Joe Strummer. Maurice Gibb. God help me, I know who's next.
The first album I ever bought was London Calling. I bought it at the TG&Y in Louisburg. Why a fourth level retailer in a two-bit rural North Carolina town had a copy of London Calling, I'll never know, but I plunked down my $14.50 anyway, and cursed the album when I got home because I couldn't find Train in Vain on the album listing.
It was the first album I ever bought, but it wasn't the first I ever owned. The first album I ever owned was the Bee Gees' Children of the World. It was the second place prize in a talent show. First prize was Aerosmith's Toys in The Attic. There was no value judgement here; Toys was just the album the first place winner chose out of the ones available. I was next, and I took the Bee Gees album, not that I had any idea who they were. Third prize ended up being a Teddy Pendergrass album, which is what I would have ended up with if my classmates had judged the contest instead of my teachers.
Did I mention there were only three acts actually in the talent show? No? It's a pretty fair indication of what my talent level was. My friend Jack won, I forget what he did. He went on to smoke a lot of pot in high school. Two black girls, Penny and Elizabeth, finished in third. They did a lip-synching dance thing that was more polished than either my act or Jack's, at least to my eyes. I don't know why they didn't win. They both got pregnant our senior year.
I sang a song I made up, "Parking Meter"
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