Foxhound
retired
So what were the defining events that lead to you getting so heavily into rock music that you ended up here on this forum? How did you first get into rock? Tell us your story. I'll start with mine:
It was August of 1967 and I was fifteen years old. I had my first summer job - on a tobacco farm near Delhi in southern Ontario. This meant of course that for the first time in my life I'd have a real wad of disposable income - and my plan was to get some of those records to which I had been grooving on the radio. Some of the tunes that stood out in my mind from 1966-67 were "Paperback Writer", "Eleanor Rigby", "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" by the Beatles, "Paint It Black" and "Have You Seen Your Mother Baby, Standing in the Shadow?" by the Rolling Stones, "California Dreamin'" and "Monday, Monday" by the Mamas and Papas, "These Boots Are Made for Walking" by Nancy Sinatra, "Time Won't Let Me" by the Outsiders, "I Fought the Law" by the Bobby Fuller Four, "I Had too Much to Dream Last Night" by the Electric Prunes, "Pied Piper" by Crispian St. Peters, "Come on Down to My Boat Baby" by Every Mother's Son, "Red Rubber Ball" by the Cyrkle and "Let's Live for Today" by the Grassroots. I was quite familiar with the music from earlier in the decade since the radio station to which I had been listening was CHLO in St. Thomas which played an oldie every second number on a Souvenir Safari program every weekend.
Having fulfilled our quota relatively early one Saturday afternoon, some of the older fellows (very cool twenty year olds from Montreal!) were given permission to take the farmer's car into the big town, that being Simcoe, and the even bigger metropolis of Brantford! At the 100 plus mile per hour speed at which they drove the car (no, no seat belts), it didn't take us very long to get to those places.
Of course we stopped at a record shop. The new exotic Beatles' album, "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", was on prominent display and I decided to make it my first purchase when I got back home in September. The other album that I remember catching my eye was "Flowers". The cover picture featured a more decadent and vaguely threatening looking group of young fellows. "Are these the Rolling Stones?" I wondered. I hadn't yet seen the Stones on TV but my guess was of course correct.
The new psychedelic sounding Rolling Stones single "We Love You" was just hitting the airwaves when I returned home just before Labour Day. I listened raptly and marveled at the sound I was hearing.
I went through with my plans and made "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" my first record purchase. I quickly followed up this purchase by acquiring the Beatles' first three Canadian albums in order, "Beatlemania", "Twist and Shout" and "Long Tall Sally".
I then stepped outside the box in October and bought "Big Hits - High Tide and Green Grass" by the Rolling Stones. I was floored! I found the Stones' record far edgier than the comparatively tame Beatles' albums. Then of course there was the innovative for the time booklet of their pictures included within the double sleeve.
I wasn't entirely sure which Stone was which at the time but the brooding, mysterious Stones appealed to me in a way the Beatles did not. I went out and added "Flowers" to my swiftly growing record collection within a couple of weeks.
I think the "Best of the Animals" may have been the first non-Beatle or Stone album I bought. "We Gotta Get out of This Place" had been a popular chant at the boarding school I had attended in Kennebunkport, Maine for grade nine although my favourite Animals' tune at the time was "It's My Life". The "Kinks' Greatest Hits" may have been the next.
I took to reading the record/music review sections of "Time" magazine to which we had a subscription and "Stereo Review" which I could find at the library to get an idea for new, cutting edge bands that weren't necessarily being played on top forty radio. By the end of 1968 I had progressed to buying albums by the Doors, Who, Yardbirds, Cream, Jimi Hendrix Experience, Jethro Tull and Led Zeppelin.
All these I played on the Seabreeze suitcase stereo with detachable speakers that I had bought to replace the family record player. My father condemned my purchase as shamelessly profligate since the existing mono record player that we'd purchased used some years back was still perfectly serviceable!
Now of course I have hundreds of record albums and 45s as well as a steadily growing collection of CDs which I play on a very nice stereo sound system indeed. (My father would be aghast I suppose.) My musical tastes are many and varied - but, nevertheless, after all these years I'm still a Stones fan.
It was August of 1967 and I was fifteen years old. I had my first summer job - on a tobacco farm near Delhi in southern Ontario. This meant of course that for the first time in my life I'd have a real wad of disposable income - and my plan was to get some of those records to which I had been grooving on the radio. Some of the tunes that stood out in my mind from 1966-67 were "Paperback Writer", "Eleanor Rigby", "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" by the Beatles, "Paint It Black" and "Have You Seen Your Mother Baby, Standing in the Shadow?" by the Rolling Stones, "California Dreamin'" and "Monday, Monday" by the Mamas and Papas, "These Boots Are Made for Walking" by Nancy Sinatra, "Time Won't Let Me" by the Outsiders, "I Fought the Law" by the Bobby Fuller Four, "I Had too Much to Dream Last Night" by the Electric Prunes, "Pied Piper" by Crispian St. Peters, "Come on Down to My Boat Baby" by Every Mother's Son, "Red Rubber Ball" by the Cyrkle and "Let's Live for Today" by the Grassroots. I was quite familiar with the music from earlier in the decade since the radio station to which I had been listening was CHLO in St. Thomas which played an oldie every second number on a Souvenir Safari program every weekend.
Having fulfilled our quota relatively early one Saturday afternoon, some of the older fellows (very cool twenty year olds from Montreal!) were given permission to take the farmer's car into the big town, that being Simcoe, and the even bigger metropolis of Brantford! At the 100 plus mile per hour speed at which they drove the car (no, no seat belts), it didn't take us very long to get to those places.
Of course we stopped at a record shop. The new exotic Beatles' album, "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", was on prominent display and I decided to make it my first purchase when I got back home in September. The other album that I remember catching my eye was "Flowers". The cover picture featured a more decadent and vaguely threatening looking group of young fellows. "Are these the Rolling Stones?" I wondered. I hadn't yet seen the Stones on TV but my guess was of course correct.
The new psychedelic sounding Rolling Stones single "We Love You" was just hitting the airwaves when I returned home just before Labour Day. I listened raptly and marveled at the sound I was hearing.
I went through with my plans and made "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" my first record purchase. I quickly followed up this purchase by acquiring the Beatles' first three Canadian albums in order, "Beatlemania", "Twist and Shout" and "Long Tall Sally".
I then stepped outside the box in October and bought "Big Hits - High Tide and Green Grass" by the Rolling Stones. I was floored! I found the Stones' record far edgier than the comparatively tame Beatles' albums. Then of course there was the innovative for the time booklet of their pictures included within the double sleeve.
I wasn't entirely sure which Stone was which at the time but the brooding, mysterious Stones appealed to me in a way the Beatles did not. I went out and added "Flowers" to my swiftly growing record collection within a couple of weeks.
I think the "Best of the Animals" may have been the first non-Beatle or Stone album I bought. "We Gotta Get out of This Place" had been a popular chant at the boarding school I had attended in Kennebunkport, Maine for grade nine although my favourite Animals' tune at the time was "It's My Life". The "Kinks' Greatest Hits" may have been the next.
I took to reading the record/music review sections of "Time" magazine to which we had a subscription and "Stereo Review" which I could find at the library to get an idea for new, cutting edge bands that weren't necessarily being played on top forty radio. By the end of 1968 I had progressed to buying albums by the Doors, Who, Yardbirds, Cream, Jimi Hendrix Experience, Jethro Tull and Led Zeppelin.
All these I played on the Seabreeze suitcase stereo with detachable speakers that I had bought to replace the family record player. My father condemned my purchase as shamelessly profligate since the existing mono record player that we'd purchased used some years back was still perfectly serviceable!
Now of course I have hundreds of record albums and 45s as well as a steadily growing collection of CDs which I play on a very nice stereo sound system indeed. (My father would be aghast I suppose.) My musical tastes are many and varied - but, nevertheless, after all these years I'm still a Stones fan.
Last edited:
