The Musical Memoirs Continue with a Trip to 1974
Growing up the youngest of three, I always felt like a pest in the eyes of my brother and sister.
In fact, the age difference was so much – I was still raising hell in elementary school when they were raising hell in high school — I often felt like an only child. But while they would never be my play mates, the good thing about having older siblings is that you get exposed to music at an early age.
Back in the 70s, my sister would often hole up in her bedroom for hours (okay – not exactly a healthy habit, I admit), where she would blast Journey and Kansas on her turn table. (Okay – not the greatest of music, I admit.) And my brother would often crank the Zeppelin on his Pioneer while applying bondo to his beloved GTO.
Crazy how smells can trigger memories. But whenever I catch a whiff of bondo today, I picture my brother sanding his Goat while listening to “Black Dog.”
Ah, the sweet smell of bondo.
Even though my siblings were older and, hence, far too cool to hang around me, there are some good memories from those days. Like the time my sister showed up at my school prepared to kick an older bully’s butt for me. Or the time my brother taught me how to field a grounder.
Anyone who’s ever met my brother knows he’s not exactly a sentimental guy. So I’m sure he doesn’t remember singing to me in bed. But I can clearly remember lying in my bunk bed one night as my brother sang “Proud Mary” by Creedence Clearwater Revival” and “Black Water,” a hot new song by the Doobie Brothers.
To most it would be a trivial moment. But we weren’t the type of family that sat around the dinner table and shared stories about our day. So a moment like this is unforgettable.
It’d be a while before I’d really get into music. (“Love Will Keep Us Together” by Captain and Tenille would be my first favorite.) But these two songs – as sung by my brother — provided my introduction to rock and roll.
Posted on June 2nd, 2008 by Pat
Filed under: Music, Songs in the Key of Life: My Musical Memoirs, The World According to Pat
Thanks for the memories …
I like this series. Keep ‘em coming.
Speaking of goats and GTOs. Before I move to Moqui, I was living in San Diego and working at one of the many pancake houses that used to populate El Cajon Boulevard. At the time I was working with a dude named Sam who had a cherry red ‘65 GTO. At the time I had a goatl — a ‘61 Austin-Healy Bugeyed Sprite, a really low center of gravity, cool lookin’ but pretty guttless. So, one day, we decided to swap cars for the weekend. Man it was sweet racing around College Avenue in Sam’s red shark — black interior, Hurst four-on-the floor with a walnut steering wheel and his stereo blasting in the era when Zeppelin and the Doobies ruled KGB FM. I guess I revved it a bit too much. And by the end of the weekend, I noticed water on the engine dipstick — oh oh — an indication of a blown head gasket. I felt bad when I exchanged the GTO for my own goat. A few days later my Sprite’s axle rear busted — BUSTED! Hmmm.
Chalk it up to the excess of youth …
Awesome. And not one bit trivial.
Dude, you’re freaking me out. I also have an older brother and sister, in that order, and they listened to the same music that yours did. My dad exposed me to motown and some other 50s and 60s stuff. I’m glad I went back into your archives.