Many moons ago, long before iPhones, YouTube and FaceTroll, people wrote letters. One of many letters I received from my cousin, mentioned a crazy cover of "Let's Spend The Night Together" by someone named David Bowie, who we had heard might be...ssshhh....bisexual. Well, I had to impress my cousin, who was, and still is four years older, so I went into Sugar Mountain, a record store on Sheepshead Bay Road and there, sitting right up front on the "speed rack," was "Aladdin Sane." I felt like I was committing a crime by bringing this up to the counter and paying for it. I might have had an allowance and an already unheard of amount of records for my age, but I was still a kid. This was both thrilling and frightening.
I thought about this last night, as "Drive In Saturday" popped up on the ol' iPod Shuffle. Ten seconds into the song, and this flood of memories took over the evening.
The mind, mine especially, will never stop ceasing to amaze me. A friend could tell me something on a Monday morning at 10:AM, and by 2:PM, I will have forgotten the entire exchange. Yet, 46 years later, I could tell you that Sugar Mountain's sign had a blue background, that the counter was to the left against the wall, and that me and my cousin, who lived just a five minute walk from Sheepshead Bay Road, listened to Side Two of "Aladdin Sane" first, so that "Let's Spend The Night Together" could come on sooner. Thus, "Time," even before "Changes" and before "Space Oddity," was the very first song I had heard by David Bowie, and safe to say, the second song my cousin had heard. Then came the "1980 Floor Show" on "The Midnight Special," a Bowie spectacle with Marianne Faithful dressed as a nun, as well as The Troggs. It was a viewing experience far more intense than the usual late night T.V. fare I had been watching, which included The Tonight Show with John Byner and Al Hirt as guests, or reruns of The Honeymooners.
Needless to say, the rest is history. "Time" blew me away, and so did the Stones cover, and so did just about everything else Bowie has released, give or take the handful of clams he crapped out in the 80's.
Can you recall your entry into an artist who then became a lifelong favorite? It doesn't have to be a first song/first album deal. Actually, I prefer that it isn't. I'm more interested in who you discovered a little bit after the fact.
17 comments:
It's 1969 - I don't remember the spark point that got me into Led Zeppelin but I do remember calling up a girl on the phone who I was trying to impress and holding the phone to my little record player that was spinning 'What Is and What Should Never Be'. She thought it was a pretty cool song and I've been LZ's biggest fan ever since.
Randy
"Lola".
High School years (79-82 -- so I'm outing my age again). I loved the radio (my golden years were 71-78 when "top 40" was so diverse and exciting.)
A friend of mine was deep into "alternative" music and used to get "zines" well before either of them was a term (basically the Ralph Records discography -- "BUY OR DIE!" I thought was a cool slogan, but thought most of the music sucked -- and Fripp/Eno which was better) -- stuff that did not click with me (and, honestly, a lot of it still does not -- I never got "The Residents" beyond their presentation). He had played me lot of stuff over the years that wasn't even on my radar because it wasn't on the radio that I ended up really liking" ("A Young Person's Guide to King Crimson" was something that blew me away as an intro to that band and my friend was the first person to have "Boy" by U2 ) But this is not about King Crimson. Or U2. Or the still-incomprensible Residents. Or even "Cookie Puss" by The Beastie Boys. Or "This Charming Man" by The Smiths.
I came over one day when he was playing records and he put on a new record and we went out to his porch to listen and rather than just talk and have music on in the background, he actually stopped and said "listen to this song."
"Runaways" came on -- and I perked up ("Listen to this amazing minimal piano solo", my friend enthused.). Jangly guitars. Awesome bass line. This was followed with the driving "Ball and Chain", the brilliant "Senses Working Overtime" and by the time it hit the sweeping "Jason and the Argonauts" -- I had to immediately go buy the album. Which I did the next day. This is when Virgin had released two versions of the album -- a single version and the double version simultaneously. I brought the double album up to the counter and they charged me the price of the single version.
"English Settlement" by XTC was one of the best purchases I ever made. Lifelong favorite after that (except for Go2 -- hah). For all the stuff my friend played for me, I couldn't remember him playing anything by XTC previously, so that was my lightning-struck intro to the band.
Two other minor memories about initial moments for lifelong favorites:
#1 In college, I read about him. Sounded like it might be somebody I might like as my tastes were getting broader, but articles I read just talked about how weird he was and his oddball song titles and I was in college and didn't have a ton of money to spend on records sight/sound unseen. But he and his band came to Ann Arbor for a club show and friends convinced me to go and I overwhelmingly loved the show -- having never heard any of his music before. That was the first time a live concert was my intro to a band/musician that became a fave (and Robyn Hitchcock's "Element of Light" -- the album the tour was based on -- is still one of my top lbums of all time.)
#2 - In college, I still listened to the radio for a while because it was the early MTV years and that mid-80s stuff was pretty diverse and interesting (radio had not totally fragmented yet.). I had it on while doing homework and some insanely catchy 2+ minute-long song came on with a girl singer (and background singers) that had this awesome mid-60s-pop song vibe. But the DJ never said who the band was. I left that stupid radio station on for *hours* hoping it would come back around. I must have listened non-stop for days -- until I heard it played *one more time* and the DJ said it was "The Real World" by The Bangles (from their first EP). Never again heard it on the radio, but that was an immediate purchase of the EP and the first full-length album is one of my all-time favorites.
Hello all…no, please remain seated,
John Prine didn’t get a lot of airplay on the radio stations I listened to in NYC in the early 1970’s. No one in the circles I ran in listened to him. But, in the mid-70’s I went to college in North Carolina and some kid across the hall played Prime Prine, a greatest hits package issued after the release of his first four albums. The Great Compromise was electrifying and made me a Prine omnivore. A lifer. Reincarnate John Steinbeck with a Martin dreadnought and a sense of humor and you have JP, to my way of thinking.
I read yesterday that Prine had to cancel his scheduled appearance at the New Orleans Jazz & heritage festival due to health issues. Although I don’t know the details, I know that he has already survived one bout of cancer. Hoping that it’s not that serious this time.
In 2018, some 47 years after the release of his first album, he released the song Summer’s End:
…The moon and stars hang out in bars just talkin'
I still love that picture of us walkin'
Just like that ol' house we thought was haunted
Summer's end came faster than we wanted
Come on home
Come on home
No you don't have to
Be alone
Just come on home
I wish all my musical favorites aged so well.
Best….RichD
One day in The Disk Shoppe (gotta love that ppe!) in London Ontario a really cool song that I had never heard before came on the system and I asked "What's this?" To which the staff person replied -- in perfect "High Fidelity," condescending, know-it-all, record store staff, style -- "That's Rock and Roll!"
So began my 35 / 40 year engagement with John Hiatt and my long love affair with knowledgable sneering record store archetypes!
1.)It's mid-70s, living in an old mansion (shared co-op) in Vancouver BC, and the fellow across the hall's record collection appears to consist of 3 Waylon Jennings albums. Played over & over & over... So I asked him "what's up with Waylon? Seems like every song is the same tempo, same bum bum bum bum bassline" and he asks what I'm doing Friday. So off we go to a massive beer hall across the river to watch a lengthy 3 or 4 set (did I mention beer?) extravaganza by Waylon and his band. The light went on!
2.) A couple of decades later, "Homicide: Life In The Streets" is a show we watch from time to time. The episode in question starts off with a distorted guitar riff, and the Subdudes blast into "All The Time In The World". Now that's rock & roll, friends. BTW, the Dudes are touring again (caught them in Phoenix AZ a couple of months ago).
When I was in high school, a friend of mine knew a guy who was already out of school and working a decent job, and he had the bread to buy all the latest and coolest imports from England. He would host listening parties where he would spin the newest stuff for all his hip—but broke—fellow Anglophiles. This friend had been to one of these listening parties, and had heard an album by a new group called Roxy Music. “You’d probably like that shit. you're into that weird stuff.”
“Well, what did it sound like,” I asked.
“Sort of like if King Crimson had existed in the 1950’s.”
Well, that sounded really intriguing. I scrounged around and found an article about the group in an English rock newspaper. Apparently this group was making quite a noise in the English press. And they did look pretty weird. But cool. These guys were decked out in a combination of ’50’s kitsch and outer space glam. And they didn’t look like they were taking it all too seriously. I needed to hear these guys.
I was prepared to buy this album, despite having heard not even a song. I managed to scrape up the nine dollars (!) it would cost to buy it, and I got on the train from my suburban town to the throbbing metropolis of Philadelphia. I meandered around until I found the store that carried the rare import LPs. I ask the clerk if they had the album. He pointed to a rack. There it was! That cover! A pin up girl in frilly silk chiffon splayed across the gatefold, a rose clutched in her hand and a gold record at her feet. Is that a come-hither look, or a sneer?
Carefully counting out my cash, I paid up and hurried to catch the train back to the suburbs. Once on the train, I peeled off the shrink wrap and opened up the gatefold. On a background of diamond-pleated leatherette, appear the six band members, each in a deckled-edge postcard frame. The guitarist had on a leather jacket and crazy insect glasses. The sax player had the biggest pompadour I’ve ever seen. The bass player wore a jacket with a Chinese dragon embroidered on the sleeve. The drummer sported a little stuffed tiger’s head on his shoulder. This guy, ‘Eno’ with his vast forehead—no idea what he does in the band—had sort of a reptilian alien look. Lastly, the singer. Posed in profile, a preening, self-satisfied look on his mannequin-like face, wore a shiny tiger-striped jacket over a tight black t shirt. Are these guys for real?
Arriving home, I dash to my room and prepared to settle in and finally get to dig into this music that I’ve obsessed over for weeks. Pulling the disk from the sleeve I discover… it’s not the Roxy Music album! I’m hoping maybe the label’s just wrong, maybe it’s the right music on the record itself. No! For fuck’s sake, it’s some other band, some English boogie bullshit! Devastated, I realize I must schlep all the way back to Philly to return it. And what if they don’t have another copy? What if they’re all packaged wrong?
Well, long story short, it was true, a whole shipment of the album went out with the wrong disk in the Roxy sleeves.
Eventually I did acquire a copy. And so: what did I think of the music after so much build up and anticipation? Well, at first I didn’t really like it! The singer’s voice was really warbly and not at all rock & roll. And the music ranged from rough and dissonant to times drifty and moody. It didn’t sound anything like the pompous prog rock of King Crimson, although my friend’s metaphor did paint an accurate picture of their unusual blend of influences. It certainly was unlike anything I’d heard before. And despite my initial reservations, something kept compelling me to put the record on.
As seminal record as there ever was one, Roxy Music’s first album still sounds as fresh and surprising as the day it came out.
few High Fidelity moments - hearing Everything but the Girl's US version of their first album in Schoolkids Records and buying (but not necessarily agreeing with) everything since. hearing the Soft Boys' "I Wanna Destroy You" coming out of the PA at a badminton party; followed Hitchcock and Kimberly Rew for a long ways.
I got My Aim is True as one of my ten "free" albums from Columbia House Record Club. I have regretted joining that club, but never regretted the choice of ordering the supposedly punk first album of Elvis Costello. Had never heard anything from the album, but loved it immediately.
Borrowed Band on the Run from my middle school library. (we had a really cool librarian)I grew up in a home that was Beatles deficient, so that was a real eye opener. Still one of my favorite albums.
So many stories along the way.
The first time I remember being aware of Elvis Costello was seeing him on Saturday Night Live, and I thought, who is this turkey? I wasn't impressed. Over the next year or two, I'm sure I heard his songs on the radio, but never paid them much mind. When Armed Forces came out, Oliver's Army was on the radio and it started to sink in a little. I started to have some spending money back in those days, and at the National Record Mart I saw the album on sale with the Live at Hollywood High EP included. That and the colorful cover were the tipping point--I figured I'd give it a chance. That album hooked me hard and I quickly went back and bought My Aim Is True and This Year's Model and have been on the ride ever since.
Another one: I was a huge Who fan throughout high school, and when Townshend's Empty Glass came out I listened to it quite a bit. That sent me back to explore his couple of solo albums, and I really liked the sound of Rough Mix. I thought Townshend's songs were great and very un-Who-like. But the other songs by this fellow Ronnie Lane grabbed me even more. That album sent me on a 20-year search for any of Lane's solo albums, which were long out of print (if they were issued in the US at all). And that sent me back to the Faces and Small Faces. I felt lucky to have seen Lane two different times live (the first time was at the Limelight, which was about the weirdest venue he could have ever played).
As cjbennett says, so many stories along the way...
These stories are great! Thanks everyone for sharing. I realize there could be a story for every artist we call a fave, so I may keep this going with additional parts down the line.
I have a couple. I always "liked" Dylan and obviously knew a ton of his music by osmosis, but the only album I ever bought by him was The Basement Tapes when it first came out--an album I loved right away and still love, duh, but at the time it felt like kind of a one-off with the rest of Dylan's catalog. In the 90s, probably around the time Time Out of Mind came out, I bought a few of the older albums, Blonde on Blonde, Highway 61, and started listening more closely, but mostly to educate myself, not out of real passion. But then I went to my first every Dylan concert, at MSG in 2001 not too long after 9/11. That's when the light went off. I'm sure it was partly the moment--I think this was the first big event I went to following 9/11, so there was an element of release and celebration as well as fear, being in a big crowd at that time--but it was also Dylan's sheer musicality, his playing and the band's. He was on guitar that night and I was blown away. I listen to and see a lot of jazz, and I heard that kind of spontaneity in Dylan's playing. I still feel that's an underrated aspect of his career. (And I wish he'd play guitar again on stage; I think he's been on keyboards the six or seven times I've seen him since.) Anyway, I was obviously way late to the party, but now I'm a passionate Dylan fan. Pretty much have everything, including a boot I found of that 2001 concert. (Audience tape. If anyone knows of a soundboard recording, let me know!)
Another example of this for me is the Beach Boys. Again, I obviously absorbed a lot of their music, and always had a jones for "Good Vibrations," as well as "All Summer Long" and "Wouldn't It Be Nice" because of their appearances in American Graffiti and Shampoo, respectively. But in my 70s high school, which coincided with the Beach Boys' Endless Summer revival, they were music for cheerleaders and born-again Christian girls, so not for me. But then one day, decades later, I was driving somewhere and "California Girls" came on the radio, and it was a revelation, Paul on the road to Damascus or whatever. The whole thing unlocked for me. And again, since, I've listened to everything I can. True story: I never heard Pet Sounds in its entirety until I was in my late 30s. The Beach Boys, for me, are the prime example of music I hated when I was young because it wasn't cool but now love. Fleetwood Mac is another example of that for me. I could go on and on... Fun topic!
Bruce H.
I can’t say that it’s lifelong, but I had never heard of Slobberbone until about two years ago when I read about them on the Adios Lounge blog. I probably missed them because they were lumped in with the alt-Country scene in the late ’90’s, but they’re a lot harder than that most times with some fine country & folk type songs. Also scary stuff like “I Can Tell Our Love Is Waning”. I’d recommend “Haze Of Drink” and “Placemat Blues” for starters, and Stephen King mentioned “Gimme Back My Dog” in a book. “Bees And Seas” is an excellent compilation.
Lately, I’ve been hearing some good songs on the “Better Things” TV show, especially by Du Blonde and Corrina Repp. I also watched two episodes of “The Guest Book” because the creator also did “My Name Is Earl”, which was a favorite of mine. I didn’t like either episode, but a duo called Honey Honey did one song as a bar band that I really liked. The odd thing is that the songs I liked had all been released at least four years ago and I had never heard of them. Time to catch up.
I may've mentioned one or both of these in past responses...but I don't remember. I saw Bob Dylan in the 80s when he was touring with Tom Petty. I went for Petty, but realized I knew more of the Dylan songs than I thought I would. Still, I thought of him as a pretentious songwriter with a lousy voice who is better when covered by someone else. Skip to a few years later, and I'm at my oldest brother's house. He has Biograph on CD. I'm looking at the song titles, and realize, again, that I know a fair amount of these songs. I go to play, if I recall correctly, "Baby Blue", but hit "Masters Of War" by mistake. Now, these two songs aren't even on the same disc, but maybe I had the wrong disc in...or something; it was a long time ago. Perhaps I was sampling and somehow got to "Masters". Anyway, the opening of "Masters" is highly reminiscent of the opening of one of the two greatest songs in history, Lennon's "Working Class Hero", so I listened to the then-unfamiliar song and was fairly gobsmacked. I then ran through the discs and officially had my epiphany that Dylan is The Thing I'd always heard about but dismissed due to my lack of receptiveness. My next girlfriend was a Dylan fiend, coincidentally, so I was able to explore the catalogue and discover that I love love love the guy's voice -- it is the perfect instrument for his songs, and his songs cover about everything.
Shortly before that, I borrowed Nick Cave's "Kicking Against The Pricks" from the previous girlfriend's friend, to give it a spin (along with a bunch of other, unknown-to-me artists) and thought it so terrible that I stopped playing it, but saved it to play for my best bud (another music freak) so I could see his reaction to its horribleness. So, I go to play it that second time....and am besotted. I still have no explanation for why I did a complete flip -- that album's still one of my all-time favorites -- but am glad I hated it enough the first time to want to play it as a joke the second time.
C in California
College, late 1980s. I'm living off campus with my great friend Jesse, who is bi. (Best man at his wedding; still great friends.) I'm the out editor of the college newspaper; he's working to get the gay student group back on campus after being kicked off since the 1970s for being degenerate or something. Jesse's also organizing the volunteer Gay Switchboard which originates in our house with volunteers manning the phones at night to answer safe sex questions so people don't die, gay questions so people don't feel alone and apparently giving an outlet for people who want to call up a stranger and yell "faggot!" before hanging up and then calling again and saying "faggot" and then hanging up and calling again and again until, yes, they start to ask questions and wonder when the person answering the phone first knew they were gay.... The house is nothing huge or special but it's great and near campus and the newspaper. We got a kick out of renting it from a racist landlord who proudly let us know he'd turned down some "colored people." We almost walked away in righteous indignation but it was more fun renting it and knowing how pissed he'd be if he realized we weren't the "right sort" like he imagined. One night we threw a benefit party for the Switchboard or the student group (I can't remember) and placed a glowing pink pyramid in the front yard that could be seen for blocks. In other words, I was at peak gayness. Tons of people flowing in and out, I'm spinning music all night long without trying to be too obvious in my selections while strangers look gobsmacked at my massive collection of albums and books that filled the living room and my bedroom. Naturally, despite hosting a gay event and meeting dozens of new people, I manage to end the night alone. (Utterly alone, as Winona Ryder might have said.) The house has emptied except for a friend or two helping to clean up. (Not Jesse, he's never alone, the bastard.) Part 1
One very good friend Alberto was being a pal. His longterm bf had gone home earlier but Alberto pitched in, picking up beer cans and talking trash about the partygoers. He casually mentioned the jazz musician Chet Baker and I confessed that not only had I not heard Chet Baker, I didn't even KNOW that I hadn't heard Chet Baker. Completely unaware. He was shocked. I mean, my collection was very impressive and given Chet Baker's androgynous voice and James Dean-like appearance, it was like hearing a gay music fan deep into jazz and standards hearing the name Judy Garland and responding, "Who dat?" Alberto said, "Wait right here," dropped the garbage bag he was filling, literally ran to his car, drove home and came back ten minutes later with the CD "The Best Of Chet Baker Plays and Sings." He insisted I put on headphones, placed the CD in the player and cued up "My Funny Valentine." That quiet, confiding voice came out, whispering in my ear. "My funny valentine/ Sweet, comic valentine/ You're my FAAAAA-vorite work of art." Who's singing? A man? A woman? Does it matter? I'm riveted to the spot, seduced by the voice and the horn and yes, the cover photo but then back to the voice. Like many instrumentalists who sing, critics say Baker uses his voice like another instrument. True, but he doesn't lose the sense of the lyrics while doing so. Suddenly, the laid-back cool of West Coast jazz in general and Chet Baker in particular and even Chet Baker when he doesn't sing became a thing for me. It's a true rabbit hole, since you can endlessly search for Japanese and Italian imports which contain that one bonus track you can't find anywhere else. Frankly, "Let's Get Lost: The Best of Chet Baker Sings" is all almost any sane person needs. It's still a constant companion and one of my essentials for any road trip. For example, even Frank Sinatra didn't get under the skin of the novelty number "Everything Happens To Me." But Baker zeroed in on the pathos, making it sadder and funnier. As with most humor, taking it seriously is what makes it work. He doesn't "own" a lot of songs but he's definitely an acquired taste that offers a vulnerability and intimacy and yet subtle swing that most other balladeers can't match. "The Thrill Is Gone," the surprisingly mid-tempo "But Not For Me," "You Don't Know What Love Is" -- ideal late night renditions. They don't make you forget other versions because they're so unique to Chet Baker they seem to reside in an alternate noir universe. I listen to so much music in so many ways that remembering my first experience of this or that artist is difficult. But I remember that night, that voice, that song and especially my friend Alberto watching me with a wicked grin as he saw me blown away by what I was hearing. He was able to do what I usually tried to do for others -- he got to say, "Listen to THIS!"
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