Favorite Albums Growin' Up
I spent some time recently listening to some AOR albums from 25-30 years ago (Poll: MOR/AOR/Arena Rock Albums 1983-85). Some I had never heard in their entirety, others I liked as a kid, which gave me flashbacks to the excitement I felt at buying my first records, and getting those first RCA/Columbia shipments with six or seven albums. There were a lot of favorites that I became embarrassed of when I was a teenager, but now I think they’re not so bad. Even the likes of Loverboy and the Fixx still have some decent jams. My top favorites from those years have mostly changed, especially when I became fascinated by the hidden world of post-punk that I had brushed up against but didn't really discover until I read the Trouser Press Record Guide years later.
1969-78
Electric Light Orchestra – Out of the Blue 77
Captain Beefheart – Trout Mask Replica 69
Curtis Mayfield – Superfly 72
Styx – The Grand Illusion 77
Cheap Trick – In Color 77
I only included albums that were released in my lifetime. Since we had Sgt. Pepper's and The White Album in the house but no Abbey Road, no Beatles on this list. I remember in first or second grade a teacher asked us what our favorite artist was, and I said Elvis, based on the 45s that my mother had. Albums from the first 8-9 years of my life mostly belonged to other people –- my mother, uncle, cousins and friends. I was simply absorbing the tastes of those around me since I didn’t yet have my own money.
1979
Electric Light Orchestra – Discovery
Gary Numan – The Pleasure Principle
Elvis Costello & the Attractions - Armed Forces
Cheap Trick – Dream Police
Talking Heads – Fear Of Music
Disappointment - Styx - Cornerstone. I thought The Grand Illusion was so great, I didn't understand how Cornerstone could be so weak and feeble. It was my first experience with a favorite band in decline (though I thought they were redeemed on the next album based on the singles). I should have bought Pieces Of Eight instead.
I started buying 45s when I was eight ("Hot Child In The City," "Call Me," "Ride Like The Wind") and 
soon caught the album fever within a year. The first full album I bought was Gary Numan’s The Pleasure Principle from Musicland at the mall. I already had the “Cars” single, which was so awesome, I figured the album was worth having. My mom expressed doubts that my attention span could handle full albums. The Numan album was a little disappointing as there was nothing as catchy as the single, and the songs were very cold and creepy. I was determined to stick it out though, and soon enough I was shoveling snow and recycling bottles to scrounge more money for my new addiction to albums.
One of the earliest albumsI bought that didn’t make the lists was Sex Pistols – Never Mind the Bollocks. I had stumbled across a record store 
called The Asteroid while downtown with my mom. As a typical indie store, it had much different stock than Musicland, with cool t-shirts and magazines like Rolling Stone and Trouser Press which I hadn’t seen before. I had been reading Creem at the A&P grocery store, and had read about the Sex Pistols. My mother, however, noticed they were also a head shop. I had no idea what the pipes and bongs were for, but she said the place wasn’t for me. I thought she was crazy, so I soon scratched together some money, took a bus there and bought the Sex Pistols record. Afraid she'd know where I got it, I kept it at my friend Brian’s house, who had the privacy of an entire basement to himself, and his own record player. The opening slashing chords of “Anarchy In The U.K.” with Johnny Rotten’s evil laugh thrilled and frightened me. However the record ended up getting half eaten by his sister's dog before we had a chance to fully absorb it, so the band was forgotten. Punk rock (aside from the Chipmunk variety) wasn’t meant to be a part of my life for another several years.
1980
Queen – The Game
Electric Light Orchestra – Xanadu
Rush – Permanent Waves
Billy Joel – Glass Houses
Alvin & The Chipmunks - Chipmunk Punk
Disappointment - Eagles - The Long Run. I grew up listening to the Eagles on the radio and the jukebox at my grandfather's favorite tavern. The Long Run looked like it should be epic with it's black cover. Instead it really, really sucked.
I saw Queen perform "Play The Game" on TV and was hooked. Around the same time I heard my friend's copy of News of the World and Queen started to threaten ELO's status as my favorite band. I wasn't crazy about the movie Xanadu, but ELO's half of the soundtrack was pretty great, and by then I had gotten most of their previous albums. My former childhood neighbor Doug turned me onto Rush when I was visiting him."Spirit Of The Radio" sounded so cool, sort 
of a bridge between 70s prog and sleek new wave-influenced guitar tones similar to The Police. My friend Brian Beers owned Glass Houses, which provided the soundtrack to our wreaking havoc in his basement. Joel's "You May Be Right" was covered on Chipmunk Punk, along with "Crazy Little Thing Called Love," my Blondie 45 "Call Me" and several great new wave songs by The Knack and The Cars. I would have liked those full albums, but thought the Chipmunk covers were sufficient at the time!
1981
Electric Light Orchestra – Time
Rush – Moving Pictures
Loverboy – Get Lucky
Foreigner – 4
Joan Jett – I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll
Time was the first album I had anticipated months ahead of time and bought the day it came out. With the robot voice intro and sci fi theme, I pretty much thought it was the best thing ever. I listened to a copy of Moving Pictures on my cousin's headphones and was blown away again, but still didn't have my own copy. A local FM rock radio station had a weekly album countdown that I started following religiously. This was when I started making use of the record clubs, stocking up on Loverboy, Foreigner and Joan Jett, along with J. Geils Band, Journey, etc. I probably would have liked The Police and Billy Squier more than those, but didn't get around to them at the time.
1982
Rush – Signals
Men At Work – Business As Usual
Thomas Dolby - The Golden Age Of Wireless
Duran Duran - Rio
Asia
Disappointment - Van Halen - Diver Down and Queen - Hot Space (though it grew on me). Van Halen were a much loved band with a lot of friends, but I made the mistake buying their absolute worst album.
MTV went on the air on August 1, 1981. I didn't have cable, but remarkably, my 7th grade home room teacher would let us watch MTV on occasion as a treat. By 1982, some of the mainstream new wave videos started to influence my taste, like Duran Duran, Thomas Dolby and Men At Work.
1983
U2 – War
Iron Maiden – Piece Of Mind
Violent Femmes
Yes - 90125
Def Leppard - Pyromania
Disappointment - Asia - Alpha, and to a lesser extent, ELO - Secret Messages
Between their videos for "New Years Day" and the anthemic stadium live show documented on Under A Blood Red Sky, U2 became my new favorite band. My friend Mike had the luxury of having a TV in his bedroom with MTV. I didn't have cable, and was a bit jealous, but always enjoyed going over to watch videos with him. He first got into Iron Maiden from the previous year's video of "Run To The Hills." I also liked some Scorpions, Judas Priest, Ozzy and Dio, but we agreed that Iron Maiden was definitely the best. On the other hand, I had started listening to KUNI, a college station transmitted throughout Iowa, which my friend was unable to receive in his basement bedroom. To me it was just a jumble of weird, unknown music. It took me a while to process what I'd heard, like the early hip-hop, and post-punk, so it did not yet influence the records I bought. Most of them I would have had trouble finding anyway.
1984
U2 – The Unforgettable Fire
Iron Maiden - Powerslave
Rush – Grace Under Pressure
Van Halen – 1984
The Fixx - Phantoms
Disappointment - Queen - The Works. Queen would actually soon revive their popularity with their triumphant performance at Live Aid, but I thought this album was crap.
I was starting to identify bands I liked on the mysterious KUNI station, like Echo & the Bunnymen, R.E.M., The Replacements, Hüsker Dü, Naked Raygun, etc. But I just couldn't find that stuff, and so my record listening was still dictated by what the record clubs had available. This was the era of blockbusters from Bowie, Prince and Springsteen, most of which I liked, but was more my mother's music. The Fixx, Van Halen, Rush, Iron Maiden, even U2 all screamed "music for 14-15 year-old boys," didn't it? I had a hard time remembering what other albums I bought that year. It's like the hormonal overload caused memory blackouts.
1985
R.E.M. – Fables Of The Reconstruction
Rush – Power Windows
New Order – Low-Life
INXS – Listen Like Thieves
The Dead Milkmen - Big Lizard In My Back Yard
Disappointment - I don't remember being let down by any favorites, really. My main problem was that I was wanting to hear albums like Zen Arcade, Let It Be, Ocean Rain and Double Nickels On The Dime, all classics from the previous year, but had no means to hear more than the bits I heard on the radio, and not enough funds to mailorder them unheard. I had John Mellencamp's Scarecrow, ZZ Top's Afterburner and a taped copy of The Cure's Head On The Door which were okay. I started subscribing to a magazine called Record at the end of the previous year, and I'd read enticing descriptions of Flip Your Wig, New Day Rising, Tim and Psychocandy. Even so, it seemed like a slow year. The magazine soon folded, and the subscriptions were taken over by a new magazine called SPIN.
I did buy my first R.E.M. album, which was beautifully gnarly and dark. This was officially the John Hughes era, with Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, Weird Science, Pretty In Pink, and Some Kind Of Wonderful. Movies about kids my age, for us, and even taking place mainly in the Midwest! As if us teenagers needed any help thinking the world revolved around us! I was realizing that girls were really much more interested in The Smiths and The Cure than Rush. I wasn't convinced that listening to them would actually make a difference, but hey, just in case!
1986
The Woodentops – Giant
Screaming Blue Messiahs – Gun Shy
The Smiths - The Queen Is Dead
Hunters & Collectors - Human Frailty
The Housemartins - London 0 Hull 4
Disappointment - Iron Maiden - Somewhere In Time. In retrospect it's not such a bad album, but it's not what I expected from them at the time. I still liked metal, and had copies of tapes by Motley Crue, Ratt and Cinderella. It was definitely a culture clash between them and the UK indie I was into. I soon began drirting more towards Metallica, Megadeth and Slayer.
Around the end of 1985 I bought a large duo-cassette boombox which altered my listening habits and the role music played in my life. I could now listen to most of my music in the privacy of my bedroom, essential for any 16 year-old. I could also start taping songs from the radio, and dub tapes from friends, and make mix tapes. Vinyl was no longer of use to me! This was an exploratory period, when my favorites were new bands mostly from the UK.
1987
Sonic Youth – Sister
Dinosaur Jr. - You're Living All Over Me
Hüsker Dü - Warehouse: Songs And Stories
The Replacements - Pleased To Meet Me
XTC – Skylarking
Disappointments - The Housemartins - The People Who Grinned Themselves To Death, Screaming Blue Messiahs- Bikini Red.
1987 was an interesting transitional year that is more fully documented in a piece inspired by my 20 year reunion. My transition from graduating from high school to starting college had a pretty appropriate soundtrack, as my tastes rapidly migrated from the big releases by U2 and The Cure to the noisier indie bands that I featured on my college radio show, before I switched to 70s-80s punk and post-punk.
