What Was The Album That Made You Love Music?

I was reading this article over at Jezebel and I tried to think what my answer would be. I don't know, honestly, what the first album was that got me into music. I know it would be a Moody Blues album. It was most likely the 2 LP set "The is The Moody Blues". I have distinct memories of the album cover.

I remember asking mum to play the albums, and as I got older and I was allowed to put the needle on the record myself, I would play them on my own. I would put on the huge headphones, plug myself in, and just allow the music to swallow me up. I loved noticing new parts, new sounds, new bits, that I hadn't previously noted. It was, and still is, one of my favourite things to do. And it all started with The Moody Blues.

My mum had a great record collection, but I recall The Moody Blues being my "go to" band. My mum and I would clean the house together so as to get it all tidy faster so we could go out and play in the park. I would get to pick the music we would blast in our tiny apartment. I would often pick Led Zeppelin, or The Beatles, but more often than not, it would be The Moody Blues.

Even now that I am all grown up and living far away, when I go home and mum tells me to pick out some music to play, I always reach for a Moody Blues CD, at least one, to go into the mix.

That 2 LP compilation was what first made me love music. The first music I really sat down and listened to. I would go on to do the same thing with The Beatles, and then every other record in my mum's collection.

But then there was the first record I heard independent of my mum. Music that would become mine, part of my collection, when I finally started to build, what is now, my way out of control music collection.

Now, a little bit of history:

I grew up in a radio station. My mum worked at a local radio station when I was young and I would often times get to spend a good deal of time there. I was in heaven. This was way back before radio was corporate and dull the way it is today. It was the halcyon days, let me tell you. So, as such, I was exposed to a lot of music, music that wasn't part of my mum's collection, at a pretty young age. I liked a lot of it, and would ask mum to turn the radio up so I could sing along with my favourite songs.

I don't know why, but it had never occurred to me that I could go out and buy this music and play it over and over myself. Radio and my record player with an already huge collection was all I needed.

Then I turned 13, and Depeche Mode released Violator. I went from listening to nothing but doo-wop (major phase I went through in my preteen years. I had forsaken all my rock & roll for doo-wop) to a major musical awakening. Not so much being exposed to new music (I was already a fan of DM and the likes) but suddenly needing to own music, listen to it over and over again, videos and concerts. Much Music and MTV were still new, and I'd already seen a bit, but now I was obsessed. Music became something to consume, as much as possible, as often as possible, and as loud as possible.

For the first time music became something I didn't share with my mum. I would listen to it, on my own, in my room, and it was mine! mine! mine! all mine! Time would make it even more so. I started to pay attention to what other people were listening to. My friends and I started to talk about music, and I would start listening to what they had, and we would trade tapes, and listen to music together. It was the beginning of my new relationship with music.

As time went on my musical tastes broadened. I would listen to anything at least once. I would also obsess over an artist, whether it be Mozart or U2, I would listen to anything and everything I could get my hands on. I would buy music magazines, read books, study, whatever, just to learn more about what I was listening to.

Jr. high was when I started to notice that music was one of those things that was just as important as clothing when it came to defining what social group you were pigeonholed into. Rather than limit my musical scope, it this only added to the music I was collecting.

I had one group of friends at my school that listened to a lot of metal, so I did to. I had a bunch of girl friends that would listen to a lot of pop and act girly and such, so I listened to what they were listening to. Then I had another group of friends at another school, a bunch of skate punks, so I started listening to that as well.

I can trace a large number of shifts in my life directly to music. It always amazes me. Music has been that powerful of an influence in my life. Huh.

Unlike a lot of people I have known, as I started to like different music, I didn't discard the old music, I just added the new music into my wonderful collection. A lifelong obsession, all started because of a 2 LP, Moody Blues, compilation.