My life begins in darkness. I'm a struggling entity, searching the furthest depths of unknowingness ever imaginable. Of course, we all begin this way. Our first sights are lost with time, as are most things, our first tastes, our first birthday cake, the first time we pick up a crayon and scribble nothing onto a sheet of construction paper. Our parents savor these moments, tack them up on walls, refrigerators, talk up their friends at dinner parties. The shroud of memory that is our childhood is only survived through video cassettes, fading polaroid captures, or perhaps the occasional glimpse in our minds.
The Sound
My dad had a really nice stereo when I was growing up—like, way too expensive to exist in our house, something that made the rest of our possessions feel like crap. He wasn't as extreme as my uncle was, the one that had an entire room in his basement, each wall from floor to ceiling, covered in C.D. racks and vinyl records, but he did have an entire closet full of tapes, C.D.s, vinyls, movie cassettes, and everything else one could imagine had the capability of containing some sort of sound and/or video recording. I can remember the names of bands on cassette tapes that sat eternally on his tape rack overlooking the couch—names of bands I didn't even know most of, but I remember them cause I would just look at them for hours. Cheap Trick, Led Zeppelin, Moody Blues, Grateful Dead, The Police, The Sex Pistols. The house was pretty much attuned with his stereo, always something playing, whether it was classic rock, jazz, or whatever, I find most of my musical taste directly aligned with what I heard as a kid. Led Zeppelin remains today one of my favorite bands, despite being primarily in the 60s and 70s, the core of which no longer is alive (John Bonham, quite possibly the greatest rock drummer to ever grasp a pair of sticks), and they have inspired me amazingly in the music I write for my band today.
It was probably Elton John—the first music I paid attention to. I remember he was on the Muppet Show, his frilly glasses and top hat. That sort of thing seems to grab the attention of a 6 year old. I knew all the lyrics to his songs, I knew the piano parts (or at least what they looked like, I couldn't play piano, and still can't very well). I would sing them all the time, around the house, during school under my breath, at the dentist's (that nitrous stuff would do weird stuff to me when I was young...). Now, I don't still know all his song's lyrics... just some better than others, my memory isn't that good.
Elton progressed through my dad's collection—Costello popped in there, along with Billy Joel and Tom Petty. My mom was into Paul McCartney a lot, so I heard a lot of Wings and Beatles as a kid. I loved the song "Elephant Talk" by King Crimson, still to this day it's probably the only song of theirs I've heard more than once.
I don't claim to be completely absolved of stupid moments when it comes to music. In spite of picking up the drums in 3rd grade, it was hard for any elementary schooler to avoid the likes of boy bands and pop music on the radio. All I can say to defend myself is that I have completely abstained from the radio in the last 5 years, which is hard to do, but well worth it. Where was I?
The Big Black, Round Thing that Made Really Cool Sounds
It was a cultural arts exhibit thing that our school had every year—displaying the different mediums used all over the world. In the gym, a local drummer had set up an exhibit full of the percussion instruments I would come to cherish in the years to come—apart from the typical trap set we all know and love, there were xylophones, wood blocks, cowbells, congas, bongos, gongs, and everything else a musically starving kid could ever dream of. My life then was defined, I was meant to be a drummer.
I know it was early to make this decision, but my parent soon bought me a drum set for my birthday, I got lessons from the same man behind the exhibit at school, and within a year I was learning from a recording artist at a real studio as a part of a mentorship for my class. I recorded a few songs, both drums and vocals, and even fooled around with a synthesizer/keyboard when he was finalizing the recordings with his friend. As far as a cool experience could go, that was probably the coolest thing that happened to me before High School when I got to play basketball games and jazz concerts. My drum roots are in jazz, cause thats mostly what I learned from my teacher, along with some funk beats, but mostly different styles of jazz. I played with the jazz band in Middle School for one year, but it really wasn't my thing at the time, whether it was too basic as most Middle School music was, or I just wasn't ready for it, I gave it up for the time being.
It was Middle School that I found confusion in what I was musically into. I think it wasn't until 7th or 8th grade when I discovered System of a Down, which acted as a gateway to the newer music scene. The new rock radio station played cool stuff most of the time, I got into Queens of the Stone Age, and Foo Fighters, too bands I still listen to currently. Audioslave probably came in 8th grade. I was attracted to these bands because of the drumming. They all have really good drummers, John Dolmayan of System, Dave Grohl of Foo Fighters, etc. I needed this, to discover a scene of music, even if they were main stream, on my own, and not because it was what my dad played on the stereo all day. I needed to find my own meaning in music, rather than what I had been told my meaning was.
The Annoying Band Dylan Played That I Eventually Got Obsessed With
I was at Peter's house, a friend of mine. We were filming a movie for class, although it didn't possess much factual basis (our movies were meant to entertain not enlighten). Dylan was there, I think he was in the movie too, for some reason. Well anyways, he was into a lot of indie music, he still is, and he would just play tons of weird shit none of us knew, and he would marvel at the amazingness of each song (yes, I know amazingness isn't a word, shut it). This became a moment that would change my life forever. I think Dylan liked the song cause it had the word knickers in it... or something like that. I thought it was annoying. I didn't know it then, but I would eventually come to hum this song to myself, perpetually fixed upon it, determined to memorize its lyrics, find the band that sang it, see them live perhaps. I think I talked to Peter about it later, and it turned out the band was coming to the WOW hall (our local concert hall) sometime that year. This was back when they were small time, we managed to squeeze our way to the front of the room to see the band closer than any others in the place. I was in awe the entire show, although I didn't know one word of one song until they played the one I had heard. It's called Billy Liar—"Billy Liar's got his hands in his pockets, staring over at the neighbor's, knickers down. He's got his knickers down."—the hit song by the Decemberists, my favorite band even to this day. I saw them live in March of 2005, my sophomore, knowing only one song. I raided my friend's computer for all he had of them, downloaded (purchased of course) their newest album the next week when it came out, and by the time they came back to town that september, I had memorized every song, every note, everything that one could possibly memorize about a band. Colin, the frontman, played a live show over the summer that I had downloaded the music from, and he played new songs then that no one had even heard, and when the first note plucked in the concert I attended in the fall, I knew exactly what song it was. My friends were shocked at my obsession (more like... "dude get a life"), but I knew that it would someday pay off, I would find others who shared my devotion. I've seen them 5 times to date, two times on two consecutive night. I'll probably go to every show of theirs that I can until I die, or can't move. I probably won't get someone to move me to a concert. And they'll all be dead before I can't move anymore...
The point is that the band opened me to a whole new world of music, the indie stream, out of which so many amazing and inspiring bands I have discovered. Death Cab was probably first, since they were pretty popular coming out of the indie scene to a major label. The rest was an avalanche falling down upon me, I wouldn't even know where to start. I only know where it's gotten me: my favorite bands mostly consist of indie groups from around the world—Spoon, Iron & Wine, The Shins, Nada Surf, Ben Kweller, Mountain Goats, Say Anything, Riley Kiley, Arcade Fire, Arctic Monkeys, Secret Machines, etc. I ditched the radio, found it hard to trust. It was much more reliable to find a band online, or what friends recommended, and just listen to all you can of those bands.
These days, I listen to those bands aforementioned, a lot of Pink Floyd, various mainstream and indie bands, and all of this is pooled into the music I write for my band, The Epitaphs, for which I sing and play drums. You'll find my tastes often eclectic, and sometimes predictable, perhaps you may even disagree with it, but that's why it's MY taste, and not yours. We each have our own histories in the music scene, events that occurred that brought us to listen to whatever we listen to, things that shaped our inner ear long, long ago. You'll probably also find it that there isn't music I won't listen to—just because I hate country music, doesn't mean I didn't give it a shot. It isn't for me, thank god. I like what I like, drop me a line if you want to talk music, or anything really. I'll keep tabs on the bands I read of here, and try to listen to as many as I can. My life is pretty much defined by music, and since my life is still changing, and growing, I have to spend my time doing something.
(P.S.) I just wrote this in like an hour...
--April Marches On...--
