I've listened to music critically for most of my life. First, as a teenage music fan, I would sit with headphones on poring over masterpieces by Pink Floyd, The Beatles, Yes, the Beach Boys, King Crimson, Bob Dylan, David Bowie, Fleetwood Mac, and so many others in the late '70s. Soon after, I began recording friends for fun and creating weird electronic music on my own. I would wonder what the artists I liked did to make their records feel so good, and I'd compare sounds between different LPs and guess at what was going on in those magical "recording studios." In college I became a radio DJ, playing records that caught my eye. I was lucky enough to hear new music all the time; I eventually became a music director and got to sort through the hundreds of LPs that would arrive at our post office box. I started contributing to 'zines from all over the states around this same time, and would get sent a box of LPs, 7-inches, and cassettes in exchange for my writing.
Having so much exposure to mostly independently-released music meant that I was privy to hearing bands from a wide variety of recording scenarios. Albums tracked at small local studios or home recordings were common, and I would wonder why most of them didn't sonically hold up next to the classic records I had been raised on. It soon became apparent that recording budgets and major label investment played a big role in this discrepancy, but also that some music was meant to "sound" different. In the early '80s it seemed every time a hardcore punk band got a bigger budget and used a fancy studio, the record would sound slick but lifeless. This realization also made me question why an artist like John Fahey would need to use a huge, fancy studio for his intimate music? Records could come from different places, and that was okay.