Zen music moment- Take me home Country Road

In the Fall of 1974, I had just finished a football season and nearly the first semester of my freshman year at Sterling College. The season was an awakening for we freshmen,, changing from the high school first teamers to the college new guys.
It was time both hard of the ego and hard on us both physically and mentally.
Everybody hit hard there. Everyone had been the high school star. We soddenly became just one of the team instead of the Go-To guy.
There were a few freshmen from Oklahoma on that team, including myself, another big D lineman b]named Sammy Hankins and a defensive back named Steve Childress.
Sammy was clumsy, big, goofy and seemed to be doing OK with the transition. I had my moments of despair and loneliness. I was homesick, beaten and bruised, and unsure. I went from a Valedictorian at a small high school to kid kind of lost in my college classes. Never had to really study hard before. never was without a starting position on a football team before since 9ht grade football.
Steve was a lot like me in that respect. He came from the small town of Okemah. I'm sure that Steve, a pretty good athlete, handsome with shoulder length hair and a great smile, must have been the pride of the Okemah football team. He struggled a little with the authority in Sterling football, but that was probably because his world was a little shaken, like mine.
But even with those Tom Cruise looks and long straight hair that gave him sort of a gladiator appearance, he was as home sick as was I.

At Thanksgiving break, Steve and I, along with a freshman basketball player from central Oklahoma, loaded into Bessie the wonder car and began a drive home for the holiday. WE drove about 5 hours to Kenny's house in another small own before heading east towards Okemah. It was dark. The road was long and lonely. The only thing we had was the shifting raido stations as we crossed the central Oklahoma plains.
As we drove closer to Okemah, passing familiar sights for Steve, the anticipation of getting home grew worse. It did for me too. I had added about 4 extra hours on to my trip by giving these two guys a ride... but that was OK. They were buddies.
In the darkness of that November night, through the crackling speakers in my '70 Ford maverick, John Denver sang "Country Road" for us.
Being a college football player required a facade of toughness and cockiness. And, when things are difficult and your heart is weak, it becomes a battle to avoid showing weakness or pain. In fact, smart ass remarks and aggressive behaviors replace that and protect you from revealing the true feelings.
AS the words to the songs filled the car, Steve, unable to hold back the pent up emotion, frustration and homesickness burst into tears. His body shuddered with the release.

"I hear her voice in the morning hour she calls me
The radio reminds me of my home far away
and driving down this road I get the feeling
that I should have been home yesterday, yesterday...."

sat awkwardly. Unsure what to do, or if my sympathies would violate that toughness we had to present. But, I knew and I understood. I grieved with him.

Steve didn't return for the sophomore year at Sterling. He moved on and like so many others, I thought he might just become a memory of another time.

I completed college and then when applying for teaching and coaching jobs my first year out of college, I put in an application at the small school of Oilton, Oklahoma. I interviewed with the superintendent and waited for his call. When he called me, he offered me the job. He told me that the thing that made his decision was he had spoken to his son in law about the interviews and mentioned my name. The son in law, Steve Childress had told him I was a good guy.
I still think of Steve every time I hear that song. Not the hurting, upset and home sick Steve, because i know we all shared that feeling, whether we spoke of it or not. I still see him standing on the Kansas football field, hands on hips, cocky ass smile on his face, wind blowing his hair as he spit tobacco juice.
That's the Steve I remember.

should ahve been a rock star- 80's songs that don't suck

Eighties songs that don’t suck

OK… I admit that a lot of the music of the eighties is equivalent to the French Rococo art style. Frivolous, pointless and gaudy. To get rid of that, French peasants ran amok, burned, looted and generally started a revolution. Ok, that is simplifying the French revolution a little, but…..a good listen to the typical 80’s play list would give you the idea.
Now, I know stereotyping is wrong and saying all 80’s music sucks is a n unfair generality. It didn’t. There were the consistent performers, many of who had started their careers in the 70’s and 60’s who still cranked out some impressive music during the 80’s. But, the advent of MTV definitely threw a curveball at the pop music genre. Pre-video channel, it didn’t take a pretty boy to crank out a fantastic guitar solo (see Jimi) or a beautiful woman to get a number one hit, ala Janis Joplin. The faces on video brought in a while new emphasis on the music.
OK. 80’s music is diverse in some ways. There were still remnants of the 70’s punk movement who even managed to get on MTV despite their less than charming looks. The Clash rocked the Kasbah and gave birth to a new movement of music, the New Wave that borrowed heavily from 70’s punk with a touch of early 60’s garage band influence mixed in. It produced a few better dressed, but still snarling musicians such as Elvis Costello, Joe Jackson and the Pretenders.
Late 60’s and 70’s heavy metal still survived, but took a fashion twist from the glam rock of the 70’s. David Bowie gave birth to spandex, long hair metal. Def Leppard, Poison, White Snake, and Guns n’ Roses ground out the decibels album after album for those more inclined to feel their ears bleed with a melodic metal sledge hammer.

The giants of music played on. Billy Joel and Elton John had video hits hat played often. Even ex-Beatles McCartney, Lennon and Harrison graced the music channels. U2 gained more and more momentum throughout the 80’s to become one of the biggest bands in the world.

Stiil, those bands are not who wee think of when we consider the music of the 80’s. It had a peculiar sound. There was synthesizer. There was an influx of dance music. The 80’s took Glam, romanticism, synthesizers and video to create something that while not always lasting, served at least as a temporary distraction for a fascinated TV crowd.
The true 80’s sound was like the old cliché’ about Chinese food. Listen to it and an hour later you’re hungry again. It was not truly filling or satisfying in most cases. It was Milli Vanilli. It was Soft Cell and “tainted Love.” It was Spandau Ballet and OMD. It was ABC and Bananarama. It was Boy George in drag with Culture Club and The Cure singing “Friday I’m in Love.”
Thomas Dolby Blinded Us With Science” and Duran Duran dressed the part of the new romantics and sang about “Rio.” The icing on the 80’s sound was Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Flock of Seagulls, and the Human League.
They all had hits. And for some reason, no matter how much I wanted to know what I had to do to “Wang Chung” tonight, I just could not see most of that music as permanent and lasting.

Some of the music definitely did not suck. The 80’s were gracious enough to give us some thoughtful gems and quirky experiments. The Talking heads twisted our brains with lyrics both hard to decipher and seemingly meaningless. The Police introduced a whole new population to Reggae music. Reggae fests soon began to appear everywhere.

PatBenetar could belt out a song, just as could Cindi Lauper. Elvis Costello turned out to be quite the wordsmith. Prince cut out a niche as a great musician and songwriter despite the fact he took the stage in a G-string in his early days. Madonna has definitely become a music icon in her own right, if not for her music then her ability to recreate herself over and over.
I could never list AHA’s “Take on Me” or Kajagoogoo’s “Too Shy” in my top 80’s sound list, and would probably not be seen dead at their concert despite the fact I let myself be talked into going to an 80s’s concert in which Flock of Seagulls performed. The shame!

Ok… so my list of 80’s sound music that does not suck follows….
1. Church of the Poison Mind- Culture Club
2. Burning Down the House – the Talking Heads
3. When Doves Cry by Prince
4. Melt with you- Modern English
5. Life in a Northern Town- Dream Academy
6. From a Whisper to a Scream- Icicle Works
7. Blister in the Sun- Violent Femmes
8. We’ve Got the Beat – the Go Gos
9. Eternal Flame – the Bangles
10. I Don’t Like Mondays- Boomtown Rats
11. Money Changes Everything- Cindi Lauper
12. Pink Houses – John Mellencamp
13. Steam – Peter Gabriel
14. Sister Christian – Night Ranger
15. Losing M Religion – REM
16. Tempted – The Squeeze
17. Shout – Tears For Fears
18. Jenny 867-5309 – Tommy Tutone
19. Whole Wide World – Wreckless Eric
20. Total Eclipse of the Heart – Bonnie Tyler
21. Turning Japanese- the Vapors
22. Voices carry – Til Tuesday
23. Beds are Burning – Midnight Oil
24. Fake Plastic Trees- Radiohead
25. White Wedding – Billy Idol

Now, there are some songs that are identified as the 80's but actually released in the 70's. I excluded those. Elvis Cosstello's great LP, "My Aim is True" contains the song Allison. Joe Jackson's "Look Sharp" with "Is She Really Going Out With Him," the Knack's "My Sharona" and the 80's and MTV classic "Video Killed the Radio Star " by the Buggles. "Video" was released just 3 months before 1980. It did go on to be the theme of a new video music generation.

Now, a lot of these people have multiple songs that don’t suck. And. , a lot of artists had great tunes, but most of the had sounds that were not 80’s sounds. They were the bands who started in another era and continued through this desert without many musical oasis.

Sure, there were bands that sucked in other eras. The 80’s has no monopoly on that. It just seems that the advent of the music video brought a lot of groups to the screen who fit the look, and seemed more manufactured than the bands of the 70’s or 80’s.
That Fact was illustrated by the Video by BLues Traveler, in which a visual band, headed by a thin singer and cool looking musicians lip synced on stage while the real band, fronted by the more than ample JohnPopper played behind a screen.

Ah... the 80's.

Zen Music Moment - Changes

Zen Music moment

I sat in the small Pizza King restaurant in Lyons Kansas. The overhead fluorescent lights gave a bluish hue to everything. Late, and tired, I was bushed. My first year of college football and the practices were killing me. I had been used to being the big dog in high school, but now I was getting pounded daily. I was trying to adjust to college classes, and it was a new thing. High school had been way too easy for me.
In the small town of Sterling, there was very little to do after the evening rolled in. Late, after study, or goofing off, a few of us discovered the pizza place from some of the local guys. It was a 15 minute drive from Sterling to Lyons, and there we sat, waiting on hot pizza and Coca Cola. We let the frustration of being a freshman, confused and bewildered, slide away with something familiar. The jukebox played and we watched the pretty Lyons high school girls waitress.
I have this memory, of myself and friend and future room mate Terry Brady, sitting there, elbows propped on the plastic red and white checkerboard tablecloth. The new song that played over the jukebox seemed very appropriate to me. David Bowie’s “Changes.”

Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes
(Turn and face the strain)
Ch-ch-Changes
Oh, look out you rock 'n rollers
Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes
(Turn and face the strain)
Ch-ch-Changes
Pretty soon you're gonna get a little older
Time may change me
But I can't trace time
I said that time may change me
But I can't trace time

Changes seemed to be washing over me like waves on the beach. Yes, it was a small college and in a small town, but suddenly I was outside the comfort zone, and an unknown. The coaches didn’t know me from any other freshman. The professors didn’t know my reputation as a good student and I was a little homesick and beaten.
Things were changing.

I thought I had to keep up the facade of being brave, tough and a football stud while daily I actually felt lost, beaten and alone. The new friends I made, including Terry, helped to soothe that feeling of displacement and fear. We were comrades, me, Terry, Mack, Don, Greg, Sammy , John and others who all started as a high school football standout and now began life again at the bottom of the food chain. We bonded from common experience and common situation.
But, there at Pizza King, as the pretty blond waitress named Dixie waited on us, for a just a few moments, Bowie’s song washed over us. Thoughtful, listening to the words and another day of challenge waited outside the door, more changes would have to wait for another slice of pepperoni and a glass of Coke.

Should Have Been a Rock Star- Rapping for an old dude

Should Have Been a Rock Star- Rapping for an old dude

Looking at some lyrics the other day… actually rap lyrics. My sons have started listening to rap music, something they distained at one time. My wife, Ash, was actually the first person in the house to give credence to Rap as an art.
Maybe it’s because she teaches literature and words are her tools, but she often, over my moans, spoke of some of the complex lyric she heard in Rap songs.

Me, just like my slow evolution to music’s new technology, I am a slow person to convert. There are a few things you will find on my IPOD that could be considered rap, or at least have Rap line in them. I really like the music by Tony Morello and Street Sweeper Social Club. It has great sizzling guitar with a rap vocal that caught my eyes and ears when it came on MTV with “100 Little Curses.” Morello says he is looking for the perfect blend of rock and rap. He’s pretty darn close.
I also have some things by Black Eyed Peas who first caught my attention with the song “Where is the Love. “ I do truly love that song and its content. I have to admit there was a time I would have turned it off before giving it a chance, which is funny because when Run DMC made the airwaves with their innocuous version of “Walk This Way,” I listened and even got the LP. I was even a fan of their song “My Addias.” For me, and my musical tastes, it was a big departure.
There were even experimental entries into white boy rap that preceded people like Eminem. Years ago artists used some rapid fire spoken lyrics, but as late as the ’93, Todd Rundgren made an LP that seemed to me to be based on William Gibson’s “Neuromancer,” called “No World Order.” Rundgren rapped the largest part of the lyrics. Even Who guitarist Pete Townshend added a sizzling bridge rap with a guest rapper to a solo live performance of the song “Who are you” in ’98 at Shepard’s Bush. Faith No More, Rage Against the Machine, the Beastie Boys and Anthrax, who is credited as being the first band to mix heavy metal and rap lyrics, all paved a way to what is pretty common place on the video channels today
These aren’t the first rappers to cross the line and bring rap music out of Black American culture. I know that when my sons turned on to it, I was surprised because, me the fossil still saw it as a cultural music, rather than something more universal. When some white artists rapped, such as Vanilla Ice, I must admit, I saw them more as a caricature. But the list is a lot longer than the few I have and they played a big part in introducing the art form to a new crowd. And, the white artists seemed almost cartoonish compared to the darker, more street oriented music that I heard from Ice-T, or Public Enemy or even NWA.
Those acts did seem to represent a culture of the streets, poverty and disenfranchisement. I could understand that their music spoke to something different, to oppression, racism and poverty. I have often wondered how those original innovators feel about the Rap/Hip Hop on the airwaves now, filled with wealth, garish display and lyrics less about cause and more about “see my wealth.” Do they see it as a violation? As a sell out? Do the rappers that burned a pathway into the public eye see the new rap as a perversion of the music of the street?
.
In its early days, the complaints about Rap music were many. Some complaints usually referenced the misogynistic theme of much of the music. Women were referred to as ‘bitch’ and many other less than polite terms. Yes, the same thing permeated some rock music, but the Rap music seemed to be less subtle in its sexism. Eventually, female rappers like Queen Latifah , Salt-n-Pepa, and Missy Elliot forced their way onto the Hip Hop scene and spoke against the inherent sexism in the lyrics. Once a voice against oppression, the Rappers had developed their very own ‘good ‘ol boys’ club.
Violence is also a focus of the criticism of Rap music. As late as 2007, a congressional hearing called witnesses concerning the focus on bad language and violence. Is the violence in the music dangerous for the listener? Even pop and rock faced the same challenge during the PMRC hearings in 1985. Those trials were inconclusive with little more than voluntary labeling for content as a result of the spectacular driven by Tipper Gore.
Even Illinois representative Bobby Rush, an ex-Black Panther, implied that the companies are not doing enough to protect young listeners. “This hearing is not anti-hip-hop,” said Mr. Rush. Still, he said, violence and degradation have “reduced too many of our youngsters to automatons, those who don’t recognize life, those who don’t value life.”

Is rap a bad influence? Is it worse than pop or rock in which semi-clad singers writhe around in videos leaving no doubt about the sexual content of some lyric like Lady Gaga’s“I Want To Ride on Your Disco Stick?” Is it the most common race of Rappers, and hints of racism itself that draws the attention of the public to this genre’s excesses? Or, it the criticism accurate in its assumption that this musical form has gone too far, degrading women, promoting violence and desensitizing the youth to foul language, violence and sexism?

A tough question that every generation seems to have to answer, whether it is the Ed Sullivan Show only showing Elvis from the waist up, making the Rolling Stones sing “Let’s Spend Some Time Together” instead of the night together, or early attempts to ban rock and roll because, as a southern radio station DJ in the 50’s said, it was “Nigger music.”

Will rap mellow? Mature?
Will it be diffused by its spread into a wider culture? Will it settle into a formulaic genre as some pop music has? Will it take the reins of social upheaval or slide into the same corporate interchangeable parts form of entertainment as so much of Rock has done, losing its mandate as the changing force in society?
Does it still speak for the disenfranchised or a display for the Nouveau Riche?

We can only hope that among the hours and hours of drivel, that somewhere in both Rap and Rock, someone is fermenting rebellion, and that someone wants to make the listening public aware of injustice, and someone is still trying to shake the foundations of complacency by using the music we love so much.

I should have been a rock star…. The lullaby

I should have been a rock star…. The lullaby

Yesterday, I walked into the field house following a frustrating practice with the 9ht grade football team… picked up the phone to see Corwin, who is at U of Tulsa, had left me a text.
Of course, one of the first things a parent thinks is “What’s wrong?”
I opened the text to find this message…..

“I just listened to Rocky Raccoon. Ah, good memories. I remember when you used to sing that to us.”

Suddenly, the tension of the practice and my aggravation with the day’s actions of 15-year-old boys faded into a smile. Warm memories of a rocking chair and bedtime chased away the October afternoon chill.

The Lullabies…
One of the few times it was OK to sing out loud for me.
When the boys were small, Ash and I often held them, rocked and sang them to sleep. Spoiled them? Maybe? Should we have done the thing about just laying them down awake so they’d get used to going to sleep on their own? Maybe. But I think it was as much as a selfish thing for us as it was a soothing thing for them.
We got to hold them, sing to them and slowly coax them into sleep with a collection of songs from the past. The warm baby or toddler, pressed against your chest, or cradled in your arms, drifting slowly into soft snores while we visited old friends in the guise of familiar tunes.

Ash and I each had our own particular list of songs we sang to the boys. Ashley went for some soft classics such as “Peter Paul and Mary’s “Puff the Magic Dragon,” or even current tunes (at that time) such as the bangles “Eternal Flame.”

“Close your eyes. Give me your hand.
Do you feel my heart beating?
Do you understand?
Do you feel the same?
Am I only dreaming?
Or is this burning an eternal flame?”

Her voice was softer and more graceful than my own, as I cracked and broke through a collection of classic Beatles and Monkee tunes.
“Sing Rocky! Sing Rocky!” was something both boys demanded from time to time. So, I would start with the songs sing-song spoken intro of “Now somewhere in the black mountain hills of Dakota lived a young boy named Rocky Raccoon, “ before leading into the song about the brash young man seeking revenge for the man who stole his love away.
The Beatles white album was a treasure trove of songs for bedtime. We sang “I Will,” “Dear Prudence,” “Mother nature’s Son,” and “Honey Pie.” The Beatles also offered up “Golden Slumbers,” “Till There Was You,” “Eight days a Week,” “Let It Be,” and “Here Comes the Sun.”
The boys were introduced to the Monkees in “Daydream Believer,” “What Am I Doing Hanging ‘Round,” and “I’m a Believer.”

No doubt, the boys had their favs. Sometimes they would request “Bungalow Bill” from the Beatles. Others, it was Queen and “Somebody to Love.” Or “Bohemian Rhapsody.” Cat Stevens, Chicago, America, The Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Leon Russell and the Moody Blues… we were the boy’s personal bedtime jukeboxes.

It was a sad moment for me, when the boys got older and the singing began to fade away. I remember the day when Corwin, falling asleep on my lap, as I began to sing softly, reached his small hand to my mouth and said “Don’t sing right now, daddy.”
He didn’t need the song to fall asleep anymore.

Our joke has always been that if we were to make the boys playlists of the songs we sang to them to rock them to sleep, it would still knock them out. After all, they both still crash into dreamland when riding in the back of the car, even on short trips to Tulsa. Those little kids comforts die hard.

“Who Knows How Long I loved you
You know I love you still
Will I wait a lonely life time
If you want me to I will.”

I Should Have Been a Rock Star- Kicking and Screaming – dragged into the future with technology

I Should Have Been a Rock Star- Kicking and Screaming – dragged into the future with technology



I still remember buying my first Beatles LP. And the hundreds of others to follow, both Beatles and the multitude of bands and artists that I followed or test drove.

The 12-inch cardboard sleeve, covered with a sheer shrink-wrap of plastic, waiting to be opened by me. It was smooth to my touch as I turned it over and over, scanbnning the pristine cover, noting each picture and word written thereon. I read the song list and even the product number and release adte.
Finally, I would tear the plastic, unwrapping the sleeve. The, flex the sides of the LP cover to open the inside, revealing a paper sleeve and within it, the plastic that bore the Beatles very voices to me. In those days, the record companies often advertised other acts on the paper sleeve. I looked them over, noting which I knew and which I had no interesting knowing. In those early days of Beatles music, the ads might bear something a Beatles fan was unlikely to have tin their collection.
Removing the black Lp from the paper sleeve, and stacking the paper on top of its cardboard container, I held the Lp by the edges, hoping to imprint not even a fingerprint on the glistening grooves. I turned the album over and over, watching the rainbow arc of the Capitol records insignia, and reading each song title, author nd noting the length of each song. There were times I had my little brothers and sisters quiz me from the albums as to the song lengths and order on every record.
Placing the record on the turntable, which at that time was a primitive single speaker player, I clicked the speed to 33 1/3 RPM and switched on the power. As the disc rotated, I lifted the needle and carefully, set it on the edge of the record allowing me just enough time to sit back in anticipation of the music to follow.
I rated each song as it played. A few years ago, I still had the lyric sleeve of the Beatles White Album, with notes and star ratings for each song. I listened the 1st side through, then lifted the needle and carefully turned the record to play side 2, repeating the process.

Playing each album was nearly a religious experience. The cover art, which grew more and more elaborate as the years passed, and the way the songs melted one into the next. Admittedly, the early albums of the 60’s tended to pay little attention to the song listing, usually posting singles as the major source of revenue for the Company, and albums were often filled with filler.
Albums like “Pet Sounds” by the Beach boys, “Sgt. Pepper” and Abbey Road” by the Beatles set new standards for the collection of songs on each LP. Rock Operas like the Who’s “Tommy” and “Jesus Christ Superstar” made the concept album an accepted idea, and other abnds followed suit. Music shifted form single dominated sales to Album Oriented Rock, which also brought on the movement to FM radio rock stations. Rock Music became more than a feel good, teenage rebel genre, it grew sophistication.
The Moody Blues, Yes and The Kinks followed quickly. Other progressive rock acts led the way with rock symphonies. Genesis, Jethro Tull, David Bowie and Pink Floyd created LPs that were more than a collection of tunes, but something with theme and movement. “The Wall” still stands as one of my favorites, but could only have happened after “Dark Side of the Moon” which I believe still holds a record for most weeks on the Billboard charts.

The LP cover itself began to change, from the simple artists photos of early rock and pop to psychedelic works of art. “Sgt. Pepper” made you look and keep looking. Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were here.” And “Dark Side of the Moon” covers were integral to the album itself. Led Zeppelin went further with its morphing covers in “Physical Graffiti” and “In Through The Out Door.” The covers became rebellious themselves, as LP covers by the Beatles (“Yesterday and Today” butcher cover), Hendrix (Electric Ladyland” Nude cover), John Lennon (“Two Virgins” nude cover) and Blind faith (“Blind Faith” naked young girl and plane) were banned for their explicit content.
The album, even with its eventual cracks and pops, was the vehicle through which rock music sailed into my life. By the time I was in college, I had collected thousands.

Then, technology caught up.

I was an LP guy caught in a changing world. In college, I had delved a little into the world of 8 Track, but never bought my favorite stuff in it.. They came in LPs and then I would record “best of” collections to carry as an 8 Track in the crappy little car 8 track player I had rigged in the car. I had taken 2 old small speakers from a decrepit stereo, hung them in the side of my 1970 Maverick and hooked them to the 8 track player. It was purely ghetto and scary to any girl who dared enter the car, but I liked it on the long drives to and from college. Four to five hours across the Great Plains and radio twilight zone, and I had 8 Track through the crackly speakers.

But, cassette was quickly making mincemeat of the 8 Track. Not only was it more compact, easier to carry, and held music, it was not split in the middle of a track by the clicking of one track to the next. My complaint about the loss of album art was even more a part of hating cassettes. I finally got a car that had a cassette deck, but once again, the albums I really treasured, I bought on vinyl. The cassette was left to making “best of” lists and Mixes.
Admittedly, I did love to make and share mixes, but my true music passion was still tied up in the total experience of the LP> In it, there was the sound and the visual. The cassette had an even smaller area for album art, and with the slow move from the LP to the cassette, you could see the end of an era in album art. Imagine squeezing the Sistine Chapel ceiling down to photograph size? Imagine if the French had sent over a 6 ft. Statue of Liberty instead of the full size? Imagine Picasso as only greeting cards?

To me, that was what the cassette was.

No more round LP’s like Grand Fink’s “E Pluribus Funk.” No more clever LP designs like “Sticky Fingers” by the Stones. The fold out LP (any Kiss LP, or classics like the Beatles White LP), and the Box Lp ( “Harrison’s “All Things Must Pass”) all faded into just another cassette box in the store bin.

Still I hung on. I had become a musical Luddite. I was fighting a single-handed war against change and loss of the LP cover. I ws ready to grab a steel bar and rush through the factories smashing the machines that stung miles of magnetic tape on tiny plastic spools. Pounding and smashing, till the powers that be brought back the cover and back the art.

It was a losing battle.

The death blow to my record collecting came in a stealthy way, behind a smiling and loving face…. My wife and my mom.

In the early 90’s, the two of them pitched in to buy my first CD player. I opened it at Christmas, unsure exactly what to think. I was like the kid, wary of his first taste of brussell spouts. They held the spoon before me, smiling and urging me to taste. Ashley even took me to a used CD store to make the purchase of these new discs a little less of a monetary impact on my scrooge like soul. The CD did cost more than the cassette and definitely more than the LP. I was wary of it for that reason and also because even George Harrison had voiced his wariness to them in a Rolling Stone interview. “They sounded ‘cold,’ he had said. He wanted to hear the comforting sound of an LP.

Me? I wanted the total sensory experience. I wanted what I had the first time I heard Yes’ LP “Not Fragile” through headphones at Jerry Realle’s house. I wanted to be able to drop the needle on any song I wanted, which was not possible with 8 tracks and cassettes. I wanted to hold the LP in may hands and scan ever detail of the bigger than life art.

I owned a CD before I had a player. I had called Rockline and answered a trivia question once, and they sent me Pete Townshend’s newest rock Opera, “Ironman.” It was the first CD I played. Then Ash and I went to the CD store and picked up other classic LPs in Cd format. “Yellow Brick Road.” “Dark Side of the Moon.” “The Wall.” “Abbey Road.” “The Beatles” (White album).
Straight from Mary Poppin’s own words of wisdom, these digitalized musical classics slid down my aural canal with a spoonful of sugar. My system fought it, and I actually felt guilty for liking it. But, the sound was good. I could switch from track to track. I could even hook up my portable CD player to my car stereo! And, the CD could go with me everywhere, just like a cassette, but with the convenience of an LP.
Other people complained about a tinny sound. Some were miffed that the warmer sound of the LP with hiss, pops and needle sound had been replaced by a sterilized computer. The disc was still too small to replace the old LP art, but everything else about it seemed to be a great improvement over the 8 track and cassette. When the CD recorder came out, it seemed that my LP collection played less and less as my CD co9llection grew bigger and bigger.
I was sold. The record player went into the closet, soon followed by the dual cassette deck. I had jumped into the world of the CD, never to breath the air of the LP again. Closing the closet door on the player, and slowly moving my collection of LPs to a place in another closet marked the end of an era of music collection.

But, technology wasn’t finished yet. I admit, I am slow to change. My metamorphosis takes a while. My cocoon takes a while to spin. My butterfly wings are slow to develop.

MY sons took the step into the complete digital world before I did. In fact, both boys and Ashley all converted to the IPOD before I did. Ashley tells me that when they finally bought me an IPOD for Christmas, she and the boys agonized over it. Would I use it? Would I give up my CD collection? Was the tactile part of the music something I would miss without having a CD, a case and a cover?

I admit, when opening it, I greeted it the same way I had with the first CD player. I was wary. I enjoyed the handling of the case and reading the liner notes. I liked to feel the cover in my hands, even if it wasn’t the old LP size, but then, they tell me size isn’t everything.

At Ashley’s instruction, I began to load my CDs onto the IPOD. It started as a small thing, and then became an obsession. It became a labor of love, revisiting all the music that had laid low in the cabinet where we kept all the CDs. I reacquainted myself with some of the more obscure songs again. I would read the song list on the CD and listen once again to tunes I hadn’t heard in a long time. I created play lists and best of lists. It became a new obsession. And best of all, it traveled with me, even while I jogged which the CD played never did a good job of doing without skipping and stopping.

Like I said, my change is slow, and I still buy the CD of my favorite artists. This past year, I made my first completely digital purchase….Neil Young’s “Fork in the Road.” That began a new era in my music collection. I have yet to actually burn a hard copy of that CD… but I know I will. Old habits and obsessions die hard.

So, I have morphed through a long series of musical formats in my collecting history. I thought at one time that the LP would last forever, and now, here I am loading new tunes onto a tiny rectangular machine that carries weeks of tunes wherever I go.

Will there be another format revolution before my music collecting is over? Maybe.

I don’t know what it will be, but I can guarantee one thing. …..

I will convert slowly and reluctantly.






these are my favorite Lp cover... what shame the new generations will not be able to appreciate them as they were..... sort of like being told great grandma was a beautiful woman... but you never get to see the real thing...

Physical Graffiti- Led Zepplin
Sgt Pepper-The Beatles
E Pluribus Funk- Grand Funk
Sticky Fingers- Rolling Stones
Dark Side of the Moon- Pink Floyd
Wish You Were Here- Pink Floyd
Close to the Edge- Yes
Fragile- Yes
Tommy- The Who
All Things Must Pass- George Harrison
Bat out of Hell- Meatloaf
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road- Elton John
Houses of the Holy- Led Zepplin
Live Peace in Toronto- John Lennon
A Wizard a True Star- Todd Rundgren

I shold have been a rock star- encore

Oct 8, 2007
Last night I had the chance t see Blue Oyster Cult again…..still on
the road and still cranking out the mega-decibels. It has been about
8 years since their last album; one that sill had some great BOC
tunes. Both Fletch and I are BOC fans and he drove back from OU in a
driving rain storm to go t the show with me.
The show was at the Tulsa state fair. They were supposed to play
outside at the Oklahoma Stage, an open air theater off the fairway,
but this gigantic front and rain moved into Oklahoma just in time to
mess up the show. Fletch had called, asking about the show. I checked
online, but no info there about any changes. I was ready to don rain
gear and stand out in a hurricane to hear “Don’t Fear The Reaper” and
“Cities on Flame With Rock and Roll” again.
I gathered the rain gear. Meanwhile, Fletch was running late in his
2 hour drive home. The roads were cluttered with traffic accidents and
slow moving cars due to the torrents of rain. I checked the fair web
site over and over, looking for news, and finally a report came across
the local news that BOC was in Tulsa and the show had been moved
indoors, but delayed by 30 minutes.
WE hadn’t seen the Cult in a few years. They played the Tulsa
fairgrounds another time, along with Starship, Foghat and BOC
headlining. The event was on a week night, and obviously, it drew an
older crowd. It, too, had been moved indoors to the lower level of
fairgrounds Pavilion. There was so much time in between acts, the
roadies wandering around aimlessly while the crowd grew more and more
restless. Starship opened with a lot of sound problems that muted
Mickey Thomas’ voice and performance. Foghat put on one of their
better sows, but they were without long time guitarist Lonesome Dave
Previtt, who died in 2000 after a battle with cancer. He had been
replaced by ex-Wild Cherry (“Play That Funky Music”) guitarist, Bryan
Bassett.
By the time BOC got to take the stage, the crowd had dwindled down
to a spare group…. And we crowded to the front of the stage. I was
afraid that the small crowd would be less of an incentive to play a
great show, but Eric Bloom and Buck Dharma didn’t disappoint us.
Standing just feet from the stage, singing along with “Don’t Fear The
Reaper” and “Burning For You,” we soaked in every note of the show
that seemed to be played just for us.

So, Fletch, and I, along with Dave Decker, drove through sheets of
rain to Tulsa, avoiding weather related car accidents and flooded
intersections to arrive at a deserted fairground. The water cascaded
across the pavement as we walked between abandoned rides and booths.
It was almost as if we were in a carnival ghost town.
We finally entered the only active place at the soaked fairgrounds,
the indoor exhibit area. There, we bought a greatly overpriced cup of
beer, shook the rain off our jackets and wandered thorough booths,
cars and mobile homes in which a skeleton crew of workers, fairgoers
and concert-minded people passed the time.
The newly moved show was in the Pavilion, across the fairgrounds
form the Expo building. We looked and paced until a time we felt would
still get us close to the stage, without waiting long in line. Then,
we set out across the grounds, still being pummeled by buckets of
rain.
The building was still being used. The rodeo was still going on when
we entered. We could see the lights and stage of the concert
suspended above the rodeo floor, but the horses and cattle still were
what rocked the building. An impatient young usher disgustedly
explained we would have to wit or sit in the rafter seats till the
rodeo was over.
We sat, impatiently, waiting through calf roping, clown acts and
finally bull riding. I was wondering what the New York based BOC
thought of following a rodeo. But, at last, well over an hour after
expected starting time, the rodeo bowed out after a final oratory on
freedom and the American soldier. Crew members rushed out to lower the
stage and begin setting up the band equipment.
Dave, Fletch and I made our way onto the dirt covered floor pitted
with hoof prints and truck tires. As we stood through the sound check,
Fletch asked, “How big was Blue Oyster Cult I their heyday?”
“Played Stadiums,” I told him. I saw them at big concert halls. In
fact, I had seen them in Tulsa several times, and in Wichita,
headlining both concert hall and outdoor stadium shows.
“I wonder how someone like that feels about playing a state fair
after being in the big time?” He asked. “Must love the Music.”

What is it that keeps a band like that still playing and coming
back? What makes some do an oldies tour? What drives a single guy from
a band to create a new band around them under the old name? Grand Fun
tours with basically only drummer Don Brewer from the original band.
The Guess Who is only two originals, and neither is Burton Cummings or
randy Bachman. Mick Jones is the only original in Foreigner. When is a
band no longer the band?
Is it simply for the money? Is it an inability to let go of the past?
Is it the hope that you might get back to the top?
Or is it truly for the love of the music? Could it be for that
feeling you get from the cheers and applause that come because you
wrote that song, or because they recognize the guitar solo you
created? Does the big stage even matter, or is it the fact that
people are coming because they remember you and what you meant to
them?
Ironically, as the concert started, we were told by lead vocalist
Eric bloom that guitarist buck Dharma was not there. He had not been
able to land in Tulsa due to the storm and was currently on his way
back after a detour to Dallas. His duties and vocals would be handled
by back up guitarist, Richie Casteland.
Fletch had said he wanted to hear “The Red and the Black” for the
guitar in it. I guess the rock gods heard his young plea and BOC
opened with the very song! I know he was disappointed that Buck was
not there, but Richie did a great job filling in. His solo sizzled.
Bloom directed the band through a series of BO hits, including “Cities
On Flame,” “Burning For You,””Godzilla,” “Hot rails To Hell” and
“Don’t’ Fear The Reaper.” They even played the unlikely “Black Blade”
from the Moorcock Elric fantasy novels.
The show was over before we knew it. I was already hoarse from
screaming the lyrics, but apparently the late start and fair schedule
left them little time to do a whole set. It was a good show, but left
me wanting more. There were so many songs that were left unplayed. I
wanted to scream “dominance” to Bloom’s “submission!” I wanted to do
air guitar to “Stairway to the Stars” and “O.D.ed On Life Itself!”
But Bloom waved to the crowd, and announced they were out of time.
The band left the stage and the lights came up. We had a good meal of
BOC rock, but still wanted desert. We stood for a few moments, just in
case and then wandered slowly off the dirt covered floor and out into
the rainy night.
I love Blue Oyster Cult. I Love their music, often described as the
“thinking Man’s Heavy Metal.” I love what the remind me of. I love
the fact that they probably did permanent haring damage to me years
ago… when the show was so loud I swear my ears were bleeding as
“Godzilla” pounded through the concert hall. I love that fact that
they are probably sci-fi and fantasy nerds with loud electric guitars
from an era that is hard to describe.

Before the show, Dave, Fletch and I were getting beer from a vendor
when I spied a couple of girls from the high school. They pointed at
the beer in m hand, and laughingly said, “Coach Dugan with beer??!!” I
walked t talk with them and asked, have either of you ever listened to
Blue Oyster Cult before?” Both shook their heads “no” and then one,
Daria, thinking because the band followed the rodeo, asked “Are they
some kind of Red Dirt band?”

I smiled. “No… definitely not,” I answered. “They rock.”