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Sara Rosinsky's avatar

Love that photo of you! :)

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Nikhil Rajagopalan's avatar

Most people say I haven't changed in all these years. Older, true, but not a major departure from baseline.

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Sara Rosinsky's avatar

I just accidentally muted this thread. Please know it was unintentional!

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Nikhil Rajagopalan's avatar

😆

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Amie McGraham's avatar

Full spectrum listening experience: 8-track tapes. Good luck finding them--and a player!!

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Oleg's avatar

Interesting post! My first experience with vinyl (like for many who grew up in the Baltics in the 90s) was at home. Everyone's parents seemed to have a turntable and a small shelf of old records (mostly Soviet era editions where the names of Western bands were transcribed in Cyrillic). We also had those huge reels with bootleg records on them. But the most memorable for me were records with fairy tales and children's stories. Those were the bomb!

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Nikhil Rajagopalan's avatar

Ah, I think I was just a product of the modern times then. Most Indian households had radios, television, and cassette players, but not record players. It was one of those leapfrog moments where our society skipped the vinyl and went straight to cassette!

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Mark Dykeman's avatar

Interesting change of post but really good!

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Nikhil Rajagopalan's avatar

Thanks for saying so, Mark! Just trying new things. I can't be serious all the time, right?

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Arvind Iyer's avatar

Lovely pic, Nik

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Brad Kyle's avatar

Fascinating POV, Nikhil! You seem to lean more on your cultural upbringing to explain your lack of vinyl growing up, but I wonder if it might be, if not just a little, about the given decade, your age (and parents, grandparents' ages, etc) that might explain it.

I know you mention your older family members and their mixtapes, but cassettes only became available in the late '60s/early '70s (and mass acceptance as the '70s progressed). Still no vinyl for older family members in the '50s and '60s? Or, is this what you were implying about cultural reasons, and India just never had vinyl "infiltration" in the '50s/'60s, etc? Just curious.

India or not, vinyl was, at some point, the only format of choice across the planet, long before tapes of all sorts were available (reel, 8-track, cassette). Thoughts?

I find it all fascinating because I had the opposite experience, growing up (in TX, mid-'50s thru mid-'70s) surrounded by some 20,000 LPs and 78s---my dad's mostly jazz recordings housed in custom cabinetry, wall-to-wall/floor to ceiling! I've always kidded that it's a wonder my brother and I didn't contract PVC poisoning growing up!

One more thing, and I hate to pick nits, but the Village People were only ever on Neil Bogart's Casablanca Records, and never Mercury (in the US, anyway, in the '70s...can't speak to other countries or latter-day re-issues...I'd guess this "Macho Man" LP was an original Canadian release, but Casablanca had a Canadian presence, as well, back in the day).

Thanks for tolerating my probing, Nikhil--I ask because I'm curious!! Nicely done...you have a background few of us have (especially when it comes to pop culture)! Use it! I use mine (apparently in more than just in MY posts)!😁👍🎶

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Nikhil Rajagopalan's avatar

Hey Brad,

I definitely cannot comment on the vinyl culture in India owing to my age, but I read an article just a while back that said production in-house hasn’t been done in India since the 80s. When I visited friends, I never saw a record player. I've seen references to it on old cartoons like Tom and Jerry, but never in the flesh. The one time I did encountered it was in an antique store in an antique store off Anna Salai in Chennai. I've seen and heard references to vinyl (and even read about our dear friend Kevin Alexander hunting for bargains), but never heard one in real life. It's an experience I'm really longing to fulfill.

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Brad Kyle's avatar

Wow, that's amazing. Thanks for replying. If I still had all my records (I had a mere tenth of what my dad had amassed, and got rid of 'em all around the turn of the century!), I'd invite you over for a vinyl orgy of sorts...living in different countries notwithstanding, of course!

You MUST dedicate at least one entire future article (podcast, maybe?...share the experience with your readers!) on the time when you finally hear your first record!

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Nikhil Rajagopalan's avatar

"Listen to vinyl with Brad and Kevin"

I put it on the bucket list :)

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Kevin Alexander's avatar

I’m in!

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