It's Dan MacRae

Hello City. I’m going to be going on for a bit of a self-indulgent ramble about my history of musical taste. It’s going to be an avalanche of text and Primitive Radio Gods inspired dick jokes, so there’s no shame in passing this by to look at new and exciting developments in the world of streaming pornography. That said, I recommend all my internet pals (Tumblr enthusiasts and otherwise) think about doing their own silly little post about their history of music listening. If nothing else, it will trick you into falling down a rabbit hole of delightful YouTube clips. Also, I would read every single one of those types of posts because I’m a colossal nerd that is interested in these sorts of essays/rambles/MS Paint Projects/manifestos.

Right, let’s get to it.

My Mom likes to tell the story about how as a three year old I bumrushed a community center stage to sing “Don’t Worry Be Happy” to a crowd of folks surprised to see a pasty toddler hijack their function. I believe this story showcases two special things about me. 1) I’ve always been a music geek. 2) My parents were clearly shit at keeping track of where their first born child was at a crowded community event.

Family Influence (If There Is Some)

My parents weren’t hip music listening types. Growing up, our house had loads of records and cassettes in it (tucked away in wooden cabinets and leather carrying cases), but the dominant sound within the home was CBC Radio. This was entirely the influence of my mom, who would have filled the living room with Peter Gzowski posters if they were available for sale. I don’t think I actually realized that radios played non-classical or non “in program” music until I was in Kindergarten. Heck, if I hear the As It Happens theme, it activates the dish drying part of my muscle memory.

My dad’s album collection was mostly a mix of 80s new wave and whatever protege Prince had that week. At a Father’s Day brunch a couple years ago, he mentioned that his favourite song was “Paint It Black”, which absolutely flabbergasted me because I’m reasonably sure my dad had never previously expressed an opinion about the Rolling Stones. I then remembered that “Paint It Black” was the theme from Tour Of Duty. That made much more sense. Also, they were just kids in that war dammit!

My dad’s tastes have always been firmly entrenched in pop and he continues to be unapologetic in his love of gaudy BIG pop songs. He’s purchased a fair bit of music on iTunes, but I would like to list the albums that I remember my dad purchasing while I was growing up. It’s an astoundingly short list.

Albums My Dad Bought While I Was Growing Up

Queen - Greatest Hits (The version with the Red cover. We also had the 1981 version. The 1981 version has “Flash”, so I always considered the 1992 version inferior.)

Michael Jackson - History

Various Artists - Italo Dance Hits

Various Artists - Men In Black: The Album

Various Artists - A Series Of Decade-Based Compilations From The Local IGA

Our Lady Peace - Naveed (A mistake where they misidentified which disc they were listening to at an HMV listening station. The album’s fucking horrible.)

Various Artists - Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me Original Soundtrack

When my mom wasn’t listening to CBC Radio, she listened to standard Mom Rock. That meant Cat Stevens and Paul Simon. I’m pretty sure Graceland is so engrained in the mom discography that you can actually hear “The Boy In The Bubble” if press your ear against any pregnant woman’s belly.

Albums My Mom Bought While I Was Growing Up

None, but she did buy the “Candle In The Wind” single, which was her duty as a Mom. She was the People’s Princess, god dammit!

My parents also had a shared love of Crash Test Dummies. Not only did they both love the band, but they loved them previous to God Shuffled His Feet. My parents were CTD OGs. I didn’t always care for my parents musical tastes (although I found I have a lot more in common with my dad’s poptimism than I would have guessed), but I think I liked the Crash Test Dummies a lot more than my junior high revisionism claimed I did. My tendency to fawn over lyrics is probably more Brad Roberts influenced than I would have originally guessed.

On one road trip, my dad played Chris De Burgh’s Spanish Train and Other Stories. and I had an absolute fucking meltdown. I was six at the time. I also was (and still am) a colossal pussy. I firmly believe that the song “Spanish Train”, the hex episode of Fresh Prince and the episode of The Simpsons where Bart sells his soul are what contributed to me having OCD.

Finding My Own Music

I was basically left to my own devices musically. Aside from the Crash Test Dummies, I didn’t really inherit any bands. I was free to scout out my own fandom and like whatever silly ol’ stuff caught my attention.

My earliest pop music memory is singing along to George Michael’s “Faith” using a vacuum cleaner nozzle as a microphone. I would follow this up by doing my interpretation of breakdancing. The “breakdancing” mostly just was just me doing poor somersaults and inappropriate crotch thrusts. My friends and family will have no problems telling you that my dancing style hasn’t really changed.

I enjoyed pop music, but with my mother’s CBC radio monopoly firmly in play, I had to find music I liked from alternative sources. Namely, television. Until I was seven, all the music I liked was either a TV show theme (the intros to Darkwing Duck and Perfect Strangers come to mind) or entrance music for my favourite WWF and WCW wrestlers. These songs appealed to me because they were direct, bombastic and would often give you some sort of insight into people I liked, whether they were a leather fixated tag team or a child robot named V.I.C.K.I.

I also went buckwild for Run-D.M.C. when I saw them on Reading Rainbow. I like to imagine all the kids at the YMCA preschool I went to had the same infinity for stylish hats and hip hop. Get that weak Raffi shit out of here.

In elementary school, my palate diversified. My parents bought me a hockey-themed compilation cassette called Contact, which had all the jock rock and techno that comes with watching people play sports on knife boots. I loved the tape and gravitated towards the high energy silliness of 2 Unlimited and Technotronic. I think it might be a rural prairie thing, but all my friends and I shared a love of hockey arena techno and MuchMusic Dance Mix compilations. We all liked explosions and playing with plastic guns and drawing gory photos, so why wouldn’t we all be enormous fans of Corona’s “Rhythm Of The Night”?

The success of Contact allowed me to talk my parents into buying other compilations and letting me borrow their copy of the Barenaked Ladies masterpiece known as Gordon (real talk: probably my favourite album of all time) to soundtrack my afternoon-long action figure fights. Next up would be the most important step in any young man’s life. Owning his first Weird Al Yankovic album.

I went from a world of limited genre access to an explosion of new sounds, ideas and ways to hear songs about food and goofy forms of homicide. I didn’t know a lot of the songs and styles that Weird Al was parodying/homaging (show me an eight year old that knows the words to “MacArthur Park” and I’ll show you a future spree killer), but I was enamored all the same. I was listening to and loving bands like Devo and They Might Be Giants without ever really knowing that’s what I was falling in love with. Also Weird Al is just plain ol’ amazing. His work would inspire me to expand my album collection beyond its current alphabetical status of Various Artists-Yankovic, Weird Al to include some more new and exciting things.

In Part 2, I’ll talk about my experiences in discovering rock radio, gravitating to some really awful bands and figuring out that it’s okay to like some really awful bands.