First album/single you bought and why

[FLips]

My first album was WWF The Music Volume 5. A solid choice for when I was playing with my figures in the bath or hanging out with my mates. A less solid choice to take on my school trip to the Lake District where the poor girl who got sat next to me on the bus asked to listen to my music and I decided Kurt Angle's theme was a great choice. She took the headset off after about ten seconds and didn't speak to me for the rest of the trip.

[Tommy!]

8 minutes ago, FelatioLips said:

when I was playing with my figures in the bath

I'm assuming that's a euphemism. 

[Egg Shen]

dunno, if I can answer this truthfully as there's probably 5-10 albums I remember having as a kid that I probably asked for as Christmas presents or whatever. I'll list a couple:

Got this bad boy in cassette, I was 8 when this came out, The Simpsons was everywhere and I had to have it. In hindsight it's a pretty weird album. Outside of Do The Bartman and Deep, Deep Trouble and maybe one or two other's I wouldn't say the music on here is the kind of thing a young kid would be into. As the title says it really is The Simpson's characters covering a bunch of old Blues tunes with modified lyrics. It's crud, but I at that age you play whatever you own to death. I've since passed a few of the tunes onto my step-son, he gets the same enjoyment out of them of that I did at that age.

Another one, I was 10 at this point:

#

1992. At this stage, to me Gladiator's was the greatest thing in the world, it was massive, I was in the fan club and everything. I also got this on cassette and browsing the track listing now, I wouldn't be surprised if this thing laid the seeds for the path I took musically in the future (along with listening to some classic albums owned, but this one was mine). It opens with the Gladiators theme music, then its's full of massive classic rock tunes. Outside of War and Wild Thing, I don't think much of it had anything to do with Gladiators but I loved all of them. They even tagged the actual music of the in-game events at the end of side 2. Very fond memories here. They put out a sequel a year (with a pink cover) or two later, I got that one two which may have been my first ever CD...either that or WWF's Slam Jam single.

I'm probably gonna remember something else later that came before these two, but they were definitely amongst the first few. May add in the first album's I bought proper with my own money with an idea at what direction I was taking musically as I entered school as a teenager in a bit.

Looking back at the two above though, it makes me realise that even at a young age I was someone who needed more of what I enjoyed. I always wanted to delve a little deeper than what I saw on the TV, hence why I got into wrestling and spent 20 years of my life posting in these bleeding place.

[BomberPat]

I can't remember the first single - probably something deeply tragic - but the first album was Appetite For Destruction by Guns & Roses, when I was maybe 12 or 13. Though I can't rule out that I might have bought a WWF Music thing before that.

It took me a while to bother buying music. I had a load of tapes that used to be either my brother's or my Dad's, so had a lot of grunge and classic rock stuff, plus Automatic For The People by R.E.M., before I decided to start buying stuff for myself. 

My brother was getting really into Kerrang! playlist nu-metal stuff then, and while I listened to some of it at first, when I was just starting to really figure out my tastes, I moved on from that pretty quickly, and the first thing I really gravitated to was classic rock and NWOBHM stuff. A lot of my early purchases were these dirt-cheap "MONSTERS OF METAL" compilations, full of stuff like Angel Witch and Saxon.

[Jazzy G]

The first single I bought was Got My Mind Set On You by George Harrison. I got it from WH Smith in Blackburn. I'm so glad I bought it because if I hadn't then my first single would have been Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini by Bombalurina. There was some acid house thing on the b-side, which was pretty cool though. Same with the b-side to Seven Little Girls. 

I got Now 13 for my 9th birthday, Smash Hits 1990 the following birthday along with a compilation called Go Nuts which was full of novelty songsI.  think the first album I bought was maybe the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles motion picture soundtrack on cassette, but there's a chance it's also Extremely Live by Vanilla Ice on vinyl. I left the Ninja Turtles soundtrack in a hotel in Lytham when I went there with my gran, and smashed the Vanilla Ice record with a hammer when my best friend at the time and I were feeling destructive. It's on Spotify now, and I still give it a listen now and again. 

Edited February 1, 2023 by jazzygeofferz

[Browser Brady]

3 hours ago, jazzygeofferz said:

 

I think the first album I bought was maybe the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles motion picture soundtrack on cassette, 

Had it also.

A belter …

 

Shredder’s suite is still a classic in my eyes…….erm…. I mean ears…..

 

 

[air_raid]

Embarrassingly my first single (on tape) was Dreamer by Livin Joy. I’d been on a school trip to Germany and had just discovered dance, which opened my eyes to a world outside Queen, Bon Jovi and whatever my folks dug out on vinyl any given weekend. I’d bought “On A Dance Tip 2” so the aforementioned Outhere Brothers, The Real McCoy, Corona, the recently exhumed Nightcrawlers and some forgotten one hitters like U Sure Do by Strike and Not Over Yet by Grace all became my jam - but Dreamer was my favourite.

The first real album I bought (on tape) was These Days by Bon Jovi. They’d been my first favourite band after Queen and I’d been introduced properly to them by my best mate Chris when I overheard Living On A Prayer at a school Christmas party. They didn’t have Crossroad so I bought the then-new album. It was a blend of (relatively speaking) decent songs and one or two I’d definitely recognise in later life as “filler” - Diamond Ring, anyone? I still enjoyed it more than Man Mountain Rock, reviewing it for WWF Magazine. He criticised it because, and I’m paraphrasing “What does Jon Bon Jovi know about living on the streets at this point in his life?” Even as a CHILD this was preposterous bullshit to me. Singers have to stay 100% grounded in real life, who knew? Next you’ll be telling me drinks aren’t free at Club Tropicana. Fuck you, MMR, certainly no Bret Hart in the music stakes - I credit the Hitman as the sole reason I first gave Pearl Jam a listen.

Both these purchases link me to Chris, and a story that would definitely be my entry if we ever had a “childhood cringe” thread.

Around the same time I was getting into dance my parents bought me a new radio/double tape deck, which had a built in microphone. Being able to record our own voices was a huge novelty and we decided for some reason to start recording our own “radio show.” We called it Fab FM, no doubt unconsciously inspired by Smashey & Nicey, and recorded under the imaginative pseudonyms “DJ (air)” and “MC (Chris’ surname)”. Two 45 minute shows live to tape, often on consecutive evenings. It consisted of little more than us dubbing songs tape to tape - probably 97% dance or Bon Jovi with an occasional entry from whatever “Big big hits” double tape Id got from Woolies with my pocket money, one of which ended up being my first exposure to Oasis and further broadening of the horizons. Between songs we killed time with inane chat about fuck-knows-what, and our terrible attempts at 12 year olds humour. I’d put on an old codger voice and pretend to be “Colin” the producer whenever something went awry, and whenever my mum would accidentally walk in on a recording we’d force her to play along as “Beryl the tea lady.” There were other terrible skits and characters such as Mr Pocketweasel who was a cross between Enfield’s Mr Grayson and IRS, dolling out “money saving tips” which were thinly-veiled acts of petty theft, and Chris’ most frequent alter-ego, MC Ganja. He’d drawl incoherently and usually be too “out of it” to keep to the topic at hand, or occasionally “not make it into the studio.”

Many of the “special” episodes like a summer special or Christmas special we did, ended up in special boxes with security tabs snapped off the cassettes, with hand drawn and felt tip coloured inlays on paper from a school exercise book, often showing little more than, for instance, a sunny sky, a Fab FM logo, and a field of grass with summer motifs like ice cream cones, picnic baskets, a radio or mic. Because of my colour blindness the grass was always orange but Chris was too good of a mate to tell me. Most cringeworthy of all is - and why I’m telling this story - that we’d end every show by playing what was number one on the “Fab FM chart”… which was always, without exception, Dreamer. More embarrassing still, on one Christmas recording I was doing by myself, I was experimenting (live to tape) with recording into the mic while also having the radio tuned in, claiming “technical difficulties” for the static while I tried to land on something I wouldn’t mind making “our show” and chanced upon the opening bars of “You Are Not Alone” by Michael Jackson…. which I clumsily introduced to “our listeners” as “current number one in the UK singles chart”. Well, that totally blew kayfabe and exposed the Fab FM chart for the sham that it was, didn’t it! Imagine if when Ric Flair had showed up in 91 Vince and Monsoon had been “OK folks, we know we’ve been peddling Hogan as champion in our houses for 7 years but THIS is the real deal!” Not sure how I sleep at night after that.

The saddest part of the memory however was that somehow the rest of our class at school found out about it. As a fat, bespectacled unpopular child already a target for bullies, this was a new nadir. Soon the shouts of “Alright raid, off home to record more Flab FM?” rang out every day in the playground. Thankfully it was soon after that I started swapping WWF tapes with my mate Tom so it was soon replaced the far more palatable “Alright raid, off home to watch more of that gay wrestling?” So, swings and roundabouts.

[SuperBacon]

15 minutes ago, air_raid said:

Embarrassingly my first single (on tape) was Dreamer by Livin Joy.

Eh? This is a cracking song.

[air_raid]

34 minutes ago, SuperBacon said:

Eh? This is a cracking song.

Well, I like it, but you never know round these parts. One man's Zayn is another man's Zeus.

[Keith Houchen]

9 minutes ago, air_raid said:

Well, I like it, but you never know round these parts. One man's Zayn is another man's Zeus.

Yeah but place it metal heavy and likes wrestling. Taste doesn’t really make an appearance. Tis a cracking song. 

[Jazzy G]

1 hour ago, Browser Brady said:

Had it also.

A belter …

 

Shredder’s suite is still a classic in my eyes…….erm…. I mean ears…..

 

 

I bought Rhapsody On The Half Shell on 7¥ because it had Turtle Power on the b-side. Some great songs on there. 

[Ironic Indie Lad]

I got a CD Walkman in 1995 with a load of Oasis, Pulp and Blur albums. I was quite lucky in that my parents had a lot of CD's when I was a kid from the likes of Neil Young, The Clash, R.E.M, Style Council, Beautiful South, Van Morrison etc. Sadly they had M People as well and to this day if I hear them I am transported back to it being a rainy sunday, my mums cleaning the house and I am very depressed about having to go to School the next day.

I mostly just listened to the above until the glory days of the late 90s/ early 00s when everyone knew someone with the ability to burn CD's.  I would acquire loads of, in hindsight, terrible metal and punk albums based off of whatever I liked that I saw on MTV2 or Kerrang at the time.

The first CD I can remember actually going into a shop and buying with my own money was License to Ill by the Beastie Boys. For whatever reason I went through a huge Beasties phase in the early 00s and amassed a seriously impressive amount of live and remix bootlegs. 

[Chris B]

The first single I owned was the free record you got when you joined the He-Man fan club. It came along with a decoder and a fan letter confirming your secret identity (mine was CALMOS).

I was bought some albums in the meantime, but it wasn't really the same as going out to buy something that was in the charts. The first one I paid actual money for was years later - and it was the same song I had my first kiss too, shifting a girl called Yvonne at a disco when I'd just turned 12. Meat Loaf's I'd Do Anything For Love (but I won't do that). 

I loved it so much that when I finally got a CD player a couple of weeks later, my first album purchase was obvious - and I played the absolute shit out of it. Still a hugely fun, over the top album, and I can still happily listen to it from start to finish.

[air_raid]

Bat out of Hell 2 is amazing. Though it does only have the second best version of Good Girls Go To Heaven, Bad Girls Go Everywhere.

Edited February 1, 2023 by air_raid

[CavemanLynn]

My first single was Aerosmith's "Falling In Love (Is Hard On The Knees)". Right in the middle of their 90s post-rehab comeback, and if they weren't on their blockbuster soundtrack rampage, I had the Wayne's Worlds on loop. Frankly, it must have been something of a relief to my Dad, having raised us on a diet of classic rock and metal. When he'd got our first 486, I went through a stage of making chibi-style pixel art in Paint of groups of characters from video games and bands, but spent an inordinate amount of time and effort making multiple cartoon pictures of short-lived boy band MN8. The video for FIL(IHOTK) is staggeringly unsexy considering the number of scantily clad possibly-lesbian models and Joe Perry eye-fucking the camera, further evidence that Michael Bay can't film people, but I still think the tune is a solid and self-aware pop rock banger.

My first album was Republica's self-titled one. Fueled mainly by the first stirrings of girl awareness for little Cave, I remember being disappointed that first-crush grrl pixie Saffron was actually doing dancy stuff rather than Ready To Go for 11 tracks, so I should probably revisit it at some point. Still, it hit my low bar of "three decent tracks on an album is worth it."