His name was Michael.
Boop boop a ditum datum watum choo !!
Got the 45 ( my first of many) for my kindergarten “graduation” .
My parents had the oldest, whitest record collection imaginable. Soundtracks, but nothing fun, only instrumental ones; and LPs like 101 Strings Play The Music of Irving Berlin, that kind of stuff. But tucked away in their two-ton “Entertainment Center” was a Kingston Trio record. It was live, they were hilarious, and they played some Pacific Island folk tunes (two grew up in Hawaii)… like O Ken Karanga.
(Do listen to John Stewart’s intro: “We ask you all to jump up during the song and dance down the aisles, tearing off bits of clothing, shrieking filthy words…
…You don’t have to, if you’re ashamed of your bodies.”)
Suddenly my six year old self realized music could be FUN!
Mine was “Rock the boat” by the Hues Corporation. I think I was in 7th grade when it came out in 1974.
Listening to records in the living room on my parent’s little plastic record player is one of my very first memories at all. My parents had different kind of records, mostly German Schlager, some of James Last’s “happy music” albums and different sampler albums. But the three songs I loved the most at 4 years were the Singing Nun’s “Dominique” and “Hot Love” and “Metal Guru” by T. Rex. My parents had no rock records, but the two T. Rex songs were on two different samplers with mostly Schlager. They instantly became my favorites and established a life long passion for rock music. I also watched the TV show “Disco”, and my first TV memory is Suzy Quatro on Disco with either “Can The Can” or “48 Crash” (I saw both, but doesn’t remember which was shown first). The little woman in leather with a bass guitar bigger than herself, screaming and rocking her lungs out, just blew my 5 year old brain.
a) When I was 7, I had one of those floppy vinyl albums that were originally embedded in the cardboard of a box of breakfast cereal. It was about the danger of forest fires – side A was Alvin and the Chipmunks singing about Smokey the Bear (not the original “Smokey the Bear” song but one of their own, which had these A, B C’s of forest fire prevention embedded in it but (unlike the linked chipmunks video) was indeed a song. and side B was a more sophisticated song by god-knows-who called “The Sigh of the Dying Trees”. I’ve looked for mention or copy of these for nostalgia’s sake but haven’t found them yet.
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My first acquisition from my parents’ collection was “Inside Sauter-Finegan” by the Sauter-Finegan orchestra. Apparently as a 6 year old I loved that so much that my Dad eventually gave up and gave it to me to play to death on my own record player.
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When I was about 9 or so, my sister had a primitive record player – the tonearm was a hollow plastic thing with no electricity and had a needle that was more like a steel push pin than a phono needle – and one of her records was a song about “Pixie Dixie” (no relationship to the mice characters “Pixie” and “Dixie” which makes searching for mention of the song downright difficult).
Pixie Dixie is always laughing…
Even Rudolph needs Pixie Dixie
Just before he leaves the sleigh…
My first favorite song was Puff the Magic Dragon by Peter, Paul, & Mary. I listened to it over and over again when I was about 4 years old. My father gave me the LP and a portable record player and I practically wore the grooves off.
“I’m a little white duck floating on the water,
A little white duck, doing what he oughter…”
No idea who sang it.
^ Burl Ives?
Nope. I’d remember Burl Ives doing it. I had a record of him doing Ugly Bug Ball. This was made on a bright blue record you played on a record player where all the child had to do was put the record on and close the lid.
The earliest pop song I recall liking is “All I Have To Do Is Dream” by the Everly Brothers.
Even as a little kid I hated “Playground on my Mind”. Probably the first song I remember liking was “Last Train to Clarksville”. I thought it was really cool that they used the tune to advertise the last Apollo mission.
A bass line and fingers snapping. how cool is that!
Cottleston Pie was one of the first songs I remember that I still hum from time to time.
My first 45 was Bird Dog by the Everly Brothers.