From Wayne Watson To Wu-Tang Clan

Music is a central part of my life and here is my history with music:

0-6 years old: I mostly listened to what my parents played with few exceptions. I knew of the Beach Boys and a few other bands of the 1960s but mostly listened to crappy Christian music. My favorite song was “One Day Jesus” by Wayne Watson which I believe started (or awoke) the part of me that still loves repetition building into a crescendo and simplicity flowing into complexity and vice versa.
Favorite song: One Day Jesus – Wayne Watson

6-8 years old: This is when I discovered (or was shown) classic rock. Listening to the radio with my dad, I used to play “name that tune” and do fairly well on late 60’s to late 70’s rock. This is the last phase when I mainly listened to what my parents listened to, with few exceptions. I got my first CD around this time (Credence Clearwater Revival’s Chronicle).
Favorite Song: Down On The Corner – Credence Clearwater Revival

9-11 years old: This was my introduction to pop music and hip hop by my friends. I still loved classic rock, but I began to listen to the radio a lot more. I don’t remember my favorite stations in New York, but I know I listened to the hip-hop station, the classic rock one, and the pop music one almost equally. This reliance on radio would be my downfall when we left NYC.
Favorite Song: Slam – Onyx

12-13 years old: I call these the dark ages. I moved to Mount Vernon which had no hip-hop station and my friends only liked pop music. I don’t even like to admit what I listened to, but it made me who I am today. I think all of us around 7th grade listen to just plain crappy music. Or at least that’s what I like to tell myself.
Favorite Song: We’re Havin’ A Party – Rod Stewart

14 years old: This is when I started to listen to awesome music. I began to listen to my cool friends as to what radio station to listen to. Cool friends meaning friends who I still consider cool today, not the kids who considered themselves cool. One friend in particular, Nick Savoia, gave me a CD that was to be the crux of my reading and would influence my life in profound ways and make me the man I am today: Rage Against the Machine’s self-titled album. It was like flipping a switch. I had gradually been exposed to more hard rock but I consider the day in industrial tech when Jimmy Epley and I created a radio station and played Rage Against the Machine for the first time, a turning point in my life. I was fully on my own and listening to some of the best music I had ever gotten my hands on. Whereas NYC had exposed me to hip-hop and rap on a surface level, I was now listening to the most socially conscious lyrics I had ever heard. I devoured Rage, NWA, Public Enemy, Wu Tang Clan, and The Beastie Boys. These were all groups I had listened to before, but now I was listening to what they were saying. My musical horizons were expanded by alternative rock which had eluded me up until now. I became a communist and attempted to read every book that was on the RATM recommended reading list (which, I’m pretty sure, put me on the watch list with the Public Library).
Favorite Song: Know Your Enemy – Rage Against The Machine

15 years old: Rage Against The Machine’s new album (Evil Empire) came into my possession and I was further inundated with communism. I had effectively abandoned Christianity in most of its forms due to its apparent lack of social consciousness. Wrestling in high school was a new challenge as some of the seniors liked to listen to Garth Brooks at practice. This would start a brief, and yet torrid, love affair with country music a few years later. For now, I was beginning to listen to music in two realms: to pump myself up and to think. Rage was still at the thinking forefront, and would remain so for a few more years; however, I discovered what I like to call “work out rock” even though my dad hated it which was necessary to get through wrestling practice.
Favorite Song: Thunderstruck – AC/DC

16 years old: I had discussed my faith with my girlfriend and started going back to church with more intentionality. The result of this was listening to DC Talk’s Jesus Freak over and over and also going back through my other music looking for Christian themes in order to see if Christianity was actually socially conscious. This led to a few logical leaps, including believing that Metallica’s “The God That Failed” was a Christian song. Needless to say I was at a crossroads yet again. I had realized that my faith was integral to my existence yet I could not reconcile it with my beliefs in social justice. Rage Against The Machine put out a new album and I got my hands on it. After Evil Empire, I was pretty much sure it couldn’t get better. I was wrong. The Battle of Los Angeles took work out rock to the nth degree and was responsible for my constructive anger during wrestling season.
Favorite Song: War Within A Breath - Rage Against The Machine

17 years old: My girlfriend and I broke up and my faith was there to back me up. It was not a pretty breakup and a song that I had always loved gained new meaning as I attempted to get over my first real heartbreak. “Amazing Grace” was a beautiful reminder of all that was good. There was much sadness and much joy in this time. I discovered Christian hip-hop including John Reuben and the Ill Harmonics, two white groups that talked about the difficulties of being a punk kid from the suburbs (country in my case) who care about cities and the issues of social justice while being seen as an outsider. As I continued to delve deeper into Christian hip-hop I found that the same things I had heard in Grandmaster Flash and Rage Against The Machine were being talked about in a redemptive manner as opposed to a defeatist or angry. This was counter intuitive to me and would take me a few years to fully reconcile (about 7 years, actually) Christianity and social justice.
Favorite Song: Amazing Grace – Mahalia Jackson (the best rendition ever)

18 years old: After the musical rollercoaster that was my 17th year, my 18th year was all about fun. I fully embraced my status as a hick and listened to country for the first time without cringing. The year was all about hope, hope for college, hope in the new relationship I had, and a burgeoning friendship with a kid that I would walk with down the path of Christianity. I also to a lot of Country oldies (Loretta Lynn, Roger Miller, Johnny Cash, etc) and this was just a happy year in general.
Favorite Song: It’s A Great Day To Be Alive – Travis Tritt

19 years old: My freshman year of college started off isolated and listening to some DMX and german folk music (the latter not by choice.) One day, I was walking down the hall and I heard an awesome song. I asked the kid what it was and he replied “O.A.R.” a band that I loved then and still brings me happy feelings. After the first quarter, life got a bit better and I started talking to a friend (now my wife) and sending lyrics back and forth. OAR featured prominently in these lyrics as did some of the old classic rock standards. I also had full access to file sharing and started a music collection that would continue to grow until I left college. My neighbor introduced me to some of the more current hip hop including UGK, Styles, Big Tymers, and Jurassic 5. This was also the year of the Travis’s: Randy Travis and Travis Tritt. This was to be the last year of country.
Favorite Song: Ran Away To The Top Of The World Today – O.A.R.

20 years old: I was officially dating my wife and the sappiness of my favorite song this year is a direct indicator of how our relationship was going. I didn’t discover much new music as most of my time was spent with my girlfriend or driving back and forth between school and home to see her. I joined a Christian service fraternity and they introduced me to Christian hard rock like Pillar and TFK which, for Christian music, wasn’t half bad. But my girlfriend and expanding my collection of music kept me listening to older music as opposed to discovering new bands on my own.
Favorite Song: Heaven - DJ Sammy

21 years old: This was a year of what I like to call “back fill.” There were a lot of bands that I liked who were classic rock artists, but it was mostly limited to Zeppelin, The Who, Rolling Stones, and the other giants of classic rock. This was the year that I discovered the roots and the fringes of rock: The Kinks, The Clash, MC5, The Ramones, Captain Beefheart, and The Velvet Underground come to mind. There were a lot of “oh, so that’s who sings that song” moments. I also started getting into jazz with Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane and, my personal favorite, Thelonious Monk. My friends were also exposing me to more indie music with Guster, The Clarks, Jeff Buckley, Sonic Youth, Sufjan Stevens, and the Pixies.
Favorite Song: Oh Sweet Nuthin - The Velvet Underground

22 years old: This was a year of expanding artists and genres I was already very familiar with (Talib Kweli, Grits, KJ-52, Silverchair, and Blues Traveller) and learning the 1950’s-60’s pop rock and 1980’s pop. These two areas were the strong suit of my girlfriend and the weakest section of my knowledge. I despised, and still despise, most 80’s pop; however, bubble gum rock was perfect for my senior year especially as I drove back and forth to and from my girlfriend.
Favorite Song: 25 Miles - Edwin Starr

23 years old: We moved to Chicago and most of my musical genres had been filled in. I got a phone that could play music and was my MP3 player. From that point until now, I have just filled in some fringe bands (Buckethead, Flobots, etc) as people let me know about them. Here are the favorite songs by year for me:
23: What Angry Blue? - Seven Mary Three
24: Add It Up - Violent Femmes
25: What I’ve Done – Linkin Park
26: Sound the Horns - Wu Tang Clan and Lateralus – Tool

Favorite Songs Recap:
One Day Jesus – Wayne Watson
Down On The Corner – Credence Clearwater Revival
Slam – Onyx
We’re Havin’ A Party – Rod Stewart
Know Your Enemy – Rage Against The Machine
Thunderstruck – AC/DC
War Within A Breath - Rage Against The Machine
Amazing Grace – Mahalia Jackson (the best rendition ever)
It’s A Great Day To Be Alive – Travis Tritt
Ran Away To The Top Of The World Today – O.A.R.
Heaven - DJ Sammy
Oh Sweet Nuthin - The Velvet Underground
25 Miles - Edwin Starr
What Angry Blue? - Seven Mary Three
Add It Up - Violent Femmes
What I’ve Done – Linkin Park
Sound the Horns - Wu Tang Clan
Lateralus – Tool