I love music. It is my passion. Always has been. From the time I was a little kid listening to to the Beatle 45’s on the orange and yellow Capitol Records label, or The Dave Clark 5, I was hooked. I had Beatle cards, Beatle dolls (still have Paul and George). Then British Invasion swept to America. Rolling Stones, The Animals, Herman’s Hermits, The Zombies, The Kinks, Freddie and the Dreamers, The Hollies. I’d watch Ed Sullivan every Sunday night to see who he would have on his “really big shew. “ Then I would adjust the rabbit ears, eat my chicken ala king that I had just boiled in the pouch and watch Shindig or Hullabaloo. I lusted after Petula Clark as she sang “Downtown” and I remember playing “Knights in White Satin” by the Moody Blues and “Sunshine Superman” by Donovan over and over again.

“ I love music as long as it’s swinging, all the joy that it’s bringing” …The O’ Jay’s

Over the years I collected 600 albums from Pink Floyd to Larry Gatlin and the Gatlin Brothers with some Andre Crouch in between. I had my Avent Model 300 receiver and pre amp, my Technics turntable and lastly my Cerwin Vega LOUD speakers that when ZZ Top sang where Jesus had left and to where he was going, everyone in the Dungeon on 211A Townes Street and surrounding areas knew it.

“Music is life, that’s why Our hearts have beats” .

Some friends and I took a vacation to Nashville, Memphis, Muscle Shoals, Alabama and the Mississippi Delta on a musical blues tour across the south a couple of months ago and to just be able to experience where Keith Richards wrote the iconic “Wild Horses”, which was on a commode lid at the Muscle Shoals Sound Studio and to hear a story about some little punk living in the woods for two weeks behind that studio which turned out to be Duane Allman. To see the gold records lining the wall of some of the most iconic songs ever made. To hear the famous Wurlitzer Electric Piano where Aretha found her sound at FAME studios was truly mind boggling. To go “Down To The Crossroads” in Clarksdale, Mississippi where Robert Johnson allegedly made his deal with the devil. ( much like Cher, Neil Diamond, Luke Bryan, Florida Georgia Line I suppose) It was a wonderful trip. It was music.

“Where words fail, music speaks.” Hans Christian Andersen

2018 had its share of great music. Leon Bridges, Jason Isbell, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, Kacey Musgraves, Lukas Nelson, JD McPherson, Chris Stapleton, Lake Street Dive, The Record Company, Paul Thorn, The War and Treaty, The Revivalist, Tyler Childers, Greenville’s own Marcus King. Just to name a few.

Music is in great shape despite the losses in 2018 like Aretha, Dolores O’Riordan (Cranberries), Edwin Hawkins (Oh Happy Day), Marty Balin (Jefferson Starship), Roy Clark, Nancy Wilson (The Supremes), Tony Joe White, Ed King (Skynyrd), Randy Scruggs and despite the cesspool that is country music, the computer techno garbage, the I guess I am to white to get rap although for some reason I did like Danny Glover’s, “This Is America”, so you will find a nugget in any genre of music. So here is to 2019 and the good music, as long as it’s groovy…..

Music is also my escape from the bullshit life can sometimes bring you………..Steve Miller