I added this specific release to my collection of personally-significant records today, and I want to post this brief backstory for posterity. It might be the first of many posts following through on my long-held intention to document just what it is and/or was about a specific selection of music and a time in my life that resonates deeply within me to this very day. I’ve always felt a strong connection to music over the decades, as I suspect most of us do, particularly how we each have select moments and memories that frequently align with select notes and chords. I’ll call this series “My Life, In Music".
If memory serves me well, It was around 1978 when I first became aware of the “Mobile Fidelity Sound Labs” half-speed mastering of landmark albums. I was frequenting a record store, “The Satisfied Ear”, within walking distance of our home in Cupertino, gradually amassing a music collection, when I determined it was time to buy a new record player. I visited a nearby stereo shop across the street and up a couple of blocks along what was then called “highway 9” and is now called DeAnza Blvd. My bulky faux-woodgrain-sided “SoundDesign” unit was obsolete. and I was brought into the new decade with a pristine black and metal “Onkyo” turntable with a clear hinged lid.
After the salesman talked me into that relatively expensive purchase, he also pressed me on the importance of the quality of the recorded media, particularly these specific products. It was an upsell. At the time, I was skeptical, and when looking at the options and seeing this particular Supertramp release, I replied regarding preferring Breakfast in America because that was popular at the time. “Logical Song” was a top 40 hit on heavy rotation. I’d not even listened to “Crime” at that point. I think I knew of “Dreamer,” but only based on ancillary exposure through historical radio play and nothing more.The salesman’s response was impactful and, I believe to this day, sincere. He shifted from pressured sales mode to artistic appreciation mode. He scoffed at the more commercial nature of the “Breakfast” release, emphasizing with passion and intensity I believe he felt about the brilliant if not a genius breadth of writing and musicianship, from start to finish, that made up “Crime.” He referred to it as a masterpiece, with conviction.
He convinced me, and I tacked it onto the purchase. At over three times the price of a standard album, some $30 if I recall, I felt a bit of pressure and resentment on the way out. When I arrived back at my parent's home, I connected the new turntable in my bedroom, carefully sliced open the sleeve to retain the shrink-wrap as I was prone to do, placed the vinyl on the new platter smelling of freshly opened rubber, pushed the start button, watched as the arm moved into position and as the needle lowered into the grove, and simultaneously leaned forward and back at once as the journey unfolded before my ears.
It was a breathtaking experience I remember to this day, as was each subsequent replaying over the coming weeks. I admittedly wrestled with the fact that there was nothing I “knew” as far as “hits” go while being pulled into the meticulous sonic layers and mastery of timing, tempo, and temperance that still sweeps me away like only a handful of recordings, leaving me in awe when the final note of the last tack arrives. The silence that follows the end of such a record as this is a sacred place of complete immersion and appreciation. The sonics of the half-speed master aside, the quality was richly woven into the work itself. Although there’s little commercial presence, the writing and playing and, in particular, the recording and engineering are on par with Pet Sounds, Pepper, Dark Side and more. There’s neither a wasted nor excessive note in the entire set of songs.
When I transitioned from LPs to CDs, this was amongst the first purchases. It’s one I’ve raved about and loaned out (and even repurchased after some damage occurred on at least one of the loans). It’s also something that, perhaps the exception of “Rudy” on a mountain drive, mandates playing from start to finish, opening and closing with an echoed bookended build-up and wind down. This record opened me up to a level of sound, overlayed with balanced instruments and notes, as nothing had before. It was a key lesson that I remain grateful to that sales clerk for. I don’t know that I would have come to find this otherwise. Perhaps I would have through another avenue, but perhaps not, and what a crime that would have been.