This Nostalgic Life #33
Music to our ears.
This Nostalgic Life is a free weekly publication rich with nostalgia brought to you by co-creators Eric Vardeman and Mick Lee. If this is your first time reading, you can subscribe using the button below so you don’t miss receiving any future issues delivered straight to your inbox.
Welcome to another edition of This Nostalgic Life. We want to start this issue by welcoming all of our new subscribers, as we’ve seen an uptick recently. We’d also like to thank our established subscribers for sharing our publication with their friends and families. We believe there is a direct connection between the sharing and the uptick in new subscribers we’ve seen.
With that said, we’ve got some fun stories for you in this issue, as Eric and Mick relay a couple of tales around some albums from the old days. If you find something in this issue that connects with you, please leave us a comment at the end of this issue so we can start a conversation. With that out of the way, let’s get to the stories.
Banned in the USA and At Home
by Mick Lee
Way back in the wonderful year of 1990, I was twelve years old and starting to find my own way as far as music went. I had grown up traveling with my old man and listening to Waylon and Willie, as well as CCR in his truck on long trips. And when we were home on Saturday nights, we’d tune into the Silver Eagle radio show that played country music while we shot pool in the basement.
But in the late ‘80s, I was gifted a single of Bust a Move by Young MC, and my musical tastes started to change. While MTV was frowned upon in our house, my brother and I would turn it on when mom was out of the house and we’d catch episodes of Yo! MTV Raps and other hit shows. It was probably there that I first heard the song and saw the video for Banned in the USA by 2 Live Crew.
While I didn’t know that 2 Live Crew had quite the reputation, nor had I heard any of their other songs, I loved what I heard in Banned in the USA. It probably had more to do with it sounding like Born in the USA than anything else, but I really liked it just the same.
Soon after, on a trip out shopping, I spent my allowance on the single version of Banned in the USA. I got home and fired it up in my knockoff Walkman and probably listened to it two dozen times or more over a couple of days. But much like would happen as a regular occurrence, my older brother and I got into some kind of argument and I probably pissed him off. Unfortunately at this time, he knew how to get me back.
I don’t recall every single detail, but I do remember him going to my Mom and telling her that I had bought a “dirty” tape. Of all the songs that 2 Live Crew recorded, Banned in the USA was probably the cleanest by far. When he told mom she had a cow. Apparently she had heard of the 2 Live Crew’s legal troubles and immediately confiscated the tape.
I begged and pleaded my case with her…about how it wasn’t a dirty tape. I begged her to listen to it and see for herself, but she was having none of it. After a while I finally talked her down off the ledge a little, and she agreed to listen to it and see if it was dirty or not. The problem was though, that she didn’t intend to do that immediately.
She locked the tape away, and every couple of days I would ask her to listen so I could get it back. No deal. This went on for MONTHS…so long that I eventually forgot about it.
About a year later, I got brave enough to go get it from where she had it locked away, and she never mentioned it. She must have forgotten about it as well. I don’t know if I have a point to telling this story, but it’s a memory that I don’t think I’ll ever shake, so I wanted to share it with you.
Summer Nights And My Radio…
by Eric
I got my drivers license in March of 1986 which meant the summer of ‘86 was the first summer of freedom for my friends and I. Several of us were able to drive at that point and there were no cell phones so once we left the house our parents had no way of knowing where we were or what we were doing. We could get into as much mischief as we wanted and, as long as we were home on time, no harm no foul. And to quote that great theologian, Kevin McCallister in Home Alone 2, “ma’am, sometimes I do get into mischief. We all do!”.
There were two albums that were the soundtrack to our summer mischief: 5150 from Van Halen and The Big Prize from Honeymoon Suite. I mean, honestly, with a song titled “Summer Nights”, that Van Halen album was a no-brainer, right? No matter what car we were in, somehow one of those tapes made it into the tape deck. I probably have a story for just about every song on both of those albums. First time kissing a cute little blue eyed, blonde haired girl while sitting on the hood of my car? “What Does It Take” from Honeymoon Suite. My first drag race on the half-mile strip of the back road to Circle Mountain? “Get Up” from Van Halen was playing (my car looked and sounded tough but I got blown out). Sunbathing at the waterfalls of Osage State Park and jumping off the bluff? “Dreams” and “Wounded”.
That summer, they were the albums that were playing while we congregated in parking lots with our classmates and dragged Washington Boulevard from Price Road to Tuxedo Drive, while we TP’d houses and went on first dates. I can still see all their faces: Mike, Ron, Jennifer, Kim, David, John, Joe, Lisa, Lacey, Loren, Jeff, Jessica, and on and on and on.
I still listen to both of these albums on a regular basis. More so when May rolls around and the days are warm and starting to get long and I’m feeling nostalgic. I’m transported to the summer of ‘86.
Summer nights and my radio. Well that's all we need, baby, don'tcha know? We celebrate when the gang's all here. Ah, hot summer nights, that's my time of the year.
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