Old school cool

Back in the ’70s, before cassettes became a mainstay in every household, a typical social party would involve long playing recorders playing vinyl records, as guests grooved to the sound of the needle scratching the discs.

Cut to 2017, and not much has changed in Mumbai. History has come a full circle, leaving the likes of cassettes, CDs, iPods in its wake. While digital music still rules the popular market, a niche section of audiophile youngsters are bringing LPs, vinyls and 45s back into vogue with listening sessions.

Seeing rare records of Pearl Jam, Pink Floyd, and Led Zeppelin are quite commonplace at these sessions, informs Roycin D’Souza, who also doubles up as a curator at Social’s Khar outlet that hosts Drop The Needle events. “Some rare records brought in by collectors have included dub plates and signed first pressings. Some come in albums, 45s and some records come with a song on each side. There are some people who are one of the five lucky guys in the world to own such records.”

The regular fixture at Social sees people displaying and playing their rare records on turntables, as well as newer ones. “The idea was to bring people who collect records together in a social environment, since most collectors are very introverted and possessive about their hobby,” explains Roycin.

On the other hand, Aman Singh Gujral, founder and CEO of guitar studio Adagio says that the vinyl nights at his institute started solely to give the students a dose of listening to music the ‘right way,’ before the event was thrown open to curious listeners too. “It turned into an opportunity for people to actively listen to music and discover a new album each week. There’s a sort of warmth in vinyl records that’s missing from the digital age,” he says, talking about why he and the academy’s co-founder Ishan Joshi prefer LP records over any other audio medium.

“I propagate the culture of listening to music correctly,” chimes in Roycin. “Chances are, if you’re listening to music just at work or elsewhere, you’re not listening to it properly, that is, with a good audio set up, an amplifier and a treated room. Listening to music on a good set up is an experience in itself. It’s the same reason people buy new car speakers, despite the system it came with being decent enough.”

At a listening session at Adagio. (Photo: Rajesh Jadhav)

Roycin, who along with his musician friends also hosts private listening parties at their homes, says that another reason why people prefer owning these records are the artwork they come with. With booklets and pullouts spanning over 25-inches in width, it’s like owning a piece of art, he elucidates.

On the other hand, as far as playing older records at the social nights go, Roycin says that he has certain rules. “Turntables that play these LPs are expensive, so if your records have dust and fungus on them, I will not let you play them.”

Aman mentions that one of the prime reasons he’s thrown the sessions open to regular crowd is because owning records and listening to high-quality vinyl audio is an expensive hobby. “We’ll never charge for these sessions. We just want people to know about the old albums and get a feel of it; it’s an open house event. At maximum, if we’re playing a famous title, we’ll ask people to RSVP.”

Adagio has hosted vinyl nights every Thursday since November, with a special eclipse night hearing of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon, in September last year. “Since we played Rush this week, we’ll stick to the old progressive rock genre and follow it up with Styx’s Paradise Theater next week,” he says. “And in February, we’ll play glam rock all month!”

The idea to get people acquainted to the right way of listening to music has gone swimmingly well for Aman so far. “A lot of people tell us it’s changed the way they consume music. Since a lot of albums are concept albums and you can barely make out when one tracks change into the other, it makes sense to listen to it at one go. With vinyl you can just make the sound out so much better,” he concludes.