Author Archives: Special to TVD

WORDS AND IMAGES: JAMES COFFMAN IN LAS VEGAS | Sick New World Festival in Las Vegas on May 13th, 2023, was an electrifying celebration of rock and alternative music, showcasing a lineup that left no stone unturned. With System of a Down headlining the event, fans eagerly anticipated an unforgettable experience. The festival was a rollercoaster ride of energy, talent, and passion, with special and exciting performances throughout the day by Flyleaf with Lacey Sturm, P.O.D, Soulfly, Papa Roach, Death Grips, Mr. Bungle, Chevelle, Sevendust, Spiritbox, Incubus, She Wants Revenge, Deftones, Korn, and The Sisters Of Mercy.

The festival kicked off with a bang with Alien Ant Farm delivering a fantastic rendition of Michael Jackson’s “Smooth Criminal.” P.O.D. followed suit, delivering a high-octane set that ignited the audience’s enthusiasm. Directly after, Flyleaf took the stage, accompanied by the powerful vocals of Lacey Sturm. Their explosive performance resonated with the crowd, setting the tone for the day ahead.

Soulfly’s intense and hard-hitting performance left no doubt about their place in the metal scene, captivating fans with their signature blend of heavy riffs and tribal influences. Papa Roach’s energy was infectious, as they unleashed their chart-topping hits with unabashed fervor. Death Grips brought a unique and experimental edge to the festival, pushing boundaries and defying expectations. Mr. Bungle’s eclectic sound and theatrical presence mesmerized the crowd, creating an atmosphere of anticipation for what was yet to come.

Chevelle commanded the stage with their powerful and melodic rock sound, delivering a performance that was both captivating and emotionally charged. Sevendust brought their distinctive blend of heavy riffs and melodic hooks, showcasing their undeniable talent and leaving fans wanting more. Spiritbox enchanted the audience with their ethereal melodies and haunting vocals, proving that they are a force to be reckoned with in the alternative music scene.

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“Vinyl has always been something we’ve viewed as just plain cool, and arguably the best way to listen to music.”

“That opinion started forming after watching movies like High Fidelity, Empire Records, and Pirate Radio, but really solidified when we learned about the level of time and care that goes into the process of manufacturing records. The feel of it—the size, the weight, the artwork, the sound—all demands a higher sense of respect that streaming music will never have.

But it wasn’t really until the first years of our marriage that we really experienced vinyl in the way we thought it ought to be experienced. That way being how we pictured hippies in the ’60s and ’70s listening—getting high, dancing and singing along, and fully submerging ourselves in the music.

My grandparents had just moved into a retirement community and their old console record player needed a home. Nicole and I lived in a basement apartment at the time and jumped on the opportunity to add it to our humble abode. Thankfully my grandparents kept it in such good condition all those years that it really worked like a charm, sounding warm and vintage and still so clear.

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“When I was growing up and discovering my music taste and preferences, the sun seemed to be setting on the heyday of vinyl records. From CDs, to iPods, to streaming platforms, the music landscape rapidly changed from year to year—and I along with it. Even though I didn’t grow up with a whirring turntable on my desk or shelves full of dusty records, I have been influenced by vinyl every step of the way.”

“My first vinyl memory came from the most unlikely of places—an EDM track. 7th grade me was browsing through early YouTube when I first came across the music video for “Levels” by Avicii. I was instantly hooked on the song. The synth chords were so catchy that I instantly went to iTunes and downloaded it to my iPod Touch. However, my favorite part came a little over halfway through the track.

The beat drops out and a woman starts singing a powerful melody about a good feeling that she’s never had before. Who was this woman? I knew she wasn’t Avicii. This sent me down a Wikipedia rabbit hole only to find in the end that the woman singing was actually Etta James.The vocals were sampled from her 1962 record “Something’s Got a Hold on Me”.

My journey through vinyl continued from there. I was fascinated with albums like Wildflower by The Avalanches and Donuts by J Dilla, in which every song was made almost exclusively from sampled records. I also extensively listened to Graduation by Kanye West, who masterfully wove samples from old soul and jazz vinyl into his tracks. These albums and many others would eventually inspire me to start making my own music.

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“The first thing I ever bought with my own allowance money at age 7 was Queen’s “Another One Bites The Dust” 7-inch single. It was either at Musicland or Sam Goody in Minneapolis. From that day on, I begged my parents to bring me to a record store any time we were driving around on errands. Next up were “Celebration” by Kool and The Gang, Blondie’s “Heart of Glass,” and The Empire Strikes Back movie soundtrack, all out in the same year, 1980. That’s the year music took over for me.”

“Growing up, we had instruments in the house… guitars, an organ… my parents played them, and I would noodle on them, trying to pick out melodies from the records. I think my early piano lessons didn’t stick because I wasn’t interested in reading music, I wanted to play what I heard. I wanted to play what I heard on the radio and records, not “Hot Cross Buns.”

By the time I was in middle school, Van Halen’s 1984 LP was a serious influence on my musicianship. I had started taking drum lessons by then, and that record brought musical complexity into pop music that inspired me deeply.

Vinyl has so much going for it, and it’s no wonder there’s a resurgence. The sound quality, the large scale artwork, and the physicality of opening the packaging, holding the record, putting the needle down, and flipping it every 20 minutes or so creates a very pleasurable tactile experience.

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“My earliest memories of vinyl are all inextricably linked to my family. Each record is hard-wired to emotions and specific moments that brought us together. As the self-appointed family historian, I still have a lot of those records and they feel as important to me as the dusty photo albums that most people would use to document their family history.”

“I remember from a very early age my mom playing The Beatles, Stones, and Billy Joel as well as classic country and bluegrass records from Johnny Cash, Norman Blake, and Willie Nelson. They were the soundtrack to every moment. We cleaned to them, ate to them, danced to them, and cried to them.

I was so lucky that my parents had such an eclectic vinyl collection when I was growing up. My father, who had moved from Lebanon to go to college in my hometown of Youngstown, OH, always told me that his record collection helped him learn English.

He LOVED old soul records. He was responsible for the Otis Redding, Aretha, and Ray Charles records that were always playing in the background while I played with my Star Wars action figures pretending that the cabinet that housed the vinyl was the interior of the Death Star. He used to explain that he didn’t enjoy rock and roll because the lyrics were too trippy and weird for him to really get anything out of while he was still learning a new language, but the soul records reminded him of the French music he grew up loving.

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“I fell in love with vinyl, like many fortunate kids, through my parents.”

“As a child of two super responsible Jamaicans transplanted to the Bronx and then Long Island where they raised me and my sister, dancing to records in our family room, or better yet at a basement party, brought out their sunny, fun loving nature. I was like a fish to water going through the cover art, reading the liner notes, and essentially teaching myself how to sing and phrase. My favorite of the bunch was Whitney Houston’s eponymous first album, all in peach like an 1980s Aphrodite.

Vinyl took on a totally gigantic presence at the Jamaican basement parties of my youth. My Uncle is beyond a weekend warrior when it comes to his vinyl collection, from dub, soca, reggae, dancehall, Bossa, jazz, soul. I feel that vinyl collections shaped my musical style as a vocalist and recording artist. The songs I write and gravitate to are always beyond genre when you really peer into them. They most likely draw from different styles like a super rounded, well stocked vinyl collection.

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“I often find myself telling the story of when I discovered my mom’s vinyl collection. It led to a deeper discovery of my love for music and eventually turned into me starting my own collection.”

“For the longest time, we had this giant, yet somewhat old, sound system in my house growing up. My mom used to rotate her favorite jazz CDs on the 6 disc CD player (and sometimes I’d throw in my Jesse McCartney, Aaron Carter, Dream Street, and Myra CDs in the mix as well, haha). There was also an old record player sitting on top of it, but I never really questioned it until one day I found stacks and stacks of records in our unfinished basement. I think I said something like “Mom, why didn’t you tell me you had all of these?” and then dug my way through every record she had.

Of course, I was searching for The Beatles or The Beach Boys records, but instead, I was really intrigued by an album by Air Supply and Electric Light Orchestra. I brought those two upstairs and played them instantly! “Don’t Bring Me Down” by Electric Light Orchestra was a favorite of mine, but the Air Supply record… Let’s just say, I wound up playing that one from start to finish probably every single day.

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“Growing up in Lawrence, NJ, a suburb that borders the town of Princeton, really shaped who I am today.”

“Most people know Princeton because of the University, which is one of the most prestigious academic institutions. But many people don’t know that across the street from the University is a record store, Princeton Record Exchange (PRE), arguably one of the greatest record stores on the planet. For me, living ten minutes from PRE was a dream. I had easy access to a constantly evolving collection of amazing and affordable vinyl during my formative years. This record store had a profound impact on my life and career as a musician.

My vinyl obsession started when I was 14 as a result of growing up in a diverse musical household. My mother has sung in the church my entire life, mostly as a cantor. My older brother Chris is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, singer, and producer. My parents had a small and well curated vinyl collection that fit into one cardboard box. It contained mostly classic rock LPs like Jimi Hendrix Are You Experienced, The Beatles Sgt. Pepper’s…, The Doors L.A. Woman, along with some outliers like Esso Steel Band Front Street.

I still have those records today as my parents let me keep whatever I wanted. In contrast, Chris had a far more esoteric collection that included lots of industrial and gothic folk records like Einsturzende Neubauten Funf auf der nach oben offenen Richterskala, The Legendary Pink Dots Hallway Of The Gods, and Current 93 Soft Black Stars.

Before I was in high school, I didn’t have my own record player, so I would browse through my parents’ and brother’s records. I became fascinated by the artwork and liner notes and mesmerized when I heard my brother playing his records in his room. The sounds, visuals, and inclination to copy my older brother encouraged me to buy my own record player. Back then, I was able to purchase one for $10 via a classified ad in the local paper. From there, I knew it was time to build my own vinyl collection.

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“There is nothing more distinctive than listening to a recording on vinyl. The feel, the one of a kind sound, the obsession it can lead to. For a long time I was picking up a few records a month, rather than a streaming service subscription. I figured it helps the bands out way more, and I get to own something that I will really appreciate having in my collection.”

“I would say I am a modest collector compared to some of my friends, and that my collection really has come from an urge to support artists I love, more than necessarily wearing down the needle with play after play. Whenever I see a new band that I really love putting out their music this way I try my best to pick it up. I don’t want more MP3s or burned CDs around the house; they sound exactly the same on the internet. A record is unique, and I absolutely want to indulge in that.

The past year has been a little slower, but I have managed to pick up a few of The Wonder Years and Frightened Rabbit albums that I’ve been chasing for a while. I am really proud to finally own those, as well as some pals’ bands like October Drift and Wrest’s debut albums.

The best way I have found to experience a band’s work comes from putting on a record, sitting back and taking it all in—listening to a body of work exactly how it was intended, from start to finish. No skips, no bloody adverts—you’re just in it until the end—it’s absolute magic.

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“My earliest musical memory involves vinyl.”

“I was four and my mom bought me my first two records—Thriller and Synchronicity by The Police. I remember playing those albums over and over again until I had almost every word memorized. At that age the whole process of learning how to use a turntable, putting what I thought at the time was a massive piece of plastic on it, and then having this amazing music blast out of the speakers was pure magic. That was it. I was hooked for life. And looking back I think by becoming a producer/artist I’ve been trying to recapture that childhood feeling ever since.

My best music store experience involves the now closed Tower Records in Atlanta, GA. At the time I was an assistant engineer at a big Atlanta studio. I was assisting on a Lionel Richie session and the guitar player he had been using couldn’t make it that day. By sheer luck the head engineer told Lionel I play and I ended up tracking guitar on a song that night. I thought for sure they would have his main player come in and replay my parts.

But I was pretty shocked to find out he ended up keeping mine. This was my first real credit on a big commercial label release. The day it came out I drove to Tower records at 7:00am and waited in the parking lot for them to open at 8. I bought the Coming Home CD, opened it in my car and stared at my credit while playing the song probably ten times. RIP Tower Records. Thanks for one of my best musical memories!
—Graham Marsh

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“I was fifteen when I received my first turntable as a gift from my bandmate. At the time I didn’t own a single record, but it looked cool, so I put it in my room and made a mental note to start my collection.”

“Gradually I started building it starting with a few records I found at a local music shop called Sound Spectrum. My grandpa had been educating me with the music of Doris Day, Bing Crosby, Irving Berlin, and Tony Bennett, so when he discovered I had been given a record player he eagerly let me “borrow” some of his favorite records of theirs, which I began listening to on repeat. Now it feels strange to listen to those artists in any other setting!

In recent years I’ve found great records all over the place. I’ve found many at the Amoeba Records locations in LA/SF where they have such a broad assortment of well-known material it can be a bit overwhelming. Sometimes I prefer finding gems at thrift stores/antique shops where you really have to hunt for the good ones (it makes it sound better.)

Listening to vinyl is an entirely different experience than listening via a streaming service, or even a CD. The warmth and quality of the sound is obviously elevated, but it’s also the experience. Sort of like opening up a piano and seeing the mallets hitting the keys as you play them—it’s really special to see the mechanics so clearly when you set the needle on the grooves of a record.

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