplifier here in a few weeks. I enjoy the anticipation though. It makes it that much sweeter when i get something good. Patiece.

I don't recall a moment that the light bulb went off but I think it was turned on when I was a baby. My older sister was ten years my senior and my brother was seven years older than me. I even have a sister that is seven years my junior.

My folks didn't have much but they always had really great country music playing on the radio. That was back when you could pick up am stations all over the country so we listened to the Grand Ol Opry nearly every night and blue grass on the other nights. My older sister was the original bobby socks, pony tail mid 50's teenager playing those 45's of Elvis, Chuck Berry, The Big Bopper and Buddy Holly on her little portable record player. My older brother influenced me with folk music, James Brown and some of the lighter stuff of the era.

My grandfather played the fiddle and would dance a jig at the same time. His method of playing was with the neck of the violin pointing at the ground and the instrument body near his bicep. Many of his friends played bluegrass and Irish folks songs with him on a regular basis. If anyone is familiar with the Springfield, Missouri area and all of the incredible country/bluegrass talent surrounding it, that is where my family's roots are. My father, may he rest in peace, moved his little family from there for a better life but we went back regularly and I remember well those hillbilly summers of wonderful music and very interesting characters.

My brother took me to see The Rolling Stones when I was about 12. This was in Omaha on their first US tour. Perhaps 250 people showed up and they (Mick Jager) were so mad they only played three songs and stormed off stage. I even heard Mick mention on a VH1 interview (it may have been a history of rock and roll thing) a couple of years ago that the one place he would never play again was Omaha. He also took me to see the Trogs. Remember Wild Thing?

Honestly, with that kind of environment I didn't know that one could live without a daily fix of music. My grandpa, mom and dad, and older sis are all gone and I owe them a great deal for the gift they gave me. I've tried very hard to pass this along with my tiny family and since my grandson loves to sit and listen to jazz with me maybe I will succeed.

I realize it's not too late to form an appreciation for classical music but I can't shake my roots of being a hillbilly at heart. I'm just like the people that influenced me so much; much, much more than anyone that knows me can tell. I needed a good shave yesterday. I can still fondly recall going to the cistern to fetch water and using the outhouse, carrying the split oak in for the stove and gathering eggs each morning. Taking a bath in a wash tub before going to somebody's house for a spell (a good time) was time for anticipating the event. It's no wonder I feel so differnet from my contemporaries.

I'm reading all these great stories, and loving them! I also notice a trend of a love for music for a while, THEN followed by a general or specific point in time where the concept of getting the equipment comes into play. Maybe it's when it can be afforded?

As an tangent to my story, I had been into music for MANY years before buying my first true hi-fi equipment (Adcom GFA-1A amp and Apt Holman preamp in ~1984). My mother loved to listen to music, especially female vocals (Helen Reddy, Crystal Gale, etc etc). And I had two older brothers who each listened to a lot of music. I remember my first 45 and LP, The Who "Love Reign On Me" and J. Geils' "Full House Live" in ~1971 and ~1973 respectively. I remember getting huge into ELP in 1975, and Pink Floyd (Syd Barret era especially) around the same time.

Stereo-wise, I had the equivalent of a close-and-play, and a portable mono cassette recroder/player.

I graduated to a Fisher all-in-one, with receiver, cassette, and turntable. I remember opening up the speakers and seeing a single driver, and a second "driver" that just was taking up the hole - no wires! Within a couple days, I found out what a passive radiator was, and realized I was NOT ripped off. I upgraded the full range driver with a Radio Shack speaker, and the step up was dramatic.

College had me with an Aiwa minisystem due to space limitations, and about 400 cassettes!! Ah, what a group of misfits we had on our floor: a dance/disco music freak, an Ozzy Osbourne freak, a Deadhead, a Southern rocker (Molly Hatchett, Allman Bros, Mountain, etc), an alternative geek (me), and these bizarre brothers who always seemed to have only 3 songs they ever played: Monkee's "Daydream Believer," CCR "Have You Ever Seen The Rain," and the theme from the "Beverly Hillbilly's" (!).

It was my between my freshman & sophomore year that I discovered the higher end gear at Nantucket Sound, and my junior year that I bought the Adcom and Apt gear.

Last note: the Deadhead was into some stereo, and I had listened to and loved his NAD 3020 integrated as well! I bouht an Aiwa ADF-990 cassette deck from him, and I still have it to this day!

Ahhhh, memories.....