Damn Rascal Music History : Rock Music Oblivion

It’s hard for me to remember exactly which compact disc (CD) I purchased first. But I know damn well which cassette tape poked the most formative holes in my sheltered musical bubble : Classic Queen. This small and unassuming musical collection was comprised of 12 magical songs, one of which was a little tune called Bohemian Rhapsody.

I couldn’t understand why everyone in our little rag tag band was so excited by this new sheet music. Their excitement at the prospect of learning this song made me curious…curious enough to approach my dear mother about possibly acquiring a copy of it. I did so, when she seemed in a good mood, mentioning that we were learning new music and it would be great if I could hear the original version for myself. “Of course this is purely for research purposes”, I added. And it honestly was, because I literally had no idea what the song was or who the band was. I just new the name of the song and that we were supposed to learn it in hopes of performing it at a band competition in the Spring. Armed with that information and the clear mission to see her child succeed in this endeavor, my dear mother paid a visit to the local music store (Sound Warehouse in Tulsa, Oklahoma) and after school a few days later, I was presented with a copy of “Classic Queen”.

I’m sure it helped my cause that there were no strange pictures or “long haired hippies” (as my dad used to say) on the front cover. The band’s name, “Queen”, certainly didn’t raise any devil rock music alarms. And none of the song titles were outrageously alarming. But inside that little package, recorded onto the innards of the plastic and the tape, was a whole new world for me…one with loud guitars, big drum sounds, and a voice that I could only define as angry and angelic, all at the same time. I honestly don’t remember the first time I listened to Bohemian Rhapsody. I just remember that I listened to the whole cassette tape again and again and again and so on. And like anything that you start to enjoy, you begin to want more of it. So it was with music.

Bohemian Rhapsody as it turns out, was a sad, interesting and captivating song. The words seemed to tell a story about a troubled boy. I could immediately relate to that story line. But what was most intriguing, was how everything changed so much within the song itself. The Beach Boys were never this interesting. That cassette tape became my gateway into, what would become my lifelong interest and obsession with listening to and making music. Needless to say that by the time our band competition rolled around, I knew full well why it was such a big deal to be playing this song in a band competition. Of course, the judges, firmly rooted in their classical music traditions, didn’t take kindly to our adventurous choice in song selection. They had either never heard of the song before or they knew full well what we were playing and failed to appreciate the uniqueness of our choice. Regardless, their sentiments were reflected full well in our lackluster competition scores. Still, we had managed to hold it together and our band teacher’s simple act of bravery had inadvertently unlocked a new world of music for one of his students. And down the musical rabbit hole I went…

Damn Rascal Music History : An Introduction

It was decided by my parents during my 4th grade year of elementary school, that I should take up a musical instrument. And years later, it was also my parents who attempted to closely monitor, reign in or altogether squash my interest in music…specifically rock music. To their credit, they didn’t understand it and quite frankly, neither did I. But I loved how it sounded and listening to it made me feel less alone and more real. And that was my childhood with music in a nutshell.

Prior to 4th grade, my earliest memories of music were the songs on my Dad’s radio station of choice. Present day, these songs would be considered “yacht rock” and although I admired the melodies and occasional electric guitar solos, I was keenly aware that this music was not celebrated by my peers and labeled as “cool”. When 4th grade rolled around and I was tasked with deciding on a musical instrument to learn, I chose the Saxophone because I thought it looked cool and I liked how it sounded. And so my parents brought home a Saxophone and a number of Kenny G albums to go along with it. I learned it and I played it but I never “bonded” with it. My experience with the Saxophone for the most part, was the classic text book case of a student learning sheet music, practicing sheet music, performing sheet music and then, throwing the sheet music in the trash and replacing it with more sheet music. Maybe I was too young and too sheltered to realize that a musical instrument can be much more than just a way to methodically play music.

My childhood was an interesting one. I am now in my mid forties and my two siblings are 15 and 20 years older than me. My brother was a senior in high school when I was born and my sister was well off to college and probably nearly married. Looking back, I’m quite sure my parents were surprised and possibly alarmed at this unexpected change in their plans as nearly empty-nesters. But I was always assured that I was loved and wanted. My parent’s older ages informed the sort of music that was readily available to me as child. There was the yacht rock radio station, classical music, church choir music and occasionally, “The Sound of Music” and “Chariots of Fire”. At some point during my childhood, my Kenny G cassette tapes were joined by “The Beach Boys Greatest Hits”. And on the weekends, the yacht rock radio station switched their airwaves to distribute what was dubbed as, “Big Band Saturday Night”…a collection of big band music from the 30’s, 40’s and 50’s…much to my parent’s delight. Looking back, this was probably the music that was most familiar to them.

It wasn’t until 6th grade that I learned some hard facts of life. For example, I learned that I stunk. To be clear, I’m sure it was the collective effort of myself and my fellow classmates to involuntarily stink up our classroom after running around at recess. But when our teacher informed us of this reality and told us all that there was a stick of deodorant in the locker at the end of the hall and that we were all required to use it, I took it personally and used the deodorant. I also learned that the two big music acts of the time were Guns ‘n Roses and Nirvana. I had never heard of either of them but they sounded cooler than Amy Grant and Lionel Richie. But I don’t think I really ever gave them a listen in 6th grade, because my fellow students had no way to portably play this music for me and I didn’t know how to ask my parents for permission (and money) to purchase the cassette tapes. My big music experience in 6th grade was definitely “Kriss Kross’ll make you JUMP JUMP, which I discovered at a sleepover. My little mind was blown a little bit.

In 7th grade, I switched schools yet again. My 6th grade experience was at a Catholic School and my parents, being the devout Christians that they were, decided that while the academic capabilities of the Catholic School were more than satisfactory, the theology didn’t quite align with their beliefs. And so I was moved to another school. And thus began the process of finding friends, making friends, keeping friends and trying to fit in and not feel awkward and alone. It can’t be overstated how awkward, sheltered and behind I actually was with all of these things in 7th grade. I was not good at sports, I knew nothing about baseball, basketball or football. I was extremely introverted and relied heavily on people to talk to me vs me talking to them. My classmates, by stark contrast, were all cool. They knew everything about sports and they had all grown up together, so there was somewhat of an unbreakable bond between them. To make matters worse, many of them were the children of wealthy Tulsa oil tycoons, spoiled rotten and needing or wanting nothing to do with little ol’ me.

And then, there was the school band. (insert sad, out-of-tune trumpet sound here). There weren’t enough of us to be a marching band and truth be told, there really weren’t enough of us to even be a full concert band. We were a rag tag hodge podge of people who played our instruments well enough to hold our own and I think we were all just looking for a place to play, mostly so we would not have to pick another more boring or embarrassing elective (like choir or weight lifting). We would play at the school football games, subtly adding our meager team spirit offerings into the mix of jocks and cheerleaders who were the undisputed commanders of our Friday Night Lights. And when football season ended, our band teacher decided that we needed another goal to work towards…a band competition. Instrumental music was distributed and we all settled in to learn an instrumental version of….Bohemian Rhapsody. And this, my rascal readers, is where my mind really started to get blown.

More to come…