I couldn’t really pick just 5 songs. So here are my 10 favorite songs in no particular order.
Guess what day it is? Its the first day of my birthday month.
Last year I spent 31 days flashing my life before my eyes on Facebook. If you follow me on Facebook then you were privy to a chronological accounting of my life complete with photos and videos. Perhaps I’ll do that here one month.
This year I decided to do a month (31 days) of Ozone Ferd‘s Top 5’s (Top 10 in some cases). Every day I’ll post my Top 5 of some subject or product. Starting with an easy one.
TOP 5 BANDS (or in this case Top 10 cause music is life)
1. KISS – cause it’s KISS and if you know me personally you know I’ve been a KISS fan since 1975
2. Led Zeppelin – well, again no brainer, been a fan since 1974
3. Grand Funk – even before there was KISS there was Grand Funk Railroad, always a fan
4. AC/DC – found them in 1978, will never forget seeing them from the front row on the Black Ice Tour. doesn’t hurt that my band played a lot of AC/DC cause I could sing like Bon Scott.
5. Rush – Another band that my band played a lot of because I could sing like Geddy Lee. We would do the whole side 1 from 2112 plus some of the oldies along with Xanadu
6. Queen – who isn’t a Queen fan. We used to play Tie Your Mother Down
7. Ted Nugent – the man, the legend. When my band wasn’t playing AC/DC or Rush we were playing Nugent songs – Stranglehold, Cat Scratch Fever, Free for All, etc.
8. The Tubes – not many people no this band. I learned of them through CREEM magazine. Like KISS, they had an unbelievable stage show and I lucked into their first album in a K-Mart in Natchez Mississippi. White Punks on Dope baby. Their album needs to be a future Vinyl of the Month.
9. ZZ Top – I’ve live in Texas since 1976, ZZ Top is ingrained in you. While drinking beer around a bon fire in a pasture in the middle of Texas you were listening to ZZ Top. We were all looking for a little Tush back then.
10. Black Sabbath – I had to throw them on because I’ve been listening to them a lot lately. Tony Iommi is a riff master.
So many din not make the list (Judas Priest, King’s X, Thin Lizzy, etc.) and really Elvis and The Beatles could/should be on here as well.
Time to get things going again. First off, getting back to doing a Vinyl of the Month. Last one posted was July so I took August and September off.
Each month I highlight a vinyl album that was a favorite growing up or that had an impact on my life. Go back and read some of the older posts to get what I mean.
This month I’m going to go with the concept album Jesus Christ Superstar with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. The album came out in October 1970. I was not aware of the it at the time but we did hear the song Superstar song on the radio occasionally. I finally got around to buying the album in 1980.
To be honest I didn’t have the vinyl when i was a teen (I do now along with the CD), I had the cassette tape, and I played the shit out of it in my tape player in my Chevy Monza Myself and two friends could sing along to the whole album. I still can sing with the whole album.
This particular album brings back a memory of a trip with the two friends mentioned above (Dennis and Steve). We drove a pickup truck from Killeen TX to Nacogdoches TX (me riding bitch) and we put my cassette on and sang through the whole album during the drive. Such good times in 1982,
Dennis has since passed away (3 years now) and I don’t talk to Steve much. We both miss Dennis.
Anyway, for bringing back fond memories of a wonderful trip with two great friends, I choose Jesus Christ Superstar as this months Vinyl of the Month.
New site address – http://www.ozoneferd.com – not so much adventure as a grandparent and more stuff I do on my own.
Debating whether to keep this Blog going. Just don’t have the determination like I used to.
Gong out on a tangent for this month. For this month I’m going to recommend Cheech and Chong’s Wedding Album circa 1974. I still remember buying this album, I believe it was off the Army base in a deaprtment store in San Juan Puerto Rico.
I was already familiar with Cheech & Chong by hearing the Sister Mary Elephant routine from Big Bambu and the Dave sketch from their first album. I remember hearing these through word of mouth. My friends who had heard the sketches would recite them to us at school. Previous to the Wedding Album I had never owned a C&C album.
One sketch that had caught my attention and made me want to buy the album was the song Black Lassie (A Great American Dog). I recall hearing this on the radio. But there was also probably the best song they’ve ver done on this album as well. Earache My Eye. The song ended up in their movie years later.
HOWEVER, my favorite sketch from the Wedding Album is Hey Margaret. The sketch is man and woman at a theater viewing what sounds to be a porno movie. The man proceeds to describe the movie to his wife. It’s hilarious. I learned to recite the complete sketch by memory.
C’mon Margaret sit up straight and quit acting like such a God damn idiot. I mean what the hell its only a porno flick for Christ’s sake.
I would not listen to this one with children. There’s not any bad words, just a lot of sexual innuendo. Funny sketch and you can imagine a couple at a flick.
So if you are looking for a classic comedy album from the 70’s, I recommend Cheech and Chong’s Wedding Album as Paw Paw’s Vinyl of the Month.
Deep Purple. Everyone has heard of Deep Purple right? Perhaps not, but at one time they were the loudest band on the face of the earth (1975). I was not initially a fan of the band because, as I’ve mentioned before, I wasn’t a fan of bands with keyboardist. However, if you’ve ever learned to play the guitar you will know that Smoke on the Water is perhaps the first or second song (behind Wipeout) you learn to play. Its that easy yet so iconic.
Smoke on the Water is from the album Machine Head released in 1972. I was just a pup at the time and really didn’t know the band or the song until around 7th grade (1973) when two things happened.
Now I took a lot of ribbing from my friends (who were in the shop class) for getting punted to art class. But let me tell you, all the girls took art class and I was one of only two boys in the class and in 1973 I was starting to notice girls. So I wasn’t bothered one bit by the ribbing and I enjoyed being in art class. Getting kicked out of shop would later affect my high school shop class grade but another story for another day.
Art class consisted of one day (Tuesday) in learning to draw or paint or, my favorite project, create our own tie-dyed shirt. The other day (Thursday) was spent in music appreciation. Now, on any other year music appreciation would be listening to and discussing classical music, but I lucked out that year and there was a new teacher who wanted to listen to and discuss Rock music. The Rock Gods were listening to my prayers.
Here is where Deep Purple’s Machine Head comes into the story. The music teacher pulled out Machine Head, we listened and we discussed. How cool is that for a 7th grade class. I was in heaven. The other folks in the class, mostly girls, not so much. We went on to listen to Yes, Jimi Hendrix, Iron Butterfly‘s In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida and Uriah Heep. All bands I’d never heard of but was now seeking out and listening to. My music knowledge and appreciation was expanded greatly that year
Sadly, I don’t remember the teachers name or even remember how he looked. I do remember sitting in the classroom though.
So in honor of that year I spent in and loved art class, I’ve chosen Deep Purple’s Machine Head as Paw Paw’s Vinyl of the Month.
I’m a Grand Funk fan. Been listening to them almost as long as I’ve been listening to KISS. They are another band that I am in the process of recapturing their complete discography on vinyl again. And I’m close to doing that. Sadly I gave up a number of those old albums but I managed to hang on to All the Girl’s in the World Beware.
All the Girl’s in the World is my favorite album from them. It was released in 1974. Its the newer Grand Funk, they had dropped the Railroad from their name and picked up Craig Frost on keyboards. I bought this album, like many of my old ones, in Puerto Rico. I can sing every song on this album.
About 10 years ago I played bass in an 80’s retro band called Retroplex and even though its not an 80’s song, we played Some Kind of Wonderful because it has a great dance groove and because I wanted to play and sing it.
I still pull this album out and sing along to it. All 3 original members of Grand Funk Railroad are still alive but sadly Mark Farner does not have a relationship anymore with Don Brewer and Mel Schacher. Don and Mel still tour as Grand Funk but with ex-KISS guitarist Bruce Kulick and a couple of other guys. Craig Frost is also still alive and plays in Bob Seger’s band. I wished they would kiss and makeup. A tour with the original 3 members (and Craig too) would be a sold out tour. I’d pay fairly good money to see that.
So, anyways, my vinyl of the month pick is All the Girl’s in the World Beware by Grand Funk.
A little behind on posting this. This months vinyl of the month is the first Led Zeppelin album I ever bought – Physical Graffiti. It was released in February 1975, I probably bought it the summer of 1975, it was a double album with 15 songs. It was their 6th album release.
I was a die hard KISS fan at this point in my life, loving their short 3 minute songs about sex and girls, so getting a Led Zeppelin album was a totally different direction for me. 5 minute songs on average and the epic Kashmir almost 9 minutes long, this was a different listen for me. But I loved it. And I was now a Led Zeppelin fan for life. Custard Pie stood out as my favorite at the time followed by The Rover, both guitar heavy songs.
I then proceeded to find all the rest of Zeppelin’s back albums. Sadly #1 – I never got to see them in concert. I can still remember where I was when I heard the John Bonham (the drummer) had died (I also remember where I was when I heard Elvis had passed too).
Sadly #2 – I gave my Led Zeppelin vinyl collection to my brother after buying the CD versions of them. He proceeded to sell them. I’m now in the process of replacing all those albums. I have one left to purchase.
So this month Vinyl of the Month is Led Zeppelin’s Physical Graffiti, still my favorite Led Zep album of the bunch.
I’m still here. Taking Toy photos during February was a bust. Weather not good, work not fun, etc. And here we are already in March and there is stuff going on with work and we are watching our grandson and fixing to take a spring break trip to visit my Mom with him. So its been hard to get going on one thing or another and focus.
I’ve done some more drawing with my XP-Pen drawing pad. And I am working on a comic book idea utilizing some military toy figures I’ve purchased. And I’ve got a few ideas for some songs. So lots of ideas, but sitting down and executing is the issue. Focus.
Did I mention I’ve been doing Pokemon Go again? I got back into it (yes I was going it back when Pokemon Go app first came out) as a way to do more things with my grandson. we’ve been having fun going on Pokemon safaris around our neighborhood. Check this one out. I have a video of it licking but WordPress won’t let me post videos with paying them more. Is this not the most awesome Pokemon you’ve ever seen?
Licky Licky make you Sticky!
So, when I get some time I’ll get something going. Winter is slowly relinquishing its grasp on Texas so the mood is improving.
Oh, and we sold our Winnebago Micro Minnie. For numerous reasons I’m not going to list, it was best for us to pass it on rather than keep it in storage. It hadn’t been used since October 2021. So that is one weight lifted.
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