It was a late night playing blues and I have so much work to do that I feel like an air traffic controller with planes stacking up over Long Island City.
So, instead of me searching out some news story of minimal interest and dressing it up with smart-ass remarks, let's see how willing you are to show us your dark side.
Tell us about the most embarassing album you've ever owned. I'll start. I owned an album by this band, Harper's Bizarre. Get it? it's like the magazine Harper's Bazaar, but it's spelled all weird and trippy. Far out, I'm sure. They were part of the 60’s™ no one ever talks about, like the time grandpa was found wandering naked in the Walmart. Harper's Bizarre sang innocuous pop along the lines of the 1910 Fruitgum Company and Bobby Goldsboro and I owned a freakin' copy. Jesus, I'm surprised it didn't make me gay.
I was torn between confessing to this or to my love for Claudine Longet, Andy Williams' ex, the French gamine who sang breathy little numbers in that sexy French accent. She later went on to shoot her ski champion squeeze (Rusty Sabich?) with a .22, adding a frisson of danger to my one-sided fantasy romance. Oh, Claudine, couldn't you find it in your heart to love a geeky, glasses-wearing high school boy?
So, if you don't mind holding yourself up to unrelenting ridicule, like the time Quertermous said You've Got Mail was a better movie than Chinatown, tell us what album you're embarassed you owned. Or, if that's too personal, what was the first record or CD you ever bought?
Mine was Meet the Beatles in 1964. Yeah yeah yeah.
Fuck I'm old.
Observational Update: Look at the pants on those guys. What? Were they recording in a flood zone?
12 comments:
First record ever bought: The Jackson 5. Can't remember which one, but I was 11, it was 1971. I loved their Saturday morning cartoon show. Yes, this dates me, too.
Most embarrassing, well, I've got a few. I still have two Partridge Family albums somewhere (and I know all the words to all the songs, how sad). Then there's John Denver's Greatest Hits and The Best of Bread. Yikes.
Hi, my name's Ray, and I, uh, well, I had (and still own, though thankfully boxed away somewhere) the Mike Flowers Pops album.
And here's the kicker: I still maintain that his version of "Wonderwall" is better than the Gallaghers'.
There, I said it.
The soundtrack to Xanadu. ELO, Olivia Newton John, roller disco Gene Kelly. I was overcome. Overcome, I tell you! It's not my fault. I have a weakness for poppy '70's tunes.
Excuse me, I have to go take my medication now.
Yeah, I think I'll have to pass on the most embarassing. I'm not sure I could narrow it down to a short list of twenty, let alone a single stinker.
You see, I spent an unfortunate amount of time and money on hair bands during the eighties. (sigh)
Dave, what about your disco album?
The first 45 single I ever bought with my own money was "I Feel Fine"/"She's a Woman" by the Beatles. The first 33 1/3 LP I ever bought with my own money was The Cyrkle's "Red Rubber Ball".
The first CD I ever bought was Beethoven's 3rd Symphony performed by Wilhelm Kempf directing the Philharmonia Orchestra.
I have never bought a record I have later been embarrassed by, although my friends were embarrassed that I owned an ABBA LP in college. I bought it less for the music (although I frankly admire Ulvaeus/Andersson tunesmith team) than for its production values. It represented, as I correctly predicted, the future of studio pop music. As for their ridiculous disco outfits, well, I wouldn't dress like Freddy Mercury, either.
My teenage embarrassments were legion, of course, but usually involved girls instead of records.
Don't remember the first album I ever bought, but I do recall that I owned an entire album by The Smurfs.
Yes, those Smurfs -- the little blue animated ones. One of the songs on it (I'll never forget it, no matter how hard I try) was endearingly titled "I'm a Pink Toothbrush (You're a Blue Toothbrush)"
Ted knows I own The Ethel Merman Disco Album but I consider that more of a cultural relic than a source of embarassment.
There was a time I would have denied owning a TJ Brass 8-Track, but apparently the Brass is back in vogue among the congnescenti.
I had some of those pants too...and I thought, after trying on a pair I found in the back of the closet shelf recently, that my legs had grown... evidently not.
How could one be embarrassed by the Pinocchio sountrack, Michael Jackson's Thriller, or anything by Twisted Sister.
Impossible.
Sesame Street Disco.
Hey, I was like...6?
The first LP: "Pizza Hut Hits" from the golden age of 1970s compilations (I think the K-Tel ones were too pricey for me). All I really remember from it was the disco "5th of Beethoven".
The first single: I know it was the Village People, but not sure if it was "Macho Man" or "In the Navy".
Surprisingly, I'm more embarrassed by my 1984 purchase and obsessive playing of the "Forever Young" LP by Alphaville. (Others might point to my full-fledged Duran Duran phase as worse, but I still stand by that choice.)
Talk about being surprised your choices didn't make you gay...holy mackerel!
Jesus, Olen, from those selections I'm shocked you didn't become an interior designer in the West Village.
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
Post a Comment