Sunday, January 30, 2005
HISTORY OF THE MUSIC PROBLEM PART ONE
brendalove@gmail.com
It never fails. Sparkle and I get into the Ghetto Car every morning at 7:00 to begin our day. We are still half-dead with sleep. I turn the ignition and we get our eardrums blasted out by whatever I had in the CD player the day before. We both jump, I lunge for the volume button and Sparkle says accusingly "Mom, you've got a jamming problem!" And I do.
How does someone go about creating an insatiable music monster? It helps if you have a busy Mom like mine was....she had laundry and cooking and God only knows what else to do....she didn't have time to entertain a rowdy baby. And it didn't take too long before she found something that would keep me quiet.
Get out the old portable record player, stack 6 records, make me promise not to touch and she could get at least 25 to 30 minutes of something else done. I couldn't have been more fascinated than if poop had suddenly sprouted wings. Here's kind of sort of what the record player looked like....this is a reproduction and the color is wrong but basically.....
It was pretty damned old and it definitely had the suitcase look going on. I don't remember dancing, I don't remember singing, I just remember watching those records go round and round and listening to every drop of sound that came out of those shitty speakers. I can remember being afraid of "Judy in Disguise" by John Fred and His Playboy Band because it had this awful wicked sounding guitar in it and something about it scared me. I hear that song now and that guitar part kicks ass!
It didn't take long for the Suitcase Jams to bite the dust though and I remember being devastated. When your toys broke back then, new ones didn't just come along to take their place. I thought I'd never hear my records again, only the radio. Apparently I got pretty upset because it didn't seem like it was too long before something like this showed up at the house:
God, I'm pretty sure this almost the actual model I had. Its very damn close. Obviously somebody felt sorry for my parents because I wouldn't shut up, so they donated their old one. So then I had my VERY OWN RECORD PLAYER....in my VERY OWN ROOM. Holy shit, it still blows me away to look back. I took care of it religiously too and it lasted me from about age 3 or 4 until about age 8. You respected my Jam System or you didn't get invited back and we weren't friends anymore. I played my very first Rolling Stones record on there. I played Grand Funk Railroad on there. The Osmonds, even. Intersparsed with some Snow White, of course.
What scares you as a baby can actually rock your world later on!
This one was always a crowd pleaser when my friends were around.
My very first Rolling Stones record. Please note that the vinyl is....white. This is because the record truly does not possess any more grooves. Also please notice where the vinyl buckles up on the middle right of the picture. This is due to the record becoming so thin its like an onion skin. In other words....this could possibly be THE most-played record in America. I wish these things came with odometers, because I'm sure it would equal to London and back again....and again!
[Casey Kasem speaks]: "Coming up tomorrow......Dedications. And a stroll....down memory lane!"
Posted by brendalove@gmail.com @ 5:54 AM
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