The first time......

We all have our first. The thrill, the anticipation,  the nervousness, the awkward silence afterward....wait a minute, what are you thinking? I'm talking about the first album you purchase.  Man, get you minds out of the gutter, this is a family blog!

Remember these days? My kids will never know this I am afraid

A friend of mine recently posted on Facebook about her son magically picking out the same album she first bought on his recent trip to HMV. Amazing! This started me thinking about my first album purchase. Now to be fair, I think the first album I bought was my cousin Neil's used tape of Michael Jackson's Thriller. I really can't count this as I can't even remember listening to it, all I can remember is that it was in my room, so we'll just file that one away. Maybe I just thought it was a cool picture on the cover. Maybe I only liked "Thriller" or "Bille Jean". Regardless, I can't count this as the first album I really got into.

"In Red Hill Town, the lights go down on"

Your first album has to be something you listen to endlessly and really get into,  and for the most part understand.   This album has to live with you. I think, it will even mark a point in time for you and magically transport you back to that time. Maybe it is just me, but still to this day I can put on albums and still taste, smell, feel, and sometimes feel that time period or stage in life I was in when I listened to that album the most. To this day, when I hear U2's "Red Hill Mining Town" I am automatically taken back to my bed room in Nanaimo, age 13, sitting at the huge desk my Dad found for me at his office doing homework or playing the latest share-ware 8-bit computer game. I can picture the math homework!

Enter here, the fall of 1991.  I wanted a stereo system bad. I am sure, much like most big ticket items I wanted, I had been tasked with as many extra chores around the house as my Mom could think of to justify a couple dollar increase in my allowance for a number of months. I can remember saving all my birthday money as well to save for the stereo. For some reason the amount of $200 sticks in my mind, which, considering the time, was pretty expensive. Finally after months of saving I had enough to make the purchase.  I wish I could remember the make of it, but I can't. I do remember it had two tape decks, a CD player, a three band equalizer, and, wait for it, a REMOTE!! This was the icing on the cake!

The day finally came sometime in October or November when my Mom had time to take me to the store in the mall after school to make the big purchase.  I was so excited.  Everything went well, the stereo was still there and I had more than enough money to cover the cost. Now what happened next will forever be part of my musical upbringing. Somehow, I managed to persuade the store owner to throw in a new CD with the purchase of the stereo. Perhaps I paid a bit for it, but I can still see his face when he was pondering the idea that I had proposed.   Amazing! I had a brand new CD! I actually had no idea really what it was! My parents had a stereo but not a CD player, we didn't own any CDs. I as so excited to pick out a CD, the only problem was, I didn't know what I wanted. Up until that time I had listened to compilations of 50's and 60's music and the odd kids tape, but no major artist that I could think of (and yes, I did listen to Weird Al Yakovic, come on, what dorky boy didn't at that point in time, again, he does not count as a first album). I remember searching the store racks for something I recognized. Finally I found it:

You sing it Bryan!

Earlier that summer the lead off single "Everything I Do, I Do it for You" came out along with the movie "Robin Hood Prince of Thieves". Yes, I saw the movie, and to this day I can remember the music video for the song vividly. Watching music videos was my main past time at home.  What can I say I was/am a nerd.  Anyway, I picked up my brand new copy of "Waking up the Neighbours" and marched up to the till. I was so excited. I got home, struggled with the shrink wrap and popped the disc in. I was in heaven. It was so rockin'!  I am sure I cranked "Can't Stop this Thing We Started" every time it came on, much to my parent's chagrin (check out the link). Ah, the pure indulgence of early 90's mastering in rock music, the snare drum echo, the polish of the guitars, the presence of the vocals, it takes me back. Check out other early 90's rock albums and you will notice the same type of treatment of the sound, in particular Tom Cochrane's "Mad Mad World". Same sounds. Anyway, I digress. Where was I, needless to say, I am sure I played this disc constantly, as it was the only CD we had in the house. The constant rotation of this record in the player engrained these tunes in my head. "Don't drop the Bomb on Me", "House Arrest" were popular, along with "Not Guilty". Even typing the names of these tunes is bringing back more memories that I had not realized were still in my head. 

This is the thing that intrigues me. I probably could never get rid this disc. Too many memories attached. Have I listened to it in ages, no. But even to this day, just thinking about this record, I can feel what I was feeling back in the fall of 1991. I can feel my apprehension about moving to a different town. I can hear my friends and I playing games with the disc playing in the background, running around singing along badly to the lyrics. I can even smell the crisp cold air of northern Alberta in November as I walked home from school. Amazing what simple songs can do to someone's brain.  What this album marks for me is an unsettled time for in my life. We were in the process of possibly moving to a couple of different places. I was not happy about leaving my friends, but I understood why we had to move. Without too many details, my Dad's job was taking us to one of two places. This is probably why I got into the music so much. I guess I may have wanted someplace to escape to where I didn't have to worry about things. Perhaps, and this might be a stretch, this is even what got me into listening to music so much in the first place. That might be a stretch though as there are pretty well known stories of  me bouncing up and down in the back of our suburban at a very early age to the Oak Ridge Boys sing "Elvira". Oh, well, so much for the phycological insights into my life at 11, I think I just really dug the music. Good ol' Bryan Adams, you really know that everywhere you go, the kids wanna rock!

From there on out I was hooked. The rush of listening to an album on my stereo was my drug. So, in essence, Bryan Adams was my gateway drug. Funny enough, the first one was free! Next came the excesses of more Michael Jackson (and yes the "Dangerous" album was a it excessive) and brilliant Peter Gabriel, and only a few short months later, the main artist of my adolescence, U2.

So, faithful readers, the one of you out there, what was your first? Where does it take you? How did it happen? The sordid details are always the most interesting...