Mesh Magazine

When I was.. by Jake from Hightower.

When I was 11 or 12 I was just really starting to discover music. Luckily I have parents who always had good rock music playing so I got to grow up hearing Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, The Ramones and so much more. When the The Who would be on the radio my dad would ask me “Who is this?” when I’d answer “The Who” he’d say “I was asking you.” I think these stupid games he’d play started my music nerdiness. So these are some of the things I was listening to around then that were really important to me.

Police - Outlandos d’Amour
This was my first favorite album by my first favorite band. I had always been around and liked music but this is where I discovered that you could absolutely love a band. I’d listen to all their albums but this is the one that I’d play in my box radio when my mom would take me to Jones Beach out on Long Island New York. I thought I was the coolest kid there walking around blasting “Next to You” and “Truth Hits Everybody”. I had always found “Be My Girl” to be funny but when I look back I realize I had no clue what the song was really about.

Devo – Freedom of Choice
There was something about the hats or maybe Devo just sounded like nothing I had ever heard before. Weird guys playing interesting music with keyboards? I was so into it. I think it was probably that they seemed so weird and different. They were total nerds. I was in all the gifted and talented smart kid classes at the time so I thought in a weird way I could relate to them being geeks.

Van Halen – Van Halen
Of course like everyone else of my age group at this time I discovered 1984 first. The first riff I ever learned on guitar was the opening riff to panama. I wanted a shirt with dice all over it like Eddie Van Halen’s in the video so bad. I was looking through my parents records and I found Van Halen 1. I figured I liked 1984 so this will probably be good too. Good was an understatement. When it got to the second cut “Eruption” I was blown away. I had never heard a guitar played like that. There was nothing in my little brain that ever thought you could make those sounds with a guitar. Then after hearing all the other great songs on there I was sold. 1984 was still good to me but this was and still is my favorite Van Halen record.

Iron Maiden - Powerslave
This record I have to say was my introduction to metal. In many people’s opinions it may not be the best Maiden record but every song is good on it all the way through. I was just learning to play guitar around this time so the harmonies on this album were the thing I had been looking for. The guitar wasn’t just a rhythm thing backing the vocals and it wasn’t a lead thing showing off over the other instruments. They played off each other so well it was great. And then there was Bruce Dickinson with his operatic vocals. Whoa! I was never even one of those weird D&D kids but Maiden made me want to go ride on the backs of dragons and burn down villages full of non believers of metal.

By a mystery man from Calling All Monsters.

So I must have been like 9 or so… and I saw the video for “Stand and Deliver” by Adam and The Ants on this show called MV3…. it was a video show, that I think, originated in England (all the VJ’s were British)… somehow, this program was syndicated on a local station I got (Hey, I am a kid, I don’t know how these things worked…).

    Anyway, I went out and bought the cassette of the album, KINGS OF THE WILD FRONTIER…. the LP didn’t have “Stand and Deliver” on it, but the cassette did. I have since bought the LP and pump that record at least once a month.

My mom and I used to buy 45’s from the Radio Shack in town. Men at Work “Who can it Be Now?”: J Geils “Centerfold” : QUeen “Another One Bites the Dust”, stuff like that.

The best thing about that MV3 show, was that they would show all types of videos, no matter what style… Like in the half hour the videos would be Billy Joel’s “Pressure”, then The Cure’s “The Walk”, then Judas Priest’s “Breaking the Law”……. which was obviously, rad.

Brian Gorman from Tartufi clues us in on his record collection at age 11.

I was eleven years old in 1985, in Troy, New York; where all the kids were into Iron Maiden and Metallica. I learned about bands mostly from my older brother, Scott, but also from the constant buzz of radios and TVs on in our home. MTV was on constantly.

Van Halen – 1984 – This album was like a sex ed class before I knew what sex was. “Why are they easing the seats back and reaching between their legs?”

Bon Jovi – Bon Jovi – This was my first taste of what became sort of an embarrassing obsession. Two years later I went to the Bon Jovi / Cinderella show and screamed so loud I lost my voice. The next day in shop class I got in a fight because a kid called me a pussy for going to the show.

Quiet Riot – Metal Health – I listened to this album over and over and over while reading a book called, “The Electric Book”- a freaky story about a kid with a magic typewriter. To this day if I hear a QR song every detail of that story comes back to me.
(more…)

When I was 11, I was in 6th grade and one of my assignments was to write and illustrate my very own book. I decided to write about a spoiled affluent girl named Mary whose mom sends her to Compton to learn about the “real world” after she throws her escargot plate at the wall. During this journey of personal epiphanies, she witnesses gang violence, crack being dealt to kids her age, corrupt & lazy cops, and prostitution.

Bloods and Crips

View the rest here.

Lynne Angel of Tartufi.

When i was eleven i lived in the nightmarish town of Swampscott, Massachusetts and i hated it there having just moved from the wicked friendlier and uber midwesty Lincoln, Nebraska. It was 1990 and I was in 7th grade and listening to:

    Def Leppard - Hysteria
I know, I know — I am a few years late in terms of release date….but this was a hand me down album from my sister’s crazy friend and it made me feel wild and out of control. Riiiiight.

    The B-52s - Cosmic Thing
Ok - so Fred Schneider may quite possiby be the most annoying man on the planet but - I swear to sweet Jebus - put Kate Pierson and Cindy Wilson together and even if they coughed through the whole album it would sound like sweet sweet heaven on earth. Those ladies taught me how beautiful harmonies could be — and about partying in things called “Love Shack”s, which sounded pretty cool to my 11 year-old ears.

    Janes Addiction - Ritual De Lo Habitual
This album kind of scared the crap out of me. What with the lady in the “Been Caught Stealing” video dancing all through the produce aisle. I mean - she was dancing all up on the fruits and vegetables!!! That is just too much!! And where was that man shoving those items?? Into a fakey pregnant belly? Oh man. Side A was simply the most gi-normous sound I had ever heard. And Side B was just lovely and like a carnival ride that never ends. It took me a few years to fully realize how mind blowing this album was.

    Vanilla Ice - To The Extreme
This is embarrassing and true. I got it for my birthday and, by the next day, I knew all the words to “Ice Ice Baby”. Nuff Said. Let us never mention it again.

    Madonna - The Immaculate Collection
I still think “Cherish” is one of the best songs ever. My mom took my Madonna tape after that hanky-panky-spanky song on the Dick Tracy soundtrack came out. The only other tape she ever took away was my Minor Threat discography. Both of these confiscations hurt me deeply.

17, the year was 1999. I was finishing high school dreamed of living in San Francisco everyday. My favorite records were:

1. De La Soul - Buhloone Mindstate
“I Am I Be” was the jam. Even if it was six years old.

2. Lauryn Hill - The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill
I had a serious girlfriend at the time so there was no escaping this one.

3. Various Artists - Beneath the Surface
This was underground rap from LA. Everyone that listened to this always had a backpack on.

4. Bjork - Homogenic
I’ve had a secret fascination with Bjork ever since seeing the “Human Behavior” video on Beavis and Butthead when I was 12.

5. Anticon - Music for the Advancement of Hip Hop
This was the start of an annoying technical appreciation of rap. All the soul of the Mos Def album was lost on me once I started listening to this.

Listen to “The Bay Is Back” by Eddie K. Check out Ed’s Myspace page to hear more, and to purchase his album, Gurpology 101.

Man when I was 11 I was lucky to have an older brother who use to DJ alittle so I was all in his stuff when he left the house. So at 11 I was bumping “Birthday Party” Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five and everything that came out under Sugar Hill.

At 12:
“Planet Rock” - Afrika Bambaataa/Soulsonic Force,

“The Bubble Bunch” Jimmie Spicer

At 13:
“It’s Like That/Sucker MCs” Run-DMC.

Everything by Uncle Jamm’s Army, straight up electro stuff.

At 14:
“Roxanne Roxanne” - UTFO
(more…)

15 in 1997, I rode my skateboard everywhere. Despite never having been on a boat or a horse, I wore a lot of Nautica and Polo Sport. Hip-hop overtook my top 5 that year:

1. Gravediggaz - 6 Feet Deep
Listened to this everyday. It was like rap by Satanists.

2. The Pharcyde - Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde
This was already pretty old but I saw a rerun of In Living Color where they preformed “Passing Me By” during the end credits and searched every record store until I found a cassette.

3. GZA - Liquid Swords
The intro sample and beat on the first song were so good. It was my favorite Wu-Tang moment ever.

4. Wu-Tang Clan - Enter the Wu-Tang
So what if it was four years old. That ‘W’ was handdrawn on every notebook I owned.

5. Outkast - ATLiens
I lived in the South and you couldn’t escape this.

I also liked everything and anything that was in skate videos and that Cardigans song from the Romeo and Juliet soundtrack.

Adam Cimino from The Mall

I turned 11 on November 1st, 1989 and had a big brother that worked at a record store in Pleasanton, CA called City Records. The list below has a lot to do with what I could scavenge out of his room while he was at work or out getting rad on his BMX.

Dead Milkmen - BeelzeBubba

Ministry – The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste

Death Angel Death Angel – Act III

Fugazi – 13 Songs

Nine Inch Nails – Pretty Hate Machine

Sonic Youth – Goo

DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince – He’s the DJ, I’m the Rapper

Metallica – And Justice for All

Jane’s Addiction – Ritual de lo Habitual

I bought a Rush tape at Sprouts Reitz around this time too. They had maybe 50 random tapes in a cardboard display. I bought Flight by Night because I liked the cover and ended up collecting at least 20 more of their albums over the next year or two. Who ever was stocking it kept track of the ones I had because Motorhead and Sinatra sat stagnant as Rush’s discography cycled through at $3.99 a pop. I spent a lot of time playing with drumsticks on my bed to those tapes after school.

13 in 1995, I had just moved to North Carolina. I hung out in my neighborhood a lot and wore XL T-shirts despite being five-foot-nothing. My five favorite records at the time were:

1. Nine Inch Nails - The Downward Spiral
This was the first rock concert I ever went to and I was easily the smallest kid on the floor. When the mosh pit broke out, it was the most thrilling/scariest moment of my life to date.

2. Pavement - Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain
This was the first album I ever had on CD. The song “Range Life” epitomized my summer that year.

3. Marilyn Manson - Portrait of an American Family
This is pretty embarrassing, but that guy had a good schtick at the time.

4. Ministry - Psalm 69
At age 13, this record just seemed so epic, dark, and full of hidden secrets, which no one would ever find out because they only existed in my head.

5. My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult - Hit & Run Holiday
Who let me listen to this? Seriously. I had no idea what I was doing. I should’ve had an older brother.