Steel Wheels

My parents introduced me to the Rolling Stones when I was in elementary school. "Steel Wheels" was the first rock record I ever heard, and second-grade me was blown away.

I was always the good kid in class. "A" Honor Roll, teacher's pet, thick glasses and tucked in shirts. I was the nerd who was good even when we had a substitute teacher. But listening to the Stones made me feel like a rebel. I knew something that the other kids didn't. I wasn't sure exactly what Mick Jagger was singing about, but I knew it was cooler than Disney soundtracks and pop radio. While my classmates perfected their New Kids on the Block dance moves, I memorized the lyrics to "Rock and a Hard Place."

"Steel Wheels" isn't my favorite rock album. It isn't even in my Rolling Stones Top-Three. But it is the album that defined rock and roll for me at an early age.

Important records

I've been meaning to do one of those "15 Albums that You Love" notes on Facebook for a while.

I figure that no one over there really cares about it though. I mean, there are some albums that I really love, and a few that are meaningful, but I can't bring myself to post about it over there. According to Facebook, I've got 364 friends. Of that 364, there might be 50 people on there who I consider good friends. Maybe. Of those 50, maybe 20 would read one of those notes if I posted it. 20 on a good night when everybody was home on their computers with nothing else to do. In reality I'd be lucky if 10 people looked at it. Maybe five would care to read what I had to say about the albums, but most would probably just scan the list to see if there were any they recognized.

I said all that just to say I will post some albums I consider memorable on this blog. Almost no one will see it, but the people who do are people who might actually care about it. So that's good, I think.

So stay tuned if you care. Or not. Whatever.