Preludin 5-10-15-20

[clive gash]

Shamelessly nicked from Pitchfork (boo!), a thread where you pick the music that you were listening to when you were 5-10-15-20 and so on. I don’t know about you but my tastes atrophied about 10 years ago but still, something to do eh? 

You first. 

[fonz]

I’ll come back to this

[Charlie O.]

I'm working on it now.

[Charlie O.]

Age 5 (October 1970 - October 1971)

albums:
The Beatles - Help! (US soundtrack album - I'd just seen the movie on TV), Let It Be (my 12-year-old brother Jon bought the former and I the latter; at some point we traded)
(Paul Revere &) The Raiders - Greatest Hits Volume II
Iron Butterfly - In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida (my 15-year-old brother Jim's)
Rare Earth - Get Ready
Creedence Clearwater Revival - Cosmo's Factory
Three Dog Night - Naturally, Golden Bisquits
Donovan - Barabajagal (which I'd had for a while, but was still playing a lot)
68/WRKO Now Radio Boston - 30 Now Goldens Vol. 2 (my brother Jim's; seems he was feeling a bit nostalgic that year)
Ringo Starr - Sentimental Journey (a Christmas gift; not played quite as much as most of the others here, but it was effectively my introduction to The Great American Songbook, so thanks, Ringo!)
The Partridge Family - first two albums (even at that age I could tell they were a bit bogus, however much I enjoyed the TV show)

45s:
Tommy James - "Draggin' The Line"/"Bits And Pieces" (which my brothers talked me into getting - I hadn't heard it before)
Three Dog Night - "Mama Told Me (Not To Come)" (my brother Jim's)
The Guess Who - "Share The Land"/"Bus Rider" (I got this hoping it was "Hand Me Down World", which I loved but didn't know the name of)
The Grass Roots - "Come On And Say It"/"Something's Comin' Over Me" (I got this hoping it was "Temptation Eyes", which I loved but didn't know the name of)
The Music Machine - "Talk Talk" (my nostalgic brother Jim's)
The Music Explosion - "Little Bit O' Soul" (ibid.)

And plenty of Top 40 radio, of course.


Age 10 (October 1975-October 1976)

albums:
Joni Mitchell - Court And Spark (Jon asked for it for his birthday; I got it for him, then fell in love with it myself. He subsequently got The Hissing Of Summer Lawns but aside from a few cuts that one didn't really connect with me.)
Aerosmith - Rocks (also Jon's)
Todd Rundgren's Utopia - self-titled and Another Live
Queen - A Night At The Opera
History Of British Rock Vol. 2 (Jim's - though I got my own copy not long after)
Monty Python - The Worst Best... (a comp of Another Monty Python Record and Monty Python's Previous Record... this was HUGE for me)
Simon & Garfunkel - Parsley Sage Rosemary & Thyme
I had to have bought other albums that year, but I can't remember what, now! A lot of cut-outs, I'm guessing.

45s:
Neil Sedaka - "Bad Blood"
Cheech And Chong - "Framed"/"Pedro's Request"
There were probably other 45s, too, but I was beginning to drift away from those a bit.

And plenty of Top 40 radio, of course. (It was Peter Frampton and Fleetwood Mac's year, but I mainly remember how fresh and exciting Boston's "More Than A Feeling" sounded coming over the airwaves... the first several dozen times.)


Age 15 (October 1980-October 1981)

albums:
The Red Crayola with The Familiar Ugly - The Parable Of Arable Land
13th Floor Elevators - Easter Everywhere (didn't get a-hold of the other albums 'til a few years later)
Love - Best Of (Rhino), Forever Changes
NRBQ - Tiddlywinks
Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band - Doc At The Radar Station
Pere Ubu - The Art Of Walking, 390° Of Simulated Stereo
The Velvet Underground - first two albums and the bootleg etc.
Gentle Giant - Free Hand (on 8-track!)
John Fahey - The Essential (comp of his two Vanguard albums... also on 8-track)
The Mothers - Just Another Band From L.A., One Size Fits All
Roky Erickson & The Aliens - self-titled, The Evil One
Soft Machine - Third
Robert Wyatt - The End Of An Ear
Joy Division - Still (I think I caught up with the two "proper" albums and singles the following year)
U2 - Boy
Urgh! A Music War

45s:
Pere Ubu - "Not Happy"/"Lonesome Cowboy Dave" (my introduction to the band!)

And lots of The Doctor Demento Radio Show, of course.


Age 20 (October 1985-October 1986)
I spent the evening of my 20th birthday seeing X, one of my then-favorite bands, for the first time - promoting Ain't Love Grand, possibly their worst and certainly their most disappointing album. It was still a pretty good show, though not as strong as ones I've caught from them in this century.

albums:
Hüsker Dü - Flip Your Wig
The Replacements - Tim
Big Star - 3rd
Huey "Piano" Smith & The Clowns - Serious Clownin' (compiled by future Black Cat Boner tg!)
R.E.M. - Lifes Rich Pageant
Rites Of Spring - s/t
Alex Chilton - Like Flies On Sherbert
The Damned - Machine Gun Etiquette
Meat Puppets - first three (I'd just discovered them)
Minutemen - Double Nickels On The Dime, 3 Way Tie (For Last)
Volcano Suns - All Night Lotus Party
Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers - It's Time For
Hank Williams - 40 Greatest Hits
Alexander Spence - Oar
Paul Simon - Graceland

bootleg cassettes:
The Replacements - Maxwell's, Feb.2, 1986 (finally released legitimately a few years ago as For Sale)
Dylan & The Hawks - "Albert Hall"

EPs:
The Rational Herdsmen - Out To Pasture
D.T. & The Shakes - Smooth Studio Crafted Teen Fodder
Meat Puppets - In A Car, Out My Way (I'd just discovered them)
Rites Of Spring - All Through A Life (a cassette dub - it was officially released at least a year later)

45s:
Volcano Suns - "Sea Cruise"/"Greasy Spine"
Squirrel Bait - "Kid Dynamite"/"Slake Train Coming"
Prince & The Revolution - "Kiss"/"♥ or $"

and loads else I'm forgetting about. I was just gobbling up music all the time.

I'm gonna stop here, for now at least. This is hard!

[sloopjohnc]

How does anyone compete with Charlie? I was listening to fucking Peter and the Wolf at five.

[toomanyhatz]

5 -



10 (8, actually, but hadn't moved on yet) -



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[Deleted]

Teen years must have been tough listening to shite like Emerson Lake and Palmer?

Your taste has certainly improved by quite a bit....thank the Lord.....

Do you still listen to ELP?

Mary Popppins is great as well.....some great standards in that one actually....

[toomanyhatz]

At 15 I had discovered pot, and hadn't really discovered 60s music yet despite already being a pretty big Beatles fan. I came to like a lot of the early punk bands a few years later, but that was later. My taste was developing, but just being honest that for 6 months there I thought ELP was the greatest thing in the world.

[tg]

Sept 3, 2021 23:26:53 GMT Charlie O. said:

Huey "Piano" Smith & The Clowns - Serious Clownin' (compiled by future Black Cat Boner tg!)

Someone remembers! And enjoyed!

(Thanks Charlie)

[Charlie O.]

Sept 5, 2021 11:55:30 GMT tg said:

Sept 3, 2021 23:26:53 GMT Charlie O. said:

Huey "Piano" Smith & The Clowns - Serious Clownin' (compiled by future Black Cat Boner tg!)

Someone remembers! And enjoyed!

(Thanks Charlie)

Played it just the other day!

[loveless]

Charlie's list is impressively mind boggling, in that his tastes at 10 and 15, for example, seem impossibly hip, tuned in, curious, adventurous and knowing compared to my own at those ages (I wasn't anywhere NEAR ready for the likes of Wyatt/Soft Machine, 13th Floor Elevators, Love, et. al. at 15...and wouldn't have known to look/where to look - I was fully immersed in Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin and the Doors [and Changesonebowie], maybe the occasional dash of U2...and really didn't need much else).

[Charlie O.]

Older brothers can provide a great head start. Thanks to Jon, by 10 I was reading CREEM Magazine regularly.

And by 15 I'd discovered Lillian Roxon's Rock Encyclopedia and (more crucially) the first Rolling Stone Record Guide.

[fearlessfreap]

5 68-69. While trying narcotics for the first time, I was sitting in the bushes of Tompkins Square Park tying a belt around my bicep, when I heard the mellifluous tones of I Heard Her Call My Name wafting from a tenement window and thought to myself, what is that beautiful music. It stuck in my head for a while, and later that week, I was at the Strand bookstore engaged in a conversation about the writing of Andre Gide with a Barnard co-ed when I heard the song again coming from a back room. Quickly, I turned to the salesperson behind the counter to ask what it was, and that’s how I discovered the Velvet Underground.

Seriously, at five, I wasn’t listening to anything.

10 73-74. I heard the Alice Cooper band on the radio and in school, and they became my first favorite act. I was also into the Stones, Led Zeppelin and Philly soul.

15 78-79. By now I was immersed in Creem and Trouser press and would read the British weeklies at the magazine shop at the mall. I liked current acts like the Buzzcocks, the Jam, the Saints, the Clash, Talking Heads, and noisy post punk like PiL and the Pop Group.

20 83-84. Indie rock - the Wipers were my favorite, also, the Minutemen, Husker Du, Mest Puppets etc. I had been into jazz since I was 16 and was buying Ornette Coleman, Mingus and Sun Ra records.
Early hip hop - Sugar Hill 12”s Afrika Bambaata, Run DMC…

25 88-89 Still lots of jazz , golden age hip hop —Eric B and Rakim, Public Enemy, Jungle Brothers, EPMD, and acid house 12”s indie, like Mudhoney, Bongwater, My Bloody Valentine, Flying Nun and Creation imports

30. 93-94 Stereolab and other Too Pure acts, Wu Tang Clan, Nas, Beatnuts, Geto Boys