— image by GregKolls CC-BY Some rights reserved
I’ve heard people say pot is a gateway drug. Musically for me, the band Bad Brains was the gateway group for me.
When I was growing up just getting into skateboarding and punk rock music. That weird time where it matters for some reason what you listen to. No longer could you just listen to things just because you liked them. You become aware they have to fit a criteria approved by groups you choose to hang out with.
In morning’s, friends older brother drove us to school. Always cluing us in by listening to what was the new punk album at the time.
And I remember the time he had just bought “I Against I”. I had heard Bad Brains before but this time was different.
It was many different things. It was punk but it wasn’t. It had soul. Ballads. Grit. Of course reggae.
And from the way my friends brother was tapping on the steering wheel it was OK that I liked this.
It made me aware just because you like punk you don’t have to only look in that section for music.
And when I first heard the drum beat for the track “Re-ignition”? Forget it. The way that HR, the singer just sang in soo many different and unique ways to express what he was feeling was so appealing to me. I didn’t even know what he was talking about half the time. But I could feel it.
Man that was a good day!
When I say they were a gateway, I mean a gateway that showed me not to be ashamed I liked other styles.
I grew up in a house of Leon Redbone, Jim Croce, Kiss, Michael Jackson, Tommy James and soundtracks for things like the Jungle Book and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, etc. Things like that. We just had random 45’s of all things.
HR had his own contemporary jazz band Human Rights. After hearing what he did with that I went back to listening to any random group I could find. I listened for music. Not type anymore.
###Re-Ignition by Bad Brains
