Brad Delp, lead singer of the rock group Boston and The Beatles cover band, Beatlejuice, passed away last night. He was 55. What a tragedy: ["'Nice guy' rocker dies at 55"].
I'd always heard Delp was a nice guy and everyone raved about how good Beatlejuice was. I never met the man but it sounds as if very approachable, not unlike others in the business. Boston rockers like Peter Wolf, lead singer of the J.Geils Band, would almost always talk to anyone he ran into [Wolf even did a stint on WMFO's "On the Town" show for kicks]. Gary Cherone of Extreme, at the top of his game, was still working out and playing basketball at the Y in Malden, as another example.
I was never a big fan of Boston but I never shut it off when it was on the radio either. Just thinking about the band brings back a flood of memories. Boston were always on the radio after 1976. That first album was so huge back when records sold respectively and didn't really sell like they do today. It is estimated that the debut album sold 16 million copies in the United States alone. That is quite amazing when you think about it.
I was young when that record came out - maybe 10 or 11 - but I was old enough to know what rock 'n' roll was. This is mostly because my parents listened to all kinds of music and it trickled down, even if I was more into the early 1960s Beach Boys or Sly & the Family Stone than Boston or Aerosmith. I didn't quite understand everything I was listening to at the time. But in later life, I learned to appreciate some of that music more than I did when I was younger. Not so much Aerosmith, although I laugh at "Big 10 Inch Record," and still play the old version of "Walk this Way" and "Back in the Saddle" on my mp3 player, but the serious, more arty rock bands.
At the time, Aerosmith were a big deal. They were kids who hung out at Lake Sunapee, just up the road, during the summer when they were just starting out and poof, they get a record deal. Later, parental influence would lead me to the Moody Blues, the Doors, and Isaac Hayes. I think about that sometimes now with my own child. Will he be influenced by the fact that his dad listens to the Flaming Lips in the car the same way I was influenced by hearing Grand Funk Railroad? I still listen to "We're an American Band" for kicks, again, on mp3 [although, their version of "Loco-motion" has the most amazing guitar solo on it]. I understand now what the rock 'n' roll lifestyle was about having lived in on a mini-scale back in the mid-to-late 1980s. I've actually seen "sweet, sweet Connie," the groupie, on TV, and understand what she was doing with Grand Funk and other bands, and, allegedly, then-Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton. I wonder if my son will still be listening to "The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song" or something else when he is 40-plus dragging his kids around wherever.
Back in the 1970s, I remember one time complaining to the bus driver about the music he was playing. At the time, kids in Warner had this extremely long bus ride to the New London Middle School. We would get picked up at the beginning of the bus ride, near Exit 8, only to be schlepped around the entire community of Warner and then back to town center, traveling along every bumpy dirt road you could find. We would then all wait at Simonds Elementary for all the buses to get together and switch high school and middle school students. And then, finally, the middle school students would get shipped off on the long haul to New London. It was all so hideous and dreadful and bet the Warner kids still have to endure it.
Any-hoo, the bus driver suggested I bring some music in and he would play. The next morning, I put the few cassettes I had in a paper bag and brought them on the bus. The bus driver pulled them out and looked at me strangely: What are these? You don't have 8-tracks? Well, no, I didn't have 8-tracks, I had cassettes. My parents were semi-audiophiles. They had the latest in sound technology whether it was reel-to-reels in the 1960s or cassettes in the 1970s, which was the superior format. So the bus driver couldn't play any of the music which I had and we kept listening to the radio or his 8-tracks. Even at 11, I was a music critic and didn't even know it. Cassettes and 8-tracks have gone the way of the DoDo bird. Reels are still used in some analog recording studios. But it is amusing to think about this all now.
Radio was a big deal because it was the only form of communication in which you could hear music. Now we have all these other things like streaming audio or mp3 players. Back then, DJs were cool; now they are somewhat annoying. You never met the DJ - because they were in far away places like Boston. But you heard their voices and got to know them. Now, you can't wait for them to shut the hell up and play some more music, if you even listen to the radio at all.
One of the stations we listened to as kids was WCOZ. The FM rocker actually had a radio contest to give away a kilo. The connotation was that they were going to give away a kilo of marijuana at the end of the summer even though it probably never happened. I don't remember. I just remember hearing that "giving away a kilo" thing over and over again. Oh, have times have changed though: You can't even smoke a cigarette on television, never mind a joint, and WCOZ is now this hideous rap station, WJMN.
And radio itself has changed and not for the better in many ways. So obsessed is everyone with the commercial and revenue component, we have all now forgotten about the joys of doing and listening radio. One of the reasons I participate and subscribe to some of the radio chat boards is to be around other people who miss the old days of radio when it wasn't programmed on a computer and when it was about hearing something new which challenged you as a listener. Some of the smaller stations, like college stations, still do that. But if you live in the woods - or semi-woods - it is difficult to hear those kinds of stations.
I guess everything must change. Generations before me have been saying the same thing. But you would think that we would be able to hold to just a few things which are precious. In some ways, I can. It's called programming your CD player or mp3 player and having complete control over what you hear. But it would be great if there was one place where you could go back and have it be the way it was, even for just a few hours a week.
I'd always heard Delp was a nice guy and everyone raved about how good Beatlejuice was. I never met the man but it sounds as if very approachable, not unlike others in the business. Boston rockers like Peter Wolf, lead singer of the J.Geils Band, would almost always talk to anyone he ran into [Wolf even did a stint on WMFO's "On the Town" show for kicks]. Gary Cherone of Extreme, at the top of his game, was still working out and playing basketball at the Y in Malden, as another example.
I was never a big fan of Boston but I never shut it off when it was on the radio either. Just thinking about the band brings back a flood of memories. Boston were always on the radio after 1976. That first album was so huge back when records sold respectively and didn't really sell like they do today. It is estimated that the debut album sold 16 million copies in the United States alone. That is quite amazing when you think about it.
I was young when that record came out - maybe 10 or 11 - but I was old enough to know what rock 'n' roll was. This is mostly because my parents listened to all kinds of music and it trickled down, even if I was more into the early 1960s Beach Boys or Sly & the Family Stone than Boston or Aerosmith. I didn't quite understand everything I was listening to at the time. But in later life, I learned to appreciate some of that music more than I did when I was younger. Not so much Aerosmith, although I laugh at "Big 10 Inch Record," and still play the old version of "Walk this Way" and "Back in the Saddle" on my mp3 player, but the serious, more arty rock bands.
At the time, Aerosmith were a big deal. They were kids who hung out at Lake Sunapee, just up the road, during the summer when they were just starting out and poof, they get a record deal. Later, parental influence would lead me to the Moody Blues, the Doors, and Isaac Hayes. I think about that sometimes now with my own child. Will he be influenced by the fact that his dad listens to the Flaming Lips in the car the same way I was influenced by hearing Grand Funk Railroad? I still listen to "We're an American Band" for kicks, again, on mp3 [although, their version of "Loco-motion" has the most amazing guitar solo on it]. I understand now what the rock 'n' roll lifestyle was about having lived in on a mini-scale back in the mid-to-late 1980s. I've actually seen "sweet, sweet Connie," the groupie, on TV, and understand what she was doing with Grand Funk and other bands, and, allegedly, then-Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton. I wonder if my son will still be listening to "The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song" or something else when he is 40-plus dragging his kids around wherever.
Back in the 1970s, I remember one time complaining to the bus driver about the music he was playing. At the time, kids in Warner had this extremely long bus ride to the New London Middle School. We would get picked up at the beginning of the bus ride, near Exit 8, only to be schlepped around the entire community of Warner and then back to town center, traveling along every bumpy dirt road you could find. We would then all wait at Simonds Elementary for all the buses to get together and switch high school and middle school students. And then, finally, the middle school students would get shipped off on the long haul to New London. It was all so hideous and dreadful and bet the Warner kids still have to endure it.
Any-hoo, the bus driver suggested I bring some music in and he would play. The next morning, I put the few cassettes I had in a paper bag and brought them on the bus. The bus driver pulled them out and looked at me strangely: What are these? You don't have 8-tracks? Well, no, I didn't have 8-tracks, I had cassettes. My parents were semi-audiophiles. They had the latest in sound technology whether it was reel-to-reels in the 1960s or cassettes in the 1970s, which was the superior format. So the bus driver couldn't play any of the music which I had and we kept listening to the radio or his 8-tracks. Even at 11, I was a music critic and didn't even know it. Cassettes and 8-tracks have gone the way of the DoDo bird. Reels are still used in some analog recording studios. But it is amusing to think about this all now.
Radio was a big deal because it was the only form of communication in which you could hear music. Now we have all these other things like streaming audio or mp3 players. Back then, DJs were cool; now they are somewhat annoying. You never met the DJ - because they were in far away places like Boston. But you heard their voices and got to know them. Now, you can't wait for them to shut the hell up and play some more music, if you even listen to the radio at all.
One of the stations we listened to as kids was WCOZ. The FM rocker actually had a radio contest to give away a kilo. The connotation was that they were going to give away a kilo of marijuana at the end of the summer even though it probably never happened. I don't remember. I just remember hearing that "giving away a kilo" thing over and over again. Oh, have times have changed though: You can't even smoke a cigarette on television, never mind a joint, and WCOZ is now this hideous rap station, WJMN.
And radio itself has changed and not for the better in many ways. So obsessed is everyone with the commercial and revenue component, we have all now forgotten about the joys of doing and listening radio. One of the reasons I participate and subscribe to some of the radio chat boards is to be around other people who miss the old days of radio when it wasn't programmed on a computer and when it was about hearing something new which challenged you as a listener. Some of the smaller stations, like college stations, still do that. But if you live in the woods - or semi-woods - it is difficult to hear those kinds of stations.
I guess everything must change. Generations before me have been saying the same thing. But you would think that we would be able to hold to just a few things which are precious. In some ways, I can. It's called programming your CD player or mp3 player and having complete control over what you hear. But it would be great if there was one place where you could go back and have it be the way it was, even for just a few hours a week.
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