JAMESSORRELL

About the Author

 

I have been critically listening to audio my entire life. It all started as a young boy when my mother would put me down for a nap. She was a big fan of music and would let me lay down with a big pair of headphones and access within reach to the tuner and gain knobs on a small transistor radio. This would snowball throughout my life and eventually, magnetically pull me towards audio engineering in my late thirties. 

 

I grew up on classic rock in the 70's that was heavily influenced due to my parents love for the genre. My mother also sprinkled a dash of disco and dance music influence to add that extra cherry on top. This eventually led me to fall in love with house music when I got well into my late teens and early twenties. I have had many fond experiences with multiple genres of music growing up and as much as the influence plays a key factor in my own personal tastes to this day, it wouldn’t be the same without my own personal discoveries throughout my life.

 

My first love was when I heard hard rock and metal. I felt it had such a raw and wild side to the types of rock albums I had been raised on. It eventually led to my love for the alternative rock and the Seattle grunge sound as well as a fascination for the industrial sound. 

At the same period of finding this new rock influence, there was an emergence of an all new animal being introduced to the world, and that was the sound of Hip Hop. When I heard this, man I was done for. I had to submerse myself in everything about it, the culture, the fashion and style, as well as the desire to want to learn more about the dance scene. Bring on popin and locking and breaking baby. 

 

I laugh now at all the fashion styles that I have gone through, its pretty hilarious. Honestly I owe all my fashion changes and taste preferences at the time that paralleled to my music taste. Parachute pants because I wanted to be a B-Boy. Hammer pants, because I didn’t want anyone to touch this. Ripped up jeans and a flannel, because I could afford that fashion. Huge faux fur bellbottom rave pants, because lets face it you can really dance your ass off in those bad boys. 

 

Regardless the fashion, my love for music in general has grow and grown, and now that I'm much older, I can still look back and appreciate all of the musical influences that has brought me to where I am today. I dj house music, compose and create soundscapes for sound design, record and mix studio musicians and I love being able to do this because it all involves critical listening skills. I will always be continuing to grow and evolve all my skills, but most important above all, I am always and will forever be listening.