What are your roots

[dave.king1]

Come on guys time to fess up, there is a cast of thousands on this forum and everyone has a story to tell.

Please share them with us because it's good to know your mates and makes it easier to understand where we are all coming from when discussing our builds and what we want to achieve and why.

One of my old drummers has an amazing wall of custom shop Fenders, Gibsons, Grestch & PRS, all right handed guitars but he is left handed and can't play a note, each one of those guitars is hanging on the wall with an engraved plaque that tells the story behind the build and what inspired the purchase so being a non player is not a sin.

[Kick]

I agree with Dave; share your stories

[Chuck]

For me it all clicked into gear in '77/'78 with the emergence of punk - pretty funny for a 14 year old good private school boy from the leafy suburbs of Sydney's north shore!! Picked up the bass to start playing in bands and away we went. That punk sound is still something very close to my heart, but as with my two musical idols - Paul Weller and Elvis Costello - my tastes have broadened. I got right into the blues through SRV, and loved the whole Britpop movement, and the classic pub rock of our fine land. The surfer in me got right into the surf revival movement as well as the Jack Johnson kind of thing. All of those are still favourites, and there's not much I don't like, although I never got into metal.

From a playing perspective my band experience is very much aligned to the punk thing - and most recently played in a punk covers (think Me First and the Gimme Gimmes stuff) band - and my bass playing style reflects that! My big thing these days is writing and recording rather than performing and interestingly I can't write simple rock/punk stuff to save myself! The kind of stuff we are writing draws from a lot of genres so I feel like I'm going through another discovery phase chasing inspiration and ideas. Ah, music. It certainly has been wonderful sustenance for my soul over the years.

[Dikkybee007]

Started when I was very young in the early 60's as my Dad was always whistling a tune of some sort and then he started to sing what he whistled so I learnt the words to what he was whistling. Most was from the 30-40's and most were almost Spike Jones sort of with a George Formby being the first song I knew from start to finish. I loved that period as some of the best singers were from that period, Nat King Cole and Ella Fitzgerald with lashings of Andrew Sisters. Now this was before iPods so the only music you had was what you made yourself and that period music was easy but R&R was not as it is hard to whistle so it wasn't until we got our first modern record player, probably around mid 60's I heard the likes of Bill Hailey and Elvis as most of the records we had were old 78's, which I still own most of them with various players. In the mid 60's my dad was given a cornet and a mandolin, which I still have, and he taught himself how to play by ear which I was gifted to have the same ability. Mid to late 70's I found Deep Purple, AC-DC and the Angels as I was going to Tech school and then early to mid 80's I found Jimi and Canned Heat. It was around this time I found the drums and while I have never played in a band it doesn't mean I cant but I just play for me as I know what sounds right and if it sounds right then it is right. Due to my early music introduction from when I got my first paying job I then started to add to a record which then became a CD collection. I own every form of music, whether it be classical, heavy metal, disco, R&R, punk, techno, rap, country and western you name it, I have it. If its got a beat then I have it. My best album is a vinyl master copy of the greatest album of all time, Dark side of the moon, which I got on my 21st birthday. I didn't get into the guitar until about 2008-2009 as I liked more to listen than play which meant I have a fantastic sound system which for early 80's meant Pioneer as I could afford that on the money I was earning. Have upgraded my amp a couple of times but I use my original amp for recording my vinyl and making MP3's out of them. Once I had my first strat I then wanted more styles of guitars, which then lead me to my first bass. Found they did kits which were my more my style as I love building things as I was a Toolmaker for just over 38 years and was made redundant so now I have heaps more time to build but no income, such is life. I learnt how to play and setup my guitars from the internet and while I have a long way to go I have made huge progress which unfortunately the one person in my life I wanted to share with, as he gave me my appreciation of all music, passed away in 2010. I hear a piece of music with a lick in it and I have to work out how to play it or look it up on the net, but some tabs are way off so I keep trying until I get it right. Saw the trailer for Guardians of the Galaxy and heard part of a Fleetwood Macs, The Chain and I can now play that bass lick. The last album I bought last week was Hot August Night as I wanted to play the intro to Crunchy Granola Suite and now I can. My mates tell me I cant play and yet they all know the song lick I am playing. I learnt a piece when I was away with my mates, la cucaracha, and they hated me cause once you hear it its in your head and you cant get it out.My favourite music to play is classical, Green sleeves was the first song I played as it is way harder to get right on an acoustic than to pump out some distorted Smoke on the water. Don't get me wrong, an amplified tune is great but to make sure my technique and timing are right I play a classical piece and again if it sounds right, it is right as my timing from when I played the drums is smack on and I have the play by ear which was handed down from my Dad.

[Guvna19]

Exposed to Parents music in the early 70's - J O'K, Chuck Berry , Deltones , Neil Diamond ,any more.

started liking rock and blues as a pre teenager , ACDC , most 80' rock , Muddy Waters , Cream , Stones, Hoodo Gurus ,Violent Femmes
Angels
followed by several years getting heavier , Led Zepp , Deep Purple , Sabbath, Iron Maiden , too many more to remember all at once.

Went on to Punk and Ska, Reel Big Fish , Sublime, Blink 182 , Mighty Boss Tones , Me first and the Gimme Gimmes, again so many more bands. Rage against the Machine Ben Harper , Jack Johnson
Loved the Aussie bands Triple j played in 90's - Spiderbait , Grinspoon ,Living End , Regurgitor , John Bultler Trio , Killing Heidi , Cruel Sea - many others. Powderfinger , Frenzal Rhomb , Bodyjar , Hilltop hoods, The Grates
Still go back all the time and revisit past fav's - allways liking new bands , must of missed dozens of favs.
Went to 11 Big Day Out's back in the day - couple of Vans Warped Tours - Seen Matt Taylor live at the Bridgeway a few times in the frontbar which was gold. Blues festival at hahndorf - The Bennies at the Gov
Just love live raw Music of most kinds.
lately liking Violent Soho , Smith Street Band , Kingswood , ahh brain is hurting too many to mention

[Zandit75]

Spent my childhood listening to Dad's country music collection. My Mum enjoyed it too, but she had some of her own preferences.
I was told recently that Dad would test me with lyrics on certain albums. He'd start a song, then hit the lever that raised the needle off the LP, and ask me what the next lines of the song was. Apparently I had Merle Haggard's "My Love Affair With Trains" memorized at the age of 3 or 4! I just remember sitting there looking at all of the pictures in the fold out album cover with all the model trains on it!
I didn't start getting my own taste in music until my early teens when I started listening to the top 40 lists on the radio, and watching Rage of a Saturday morning.
I never really found one genre that I got stuck on. Pop, Country, a little Heavy Metal here and there, even some classical style music once I started playing the Trombone in High School.
Once I started playing the guitar in College, I started going back to Country, and easy listening ballads etc.
Today I'll listen to anything, except Rap, Punk, Goth and Miley Cyrus!!

[DrNomis_44]

My parents always had some kind of music playing on our home stereo, my mum tended to favor a lot of 70's rock, on the other hand, my dad preferred German Oktoberfest music, Hungarian music, music from Latin America, African music, Musicals, Classical, etc, but both my parents used to like Moog Music too (music played on the Moog Synthesizer), both of my parents were into recording and they also liked organizing barbecues where they would invite the family friends over, my parents would go through the record collection and record songs from them onto reels of tape so that they'd end up with a party mixtape that would play for hours, there's too many artists to name as possible influences on me.

[Simon Barden]

A bit mixed. I played the trumpet from 10 to about 14. Played in the school band and orchestra and the local area wind band. But I'd fallen over and damaged my top lip when I was 11, and it became harder and harder to play or get any better. Plus I wasn't very interested in the music I had to play at the time, so I gave it up.

Then my best friend and I decided to learn to play a bit of guitar, so we'd sit around a basic book about guitar playing and learnt some chords. My friend had cousins up north whose whole family went and performed at folk clubs, so that got me interested in folk music (though it was more folk-rock that I was listening to). A chance borrowing of some tapes from an older friend then got me hooked on prog rock (especially Yes and Camel), whilst other friends got me into Genesis, Status Quo, Pink Floyd, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath and Led Zepplin. But I also liked some of the electronic bands, like Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream and Vangellis.

Then a couple of guys we knew from our youth club started a band playing some simplified Thin Lizzy, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Bread numbers (quite a weird mix), so at the beginning of 6th Form college (16-18 year old period), my friend and I, plus a couple of other chaps we met at the college decided to start our own band, so we all went out and bought our first instruments (or rather, persuaded our parents to buy them for us). We very quickly usurped the playing prowess of our inspirational friends, but never managed to create enough of our own compositions or covers to actually perform in public.

Then it was off to University. First term I was in lodgings so didn't have a guitar, but then moved into halls so annoyed the rest of the floor with my practising. In the second and third years ('80 '82) I joined a band where we re-worked some of the singer and bassist's previous band's songs, from new-wave style into a rocky style, though still with some new-wave elements to it. You could almost call it grunge (but it was before grunge existed). We played quite a few gigs, got a good name in the locality and were lucky to find another student who had his own PA, lighting rig and transport, who provided his services for free! And this was a big multi-cab PA from the '70s, not the neat tops and subs systems you get nowadays.

Here we are, posing for a publicity shot (I'm 2nd right).



Shortly after coming back from Uni and getting a job, some of us put together a one-off band for a charity gig, called One Day Heroes. Mainly classic rock numbers and a very loud hired-in PA with a rather drunk mixer in a small church hall. It was great fun. But then half that band formed their own group, whilst the rest, including me, did a lot of practising in semi-formed bands with fluid line-ups that rarely performed because the main singer had lost his confidence and didn't want to gig.

Then 10 years after the One Day Heroes gig, we decided to put the band back together for another charity gig (One Day Heroes - the Second Day), except this time the band grew and added two trumpets and a sax, plus three backing singers and a percussionist and the music changed from rock to soul/R'n'B. If it was on the Blues Brothers or Commitments soundtracks, then we played it. It went down so well that the band stayed together (after changing its name to Rough At The Edges) for 13 years, with a few personnel changes. Two lots of couples that the band threw together eventually got married and had kids. This eventually led to the demise of the big 12-13 piece band as it became impossible to get all the band to a rehearsal (we only rehearsed every other week) and it took ages to learn new songs.

So it stripped down to a 4-, then 5-piece (when we added a keyboard player) blues/blues-rock band (called Stormy Waters), which rehearsed every week. We became pretty good at playing but weren't that good at getting gigs.

I got into home-recording about 13 years ago, and have a reasonable set-up and collection of mics, but unless I have a specific purpose, like recording a friend or attempting some band demos, I rarely record any new stuff, but end up re-mixing the older tracks I've done, using new plug-ins and better techniques that I've learnt from others.

Ill health (I have a currently-mild form of leukaemia which weakens my immune system, so I picked up every bug going whilst commuting, but isn't bad enough in itself to require treatment) plus associated stress at work eventually stopped me playing with the band about 4 years ago. It was a 40-minute drive to rehearsals, plus setting up and packing away time either end of a two hour rehearsal, so that and the round trip after work was o wake up at 5.30 the next day) as I felt I was becoming unreliable so didn't want to slow them down. They added a female singer and went a lot poppier in their material, so although I am now feeling a lot better than I was, it's not easy to rejoin them in my old role.

I stopped working about 3 years ago, as I eventually became too unreliable to continue, so now get my income via an insurance policy (though officially still on my company's books). So having a go at building kit guitars is now one of my new hobbies, and not working is the main reason I post so much here!

I did play half a gig with the old band a few weeks ago doing some of the old stuff, as it was a more performance orientated gig, and occasionally mix for them, but would like to get back into gigging more regularly. If I could sing, I could probably set up my own band, but I can't sing, so that's unlikely to happen.

As I've grown older, my musical tastes have broadened, so I now like a fair bit of jazz and classical, some electronica, blues, rock and folk but am not keen on modern metal, rap, hip/hop etc, though I can appreciate the technical side of those idioms through meeting people who've worked in those areas. And I like a good tune regardless of genre.

[dave.king1]

Nice tale Simon, good luck with the illness.

The not being confident enough as a singer to front a band is the reason I stopped when I did, we were doing an incredible amount of work and the rest of the band wanted to do more and having just started my second marriage I wanted to do less so in the interest of us remaining friends I dropped out.

[Chuck]

Great story Simon, except the illness part of course - I sincerely hope it all pans out okay. It's interesting how we all get thrown various challenges along the way yet the music, once you've found even a small part of it, remains with us forever.