Concerts, vinyl and audiophiles

I was an undergraduate at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign from 1970-1974. I have many fond memories of those years, including listening to the great rock music that came out of the 60’s and early 70’s. I went to some great concerts, both on and off campus.

I remember driving from Champaign to Indiana University in Bloomington to hear Emerson, Lake and Palmer and The Band. E, L & P were the back-up band, but they later went on to become a very popular group in their own right (Lucky Man was one of my favorites).

I also went to hear the Grateful Dead at the Assembly Hall on the U of I campus. It was a sold-out concert and, if I remember correctly, pretty rowdy (Deadheads galore!). One weekend I drove to Chicago with a group of girls I didn’t know (I had advertised for a ride) to go to an Allman Brothers concert. It was on a Sunday night, so we drove up Sunday afternoon and came back after the concert ended at midnight. I had to be at work at 8:00 AM on Monday, so I got no sleep that night, but it was worth it. Another weekend I drove to Chicago to see Genesis, one of my favorite groups, at the Auditorium.

I had an extensive LP collection (rock, jazz, and classical) and was continually in pursuit of a better stereo system. I got some great deals through Good Vibes and Playback, the two audio equipment stores on campus (one of my boyfriends worked at Good Vibes; a later boyfriend worked at Playback).

At the time, for the audiophile college student, it was all about savoring the audio experience to the utmost. Each component (receiver/amplifier, turntable and speakers) played its part in contributing to the final sound. I remember going to Good Vibes after hours to sample different speakers at very loud volumes (with my boyfriend, who worked there and had the key to let us in!).

Some of my favorite groups were The Doors, Moody Blues, Grateful Dead, Jethro Tull, Led Zeppelin, Genesis, Yes, and of course Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, and my LP collection certainly reflected that fact. I still have all of my LP’s (about 500) sitting in boxes on the floor of my closet (in pristine condition, I might add), in addition to my turntable (Philips 212 with an Empire top-of-the-line cartridge – tracked at less than 1 gram!) and speakers (Dynaco A-25’s) that I used back then (the turntable has been replaced by a Sony CD player, however).

Look in both the Sno-Isle and Everett Public Libraries catalog under the subject heading Rock music 1961-1970 to check out CD’s from that era. Sorry, LP’s are no longer available in the collections.

Mary K. Johnson
Librarian
Sno-Isle Libraries


Photo credits:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/khiltscher/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0