What age did the "audio bug" hit you?

My dad had custom speakers installed in a 70's style bar type thing that held highball glasses and when opened had a mirrored back. He had a Fisher reciever and one of the original AR turntables also fitted into the cabinet. He had a bunch of records by Dylan, CSNY, Pink Floyd, etc. I used to sit around spinning discs on the turntable all day. I loved the sprung suspension design and the sound was like nothing I had heard. Later my dad bought me my first stereo for my bedroom and from there I've been collecting records and upgrading my system ever since.

It all started in the beginning, no I am not talking about the Big Bang but when I was about 5. I remember the early years when my father used to play music on his Grundig Radiogram. The equipment fascinated me. Looking at the black shiny disks spinning fast and with a needle on top of it producing all the sounds always intrigued me. I had no idea why the system sounded so good; today when I look back I can understand why! It was a one-piece system; everything was almost perfectly matched and had the tubes! I had no way of comparing the equipment, but whatever was being reproduced had sounded very good.

Oh my, I must have been 7 or 8. I lived with my grandparents in the summers, and used to go up in the attic and listen to my aunt's old record player and her 45's. I remember Johnny Cash, and the Everly Brother's Dream. It never ended from there. I always had cheap stereos until I was 18, when I actually took out a loan and bought a Realistic STA-2000 reciever (75 watts/channel!), with Mach One speakers. I never looked back.

When I was in my mother's womb :) Alright guys, beat that!

Really, when I was 33. I bought an inexpensive DVD player because it seemed that video stores were really phasing out their stock of VHS tapes. Well then, the home theater bug hit first... and now I am a dedicated 2 channel listener.
I have always liked music, just not to the degree and focus that I do now.

Well, I remember dancing around to Paul Simon's Graceland and the West Side Story soundtrack when I was around 6. That was 15 years ago... My family owns a furniture store, and there's a high end audio place nearby. The guy who owns it wanted to do a trade, hifi for furniture. That's how it began...