The weird record you discovered at the back of the pile...
Perhaps my greatest thrill as a kid getting into music was when I stumbled across something really weird that fried my young mind.
In 1982 (aged 13) I was flicking through my aunt's record collection and came across Dr John's 'Gris Gris' album nestled amongst the numerous Dylan LPs and old blues records. I remember taking it out of the pile and staring at the bizarre cover, thinking "What is this?!" I put it on the record player, and will never forget the feeling I had as this strange, strange music began to play.
It was from a different planet to the songs I was used to hearing on Radio 1... wailing saxophone that sounded like a call to prayer, rhythms that could have soundtracked some veiled nocturnal ritual and a cracked drawl of a voice that seemed to emanate from a dark, shadowy place.
It floored me... I knew from that moment on that there was a world of music out there that didn't sound or look like The Thompson Twins. Over the next few years, I discovered other extraordinary sounds, but nothing ever quite matched the thrill of hearing that unique LP for the first time.
What were the records that had a similar effect on you?
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An excuse to post this...
Short cuts in the daytime
I went to see the good doctor about eleven years ago at the Forum. I remember very clearly that he announced himself as follows (or, at least, this is what I think I heard): "I'm Dr John, the Night Tripper. I take short cuts in the daytime". I still have no idea what this means, but it sounded really cool.
Hot Rats
I knew from my Led Zeppelin and other albums that a guitar could sing and lift a song to exciting heights, and I was more than familiar with Jimi's genius, but I hadn't heard anyone do what Frank does on this album with an electric guitar, the Captain on growling, and a full band as tight as a very tight thing.
It was an epiphany, and also the road to near ruin, with perpetually growing "wish lists" for years to come.
If Dweezil thinks I'm going to make that mistake again... Oh bugger.
So many...
...my parents had a small collection of 70s/80s rock albums ranging from Van Der Graaf Generator to King Crimson to Peter Gabriel, Pink Floyd and John Martyn. All of them fascinated me from an early age and continue to do so.
My own more recent 'what the...' discoveries which opened my mind to a whole new world of music include Scott Walker's 'Climate Of Hunter' and Van Morrison's 'Common One'. I posted this on the Van thread, but both of those albums are by 60s legends who did a great big 'screw you' to the music industry's expectations of them and current trends, delivering wildly uncommercial albums which were ignored at the time but acquired mystique as the years went on.
'Hot Rats' was the first Zappa album I heard too, probably the best introduction to his catalogue I think.
Terry Riley
A Rainbow In Curved Air
Discovered in the racks of Leeds University music library. I took it home and copied it to cassette. Realised afterwards I had copied it at 45rpm but thinking it sounded better that way kept the recording intact.
Hah!
What were you smoking?
You might have tried recording it played at 16 for an even more far out effect.
it was..
an older cousins Pink Floyd and Rush albums. I just could not believe the music after radio 1 and a few heavy metal albums.
Simple Minds "Sons &
Simple Minds "Sons & Fascination". I was 15, woke up too early on a Saturday morning, put the loaned cassette of the album into my cheap hi-fi and pressed play. I will never forget the sound of the bassline and warm keyboard pad into to "In Trance As Mission" as I lay in bed in the pitch dark, and the way it made me feel. It's still an extraordinary album.
The Wonderful and Frightening World of...
"Gris Gris" is a brilliantly otherworldly record - weird incense and woodsmoke seem to fill the room whenever I play it.
I remember the point when Nick Cave beckoned me to a bizarre other world. The albums "Kicking Against the Pricks", "Your Funeral...My Trial" and "Henry's Dream" were my passports. "Your Funeral..." is especially intoxicating; you worry for the kind of person who would come up with such a thing.
Tom Waits came soon after. I enjoyed the early years stuff, but when I heard "Just the Right Bullets" on the radio I was lured deep into the forest.
This kind of music works best without visuals, but here are a few examples anyway:
The Carny (set to Ingmar Bergman visuals):
Papa won't leave you, Henry:
Just the Right Bullets (ignore the role-play geek's graphics):