I Love Music



‘I love music

Any kind of music

I love music

Just as long as it’s groovin’



I can’t carry a tune in a bucket. I don’t play any musical instruments unless you count air guitar and the toy guitar that come with the Guitar Hero game. And I have white boy rhythm when it comes to dancing.

I used to could break dance. When I danced, I broke tables, chairs…

But I love music. All kinds of music.

From the various genres of rock to country to R & B/soul to southern gospel.

What I listen to is dictated to what I’m in the mood for.

XM/Sirius radio provides a great service to me in that it allows me to listen to just about any kind of music at any time along with various and sundry news, sports, talk and comedy, etc.

I’m not sure how early in life I began to really notice music but my first recollection of feeding my hunger came when I asked for an AM/FM radio for Christmas which happened to be my ninth birthday.

It was a bittersweet holiday for me and my family as my grandmother passed away just ten days prior to Christmas. But under the tree that morning, I opened a gift from her and it was my first radio.

I listened to that thing night and day. Even slept with it on. I now sleep with my XM/Sirius on.

My mother had a pretty good collection of LP records from the 50s and 60s I used to enjoy listening to. One of my favorite albums to listen to was “Green Onions” by Booker T. & The M.G.s.

We had an 8-track player in the family car and the tapes we owned included Andy Williams, Petula Clark and Elvis Presley.

My dad, a Baptist choir director, tuned into The Gospel Singing Jubilee on television every Sunday morning as we got ready for church and I would watch that while waiting on the Hercules cartoon show to come on.

I would watch anything on TV that was musical including The Lawrence Welk Show, The Partridge Family and American Bandstand.

One of my all-time favorite movies is “West Side Story”, a musical about rival gangs in New York. I’m also partial to “Grease, “Tommy” and “Damn Yankees” to mention a few.

As a boy, I would ride my bike down to the old recreation center on Saturday nights where the high school and college kids went to dance and I would sit outside and just listen to the music.

I was, and still am, a huge fan of Elton John’s music. One of the first albums I ever owned was his 1971 “Madman Across The Water” which yielded two of my favorite EJ songs, “Tiny Dancer” and “Levon”.

I got my first stereo when I was 11 years old. It included a record player, radio and 8-track player. Along with it, I got tapes by Stevie Wonder, Deep Purple and Billy Preston. I added to my collection every chance I got and soon owned more Elton and Aerosmith, to name a couple.

I never really listened to many of the bands who are considered classics such as Led Zepplin, Pink Floyd or The Beatles but they are among my favorites now.

I did like The Beatles’ “Let It Be”. I first heard it at a friend’s house and borrowed his older sister’s 45 RPM copy of it. I never returned it.

I was fascinated by radio DJs. They were so cool because they got to sit and play music all day and make money for it. I acquired a phonograph player to go with my stereo and would sit in my room for hours on end mixing music, playing disc jockey.

I even got a tape recorder to record myself. Oh, I did song intros, the time and weather and “on-air give-aways”. The whole nine yards. This, along with my passion for sports and yearning to be a sports announcer, eventually led to my decision to major in broadcast communications in college.

I did my first real on-air gig my sophomore year and, since then, have held several part-time radio jobs. I was even station manager and morning personality for the local AM country station for about 13 years.

I came after the golden years of “The Mighty 1090” for those of you from the area old enough to remember that.

I haven’t been to a headliner concert in years, but I have attended a few in my time. Bands/artists I have seen live include Cheap Trick, REO Speedwagon, Mother’s Finest, Aerosmith, ZZ Top, Hank Williams, Jr., The Stray Cats, Rick James, R.E.M., The Indigo Girls, The Psychedelic Furs, The Producers, Lonestar, David Allen Coe, Foreigner, The Dixie Chicks, Toto, Simon & Garfunkel, Days Of The New, Garth Brooks, The Connells, The Meat Puppets and The Smithereens.

In the movie “Fast Times At Ridgemont High”, Jeff Spicoli, played by Sean Penn, spent the reward money he got for stopping an armed robbery at a convenience store on hiring Van Halen to play his birthday party.

If I could do that today, I’d get The Foo Fighters. Miranda Lambert would come in a close second but, with apologies to Blake Shelton, I’d rather have her as my date.

Keep listening to the music.