my 1979 purchase that changed everything.

in 1979 i went on a trip to seattle for a rowing regatta - not that fancy but pretty exciting for a kid in grade nine who had never been to seattle before. while the rowing was interesting, i was more interested in hitting tower records to buy an album or two to play back in our dorms.
i had, for years, read about lou reed, patti smith, mink deville and the ramones but couldn't find any of their albums in the regular stores i frequented. now i knew i would be able to. i, up until that point had been listening to kiss - huge fan, bad company, nazareth, foghat, reo speedwagon, angel, and sweet. but i wanted a ramones album. and today i was gonna get one.
and i did. tower records was ripe with records - all manner of records. it was hard to choose. but i did, eventually. i chose 'road to ruin'.
and the die was cast.
soon after it was more ramones records, talking heads - after seeing them at the gardens at the pne in late 1979. and others soon followed.
that ramones record changed the game for me. i could tell by the pictures i had seen that it was interesting, that i wanted to hear it, and now i was. and it was good.
sure, 'i wanna be sedated' was on there but, 'don't come close', 'questioningly', and 'i'm against it' made a bigger impact in the end.
so great.
i'm telling you this now as i'm going to be telling about more albums i think shaped my life somehow. sweet, bowie, nazareth...

g. xo