In honor of Record Store Day we asked our hosts to tell us about the first record they remember buying. Scroll down to read their stories and join us on Twitter and Facebook to share your first record.
John Aielli: “The first record that I actually bought myself was at Craig’s drug store in killeen, a Nat King Cole 45 with “Dance, Ballerina, Dance” on one side and “Darling, Je Vous Aimes Beaucoup” on the other.”
Jay Trachtenberg: “The first record I bought was the Rolling Stones’ Out Of Our Heads during the summer of 1965, right before entering high school. I bought the album at Fedco, a local department store and I bought it because my two favorite singles were on it, “The Last Time” and “Satisfaction”. Stones rule!”
Matthew Reilly: I’m not totally sure what the first album I bought was since I had older brothers who handed albums down to me. However, the album that keeps popping into my head when I think about this is Boston’s 1976 self-titled debut. Yeah, you read that right. The first 5 songs on there are total 70’s arena rock classics. I mean the record opens with “More Than A Feeling”! This album would prove to be instrumental in wooing my wife when I included a couple of the songs on various mixtapes in the late 80’s and early 90’s. You will never convince me that “Foreplay/Long Time” isn’t totally awesome. Brad Delp’s vocal range, the extended jams and blistering solos are taken for granted now, but if My Morning Jacket released a record that sounded like this the music press would be falling all over themselves proclaiming them the saviors of rock music. Here’s the thing though, it already exists and it’s called Boston.
Paul Carrubba: “I think the first record I ever bought was a Duke Ellington’s Greatest Hits Collection. I was probably 9 or 10, and I had recently competed in a school district-wide music memory contest. “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing)” was one of the songs for the contest, and it really knocked me out. Also, being the pretentious little kid I was, I refused to listen to what the other kids liked on the radio. True confessions of a ‘lil music snob!”
Jackie Moody-Fuller: The first record I owned was The Go-Gos debut, Beauty and the Beat. I’m pretty certain I got it for my birthday (it came out a week after I turned seven, and I was already bonkers for the band via “Our Lips Are Sealed,” which was in heavy rotation on MTV.) Getting it was such a thrill – unwrapping the cellophane, reading the pink – pink! – liner notes. I can still see the front and back covers: a group shot of the band in bath towels on the front, and each band member doing something different in a bathtub on the back (in my mind’s eye, I see Jane Wiedlin eating chocolate bonbons.) I remember, too, the record including a buckslip urging me to buy an IRS records t-shirt and check out some other artists in the label’s catalogue (I did! It’s how I discovered The English Beat!) Beauty and the Beat was my favorite record. I played it until it sounded fuzzy. To this day, it might be the only record that I literally wore out.
Taylor Wallace: “I found my record player by a dumpster at a friend’s apartment almost 6 years ago. I immediately went out and bought Classics by RATATAT and Places Like This by Architecture in Helsinki.”
Art Levy: The Band – Self-Titled. When I was 13, I saw a theatrical re-release of ‘The Last Waltz’ with my mom (she’s pretty cool). The Band became my obsession; I was a history nerd too and they sounded (and looked) like something from an alternate history of the U.S. (they are 4/5ths Canadian, so that might explain it). Dallas loves to throw away its history, so my local Half-Price Books was filled with wonderfully worn records. I bought the Band’s self-titled for 3 mom-loaned bucks. In conclusion: Mom, you’re the best.
Jack Anderson: “When I was 10 I went out to Galveston with a friend of mine’s family and he had a Michael Jackson “Best Of” CD compilation. It was on the “shuffle” setting so I had no idea what track number it was but when Billie Jean came on, I was blown away. Flash forward to a month or so down the line: I’d saved up $20 and my mom took me to the now-long-gone Jupiter Records in the Hancock Center – where I saw a Michael Jackson album. They had a station where you could listen to CDs on headphones and the moment I heard that drum beat at the beginning of Billie Jean, I knew I had to have it. My mom recognized an interest I had in The Beatles so she picked up Yellow Submarine for me while were there. Thanks for spoiling my musical tastes at a young age, Mom!”
Susan Castle: ” I “think” mine was The Rolling Stones’ “Get Off of My Cloud”. All I remember it was a 45 with a blue label, I LOVED the drums and sang along enthusiastically despite only knowing the chorus. Oh, and that Mick was so cute. So lame, I know.”
Jeff McCord: “I can’t say that this was exactly the first record I ever bought on my own – my dad would bring things home he got at the newspaper where he worked, and I was often “borrowing” things from my older sister. But I think it was. I bought the Beatles White Album on the day of its release. My sister and I were already hopeless Beatles and Stones fans. Our grandfather had bought my sister the Beatles first American album at the height of Beatlemania years earlier. I remember I had to save up my allowance for many months because of its steep list price -around $12 I think – and persuade my mom to drive me to the record store, but I was determined to beat my sister to the punch on this one. And I did.”
Laurie Gallardo: “My very first record was Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. It was an Easter gift, of all things. I had seen it at Skagg’s grocery store in El Paso. I was about 12 or 13 at the time, and I had become obsessed with The Beatles. My mom bought it for me, and put it in my Easter basket. That totally beats chocolate bunnies any damn day.”
Jody Denberg: “OK, so I am a walking cliché – I am that guy. The guy that watched The Beatles debut on a Sunday night with his folks and then went out to buy their record. I was all of 4 ½ years old though, and it was my Mom who indulged me the next day, taking me to our Pelham Parkway’s neighborhood record shop in The Bronx (R&D Records), to buy the 45 RPM single of “I Want To Hold Your Hand”. It had the black and white cover of the lads (with Paul’s ciggie airbrushed out of it), “I Saw Her Standing There on the flipside, and that glorious orange-and-yellow-swirl Capitol Records label logo. The rest is mystery.”
John Parsons: “I’ll be the first to admit that I got myself into financial trouble at a young age by being suckered into the Columbia House mail order record club. It was that thing where they sent you ‘8 CD’s for a Penny’ along with a tome of fine print saying how much you will owe them a month later. I was a dumb kid with no disposable income and no concept of credit, so really just a perfect candidate for membership. I ordered CDs by the Notorious B.I.G., Chris Rock, basically anything that had PARENTAL ADVISORY warnings, and was thrilled when they showed up at my house. Then my dad found them and said, “What? No, John, you’re not keeping these.” I don’t think I’d even opened them yet. So back went 8 shrink-wrapped CDs, back to the Columbia House. Luckily, I was absolved of all responsibility, being a dumb kid and all. A couple years later, after the scarring of my bungled first attempt at purchasing music had healed, my friend Alex introduced me to the coolest record store in Tampa, FL: Vinyl Fever. I couldn’t believe so much music existed, let alone was available under one roof. I think the first legit album I purchased there was No Doubt’s Tragic Kingdom when I was 9. “An honest purchase,” I thought.”
Trina Quinn: “There was no record store in the tiny town of 10,000 where I grew up, so that Columbia House ad looked mighty attractive. I was about 10 or 11 years old and had no cash. I hit the piggy bank for some coins though and I taped $2.75 in quarters (for S&H) to a piece of paper with my album selections and mailed it off. I remember I got Wham “Make It Big”, the Breakfast Club and Top Gun soundtracks, and a Best of the Beach Boys record. Well, albums kept coming in the mail and I racked up a $80 bill. My parents finally found out and I sat next to my Dad as he called Columbia House to explain how a child was jacking their records and had no money to pay! They kindly let me off the hook.”
Elizabeth McQueen: I can’t remember exactly the first record I ever bought…probably because it wasn’t a record. Most likely it was a cassette, and more than likely it was a cassingle, because those were affordable and you got the exact song you wanted. The cassingle that keeps popping into my head is the Lisa Lisa and the Cult Jam’s “Lost in Emotion” which, if memory serves, had the song on both sides, so I could just flip it over and listen to the song again and again. Or maybe I just kept hitting rewind. But I distinctly remember doing just that — listening to the song over and over. I still do that, listen to songs on repeat until I know every little detail, can since every part, and have the song locked in my body forever.
Deidre Gott: Color Me Bad – C.M.B. Because I loved the “to the ah tick tock get up stop stop” sample in “I Wanna Sex you Up”. At the time I knew nothing about sexing anything up, so that part didn’t really resonate with me. I also thought it was cool that they were on an episode of 90210.
The list this year is filled with limited edition releases, first ever re-issues and much more. Here is our list of a few must have records:
Air – Casanova 70 [12″ EP]
Alt-J – Live at the Red Rocks [2xLP]
Big Star – Complete Columbia: Live at the University of Missouri [2xLP]
Creedence Clearwater Revival – 1969 Box Set [3xLP]
David Bowie – The Man Who Sold the World [12″ Picture Disc]
Death Cab For Cutie – Tractor Rape Chain/Black Sun [7″]
Miles Davis – Ghetto Walkin’ [12″]
Mac Demarco – Another (Demo) One [LP]
The Doors – Live at the Aquarius: The First Performance [3xLp]
Fleetwood Mac – Alternate Tusk [2xLP]
The Flaming Lips – Heady Nuggs Volume II [8xLP]
The Grateful Dead – Capitol Theatre, Passaic NJ 4/25/77 [4xLP]
Emmylou Harris – Wrecking Ball Deluxe Vinyl Version [3xLP]
Jimi Hendrix – Smash Hits [LP]
Etta James – At Last [LP]
Mark Mothersbaugh – Hello My Good Friend [12″]
Thelonius Monk – London Collection, Volume III [LP]
Metz/Mission of Burma – Good Not Great/Get Off [7″]
Outkast – Elevators (Me & You) [10″]
Patti Smith – Horses Live Electric Lady Studios [2xLP]
Sex Pistols – Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols [12″ Picture Disc]
Iggy and the Stooges – METALLIC K.O [LP]
Star Wars: The Force Awakens – March of the Resistance/Rey’s Theme [10″ Picture Disc]
Sun Ra – Spaceways [LP]
The Sword – John the Revelator [7″]