Mesh Magazine

Stealing Bryan’s theme… When I was 11, it was 1989, a year when there were many great albums released. Unfortunately, I wasn’t listening to any of them. Instead, here’s my best guess/memories of what cassettes I was rocking out to:

Billy Joel - Storm Front
I was way, way into “We Didn’t Start the Fire.”“Wheel of fortune, sally ride, heavy metal, suicide/Foreign debts, homeless vets, aids, crack, bernie goetz/Hypodermics on the shores,China’s under martial law/Rock and roller cola wars, I cant take it anymore.” Lyrical genius… well, he was married to Christie Brinkley, so fuck off.

Bobby Brown - Don’t Be Cruel
Holy crap, this album had some jams on it: “Don’t Be Cruel”, “Roni”, “My Perogative”, “Every Little Step.” They would play all of those at Roller World, where I would skate my ass off, so much so, that one time I knocked out my tooth.

Tommy Petty - Full Moon Fever
This cassette, I vividly remember getting from Columbia House as part of the 12 cassettes for a penny deal. I’m pretty sure “I Won’t Back Down” was my favorite track.

U2 - Rattle And Hum
Not only did I have this album, I got my mom to buy me a Rattle & Hum t-shirt from JC Penney, to go along with my T&C Skate Company shirt. When I went to Memphis this summer, I learned that U2 recorded this album at Sun Studios, which has the mixing board they used mounted on the gift shop wall.

Neneh Cherry - Raw Like Sushi
This was from my sister’s tape collection, and the only good song is “Buffalo Stance,” but I was feeling “Manchild” a lot back in the day.

Yeah, no Disintegration, no Bleach, no Doolittle, no Paul’s Boutique. I did actually listen to a lot of surprisingly good hip-hop, thanks to my older brother’s collection, including 3 Feet High And Rising by De La Soul, and Unfinished Business by EPMD, but man, I wish I could remember what else I was listening to, because I’m sure there was some amazing crap I could tell you about.

11 years old, it was 1993 and I lived in Florida. Hours of MTV’s Alternative Nation compelled me to buy eight cassettes for a penny from Columbia House. My top five favorite records at the time were:

1. Smashing Pumpkins - Siamese Dream.
My 6th grade girlfriend had a huge crush on Billy Corgan and all I could do was embrace them.

2. Rage Against the Machine - Rage Against the Machine.
I like how many times he cursed on the second track and the video for “Freedom” made me want to fight cops.

3. Nirvana - In Utero.
So many jams on this one and I wished I could have red hair like Kurt did in the liner notes.

4. Beck - Mellow Gold.
I got this the day it came out because I wanted to memorize all the words to “Loser.” Then the second track said something about a dildo and I thought that was so funny.

5. Salt-N-Pepa - Very Necessary.
What? “Shoop” was the first song I knew every word to. But it’s only now that I understand what that meant.