Fast forward

I'm gonna jump ahead a bit here. I'm maybe 8 or 9 years old now. Still finding my way around. Spending time in the neighborhood with friends. Playing G.I. Joe's, guns and just other stuff to keep ourselves entertained as kids.

I'm still lured by music when Im exposed to it. No real definition in particular taste but rock seems to stick out to me. The next paramount soung that strikes me is Areosmiths "Dream On". It's powerful. Emotional and a bit dark and I think this is a familiar place for me in retrospect. I think I was emo before there was ever such a title. Something I'm still plagued with to this day. At the time I was unaware and just felt very moved by the performance and message. Having roots in Christianity from both my mother and my Baptist schooling "Maybe tomorrow l, the good lord will take you away" was a familiar adage echoing my nightly bedtime prayer. Now I lay me down to sleep, pray the lord my soul to keep...

But I'm not macabre at this juncture in time. There's other sounds that pique my intrigue that contrast rather strongly. Bryan Adams "Everythibg I Do" is another song that moves me. I spend a lot of time singing this with an old walk man and headphones from a tape recorded and wobbling cuz it's been used to many times. I would record with a tape deck of my fathers old audio gear. It was a black recorder.

Another song I captured with that trusty old deck was Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start The Fire". This song was by far...my favorite song ever! I studied it so deeply. Writing down every lyric with a pencil and paper. Play. Pause. Rewind. Write. Play. Pause. Rewind. Write. Over and over until I had every lyric there to see. This song was fast. How did he say so many words? So quickly? I was challenged and practiced until I could follow. This energy was amazing. Up beat temp. Great groove. And just great style as Billy Joel just commands effortlessly.

Unaware of the fact. This was my fathers favorite artist, and he even had the great pleasure of meeting the man himself when he lived in New York , where he grew up and met my mother, before they moved to Florida.