The Power of Music

The year is 1980, I am seventeen years old and trying to look cool while cruising around with my buddy Eddie. Sweet Home Alabama starts to play on WLUP- FM. “Turn it up”, sings Ronnie Van Zant. Without hesitation, we both reach for the dial to turn it up.

Bam.

The red Firebird, with T-tops, mag rims, and killer stereo, owned by Eddie’s dad and snuck out by Eddie while he was at work, rear-ends a car at a busy intersection.

What happened next doesn’t matter here. However, every time that song plays it will forever trigger that moment and that memory.

That’s the beauty of music. It goes beyond simple appreciation. It can take you to a different place. Or time. It can put you in a better mood. Draw on your emotions. Become a friend when there is no one to talk or listen to.

I’m not a music expert. I just love to listen to it. There are groups that have made an impact on me, from their catalog of songs to the lyrics they have written. For me, it must play during parties, in the car, and while doing projects and chores.

From my first concert, local band M&R Rush, at Washington High School in 1977, to my last one, Alabama (this summer), I must have it.

As a teen during the 1970’s, there were lots of trips to Pat’s Records, just blocks from my house, and once I could drive, to Hegewisch Records in Calumet City. Still have hundreds of their albums in milk crates in a closet. In the early 1980’s we discovered a cable station that played music, called MTV. In college, we spent hours recovering on Sundays soaking it in. It changed the industry. They staked their claim, via their inaugural video - Video Killed the Radio Star. Not sure if that was their intent, but between them and the era of downloading, there doesn’t seem to be many new rock groups breaking through.

It would be a shame to think that there is not another Rolling Stones or Led Zeppelin somewhere out there living together in a cramped, roach infested apartment, playing at seedy venues in unknown towns waiting to get discovered, like so many of those great bands that finally made it big. We can only hope.

The rest of this column is a brief, personal homage to a few of the bands and their words that really connected with me. However, this is just one guy’s opinion. If you have favorites, please comment.

To start, hang the Beatles and Elvis banners as the champs. I consider them to be the greatest performers of my lifetime. Though both were influenced by others, scant few have had as big of an international and/or cultural impact.

Back to the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin. In my book, the granddads of hard and classic rock.

Mick Jagger sang about the devil’s role in tragic events in Sympathy for the Devil. “I rode a tank, held a general’s rank, while the blitzkrieg raged, and the bodies stank”. Who is at fault for history’s issues? Don’t be so quick to point a finger. “After all, it is you and me”.

Though played and overplayed, it’s hard to argue Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven’s place in rock lore. For my liking though, I’ll take their blues-eerie song, Friends. “...the greatest thing you ever can do now. Is trade a smile with someone who’s blue now. It’s very easy.”

Head south next. Lynyrd Skynyrd. Great band, rife with tragedy. They penned my favorite song, Freebird, asking, “if I leave here tomorrow, would you still remember me?” Yep, we will. Forty years after their plane crashed, they stand with the legends. If you can spare twelve minutes, check out Freebird from July 2, 1977, at the Oakland Coliseum on YouTube. Vintage arena rock. Goosebumps guaranteed.

In 1976, Aerosmith released their fourth album – Rocks. It still rocks. My all-time favorite. Put on jeans and a t-shirt, tap a keg in the garage, and play Last Child a few dozen times. A close second is Who’s Next by The Who, from 1971. Some from this era might only remember the lyric “teenage wasteland”, from the song Baba O’Reilly. I could slay a giant after listening to this one.

Other favorite performers include UFO, Rush, Thin Lizzy, Montrose, Rory Gallagher, Stevie Ray Vaughn, and Blue Oyster Cult (look beyond the “cowbell” skit made famous by Saturday Night Live).

In the mood for heavier fare? Start with the patriarchs of metal, Black Sabbath. Ozzy Osbourne became a name there before he became a name everywhere, though he was just part of their success. Without Tony Iommi’s gripping guitar riffs, Ozzy might just have been just another hard-to-understand, drug addicted lead singer who bit the heads off live bats and birds.

From 1976-1985, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, AC/DC, Ted Nugent, Van Halen, Foghat, Motorhead, and the Scorpions also drove my parents crazy.

It is unbelievably hard to choose just a few great lyrics. I struggled between several from Rosalita and the opening from Thunder Road, both from Bruce Springsteen. But I land on Born to Run - “Beyond the Palace hemi-powered drones scream down the boulevard. Girls comb their hair in the rear-view mirror and the boys try to look so hard.” The imagery. Being young. Being cool. Thanks, Boss.

At a college party, I worked up the courage to ask out a girl named Lori after getting pumped up to LA Woman from the Doors. Thirty-one years of marriage later, The Beatles say it best for me, “In my life, I love you more”.

I could go on much longer than space permits, but life has taught me that “you can’t always get what you want”.

This column originally appeared in the Times, a Shaw publication.