50 Years Ago I Was -24

When people ask me what my musical influences were growing up, I unhesitatingly respond that I grew up on The Beatles and The Beach Boys. This is true.  Yet, there was another influence that came before the boys of summer or the fabfour. 

There is a fuzzy, sepia-tone memory of going to a Hills Department Store and buying a record with my dad that is at the beginning of this story. It was 1987. Not a particularly stand out year for anything, except Luis Valdez's classic film, "La Bamba." The record my dad bought was the soundtrack to the film, and the rest is history. Aside from the Disco Duck record that I had received for a birthday a couple of years earlier, my understanding of pop-music/rock'n'roll was pretty limited at the time. So, hearing "La Bamba", even if it was Lou Diamond Phillips lip-synching to Los Lobos, was revelatory. In fact, every time I listened to the record I had to perform. I used to get out my mom's old Chris Evert tennis racket and sing along into a microphone made out of constructs. It was pretty hip. I miss those days. Point being, that record and the artists it represented, namely Richie Valens, Buddy Holly, and the Big Bopper played a big part in the development of a part of my life that I really love. It is for that reason that I was a bit surprised and saddened when I neither heard nor saw anything on the 50th anniversary of their deaths, except a small blurb on a KQED morning show, that celebrated the contributions that those early pioneers made to rock'n'roll. Did Don McClain ruin it for everybody? Anyway, my hat is off to those three who had such a profound impact on the face of rock'n'roll as it has been played since 1959.