Just like any object, vinyl records can be seen by their owners as precious possessions or merely vehicles for music. It is in this regard that Montana Agnew and his roommate, Ian Kitts, differ. The two, who share a remote house near Amazon Park, both have medium-sized vinyl collections that are wildly diverse in genre and era. But while Agnew tends to view vinyl in a more sentimental manner, Kitts is all about the music.
Like many vinyl lovers, Agnew enjoys the physicality of the medium, in part due to the way in which records can be passed from person to person. Many of his records come from a friend, who sold him a hefty collection of classic rock vinyl by artists like Bob Dylan and the Grateful Dead.
“I believe vinyl is meant to be passed on,” Agnew said. “I hope there’s someone I can give this collection to eventually.”
Agnew feels the most personally important records in his collection are his two Radiohead records, OK Computer and In Rainbows. He got the two records at a record shop in Salem, and though he doesn’t spin them very often, they’re among his favorites.
“If there’s any band that speaks to the isolation and loneliness modern life can bring, it’s Radiohead,” Agnew said. “I don’t listen to them very often, but if at this point if I was put on a desert island I would want to listen to Radiohead.”
Agnew associates certain albums with periods of his life. He particularly associates one of his favorites, Mature Themes by Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti, with winter term of his freshman year.
“It’s one of the stranger albums I’ve heard,” Agnew said. “But it was an anthem for me over a period of my life where I was just hanging out, having a good time, surviving the cold with music. It was the soundtrack to it all.”
Recently he’s been getting into Mac DeMarco’s Salad Days, describing it as “something you could get down to, but also something your dad could get down to.”
Ian Kitts does not have such associations with his records.
“I mostly just use them as records, just objects,” Kitts said.
He likes the medium in part because it’s easy to find for cheap — he gets most of his vinyl at garage sales. But he also likes it because of its simple technology.
“I got into vinyl when I was trying to make computers have a less dominant part in my life,” Kitts said.
Most of Kitts’ records are older classical and jazz albums. His most-played record is Stan Getz and Joao Gilberto’s Getz/Gilberto, the 1964 record that helped popularize bossa nova.
Yet he’s open-minded, and his roommates have influenced his tastes greatly. Though two of the house’s roommates left last term, leaving Kitts and Agnew alone, their music tastes still reflect in the collection through what Kitts has discovered through them.
“My roommates were the ones who got me into Death Grips and Andrew Jackson Jihad,” Kitts said. “We used to have all of Andrew Jackson Jihad’s albums collectively, but I only have two or three.”
These bands are the most recent records in his collection, and he says both are among his top played.
As different as the items in their respective collections are, they both are content to listen to each other’s music at any time, and selecting something to put on their record player is less a decision based on “whose” record but simply “which one.”
Though the two roommates may have different views of vinyl, the medium — and much of the music — is nonetheless something they can both agree on.
This playlist contains a few choice cuts from records in their collection.
Notable records:
The Grateful Dead – Terrapin Station
Bob Dylan – Nashville Skyline
Radiohead – OK Computer
Mac DeMarco – Salad Days
Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti – Mature Themes
Various Artists – Yodeling Songs Of The Alps
Stan Getz & Joao Gilberto – Getz/Gilberto
Death Grips – The Money Store
Andrew Jackson Jihad – People Who Can Eat People Are The Luckiest People In The World
Charlie Christian – Solo Flight: The Genius Of Charlie Christian