That's a good question, Brook. Impossible to answer, but a daggone good quesion no less. My thoughts are the beginning bands need something to imitate that both sounds cool and is relatively easy to play so you don't get too discouraged. It amazes me to see even adults trying to play who can't figure this simple rule out: if it's a professional band playing a difficult song in a studio that you're trying to imitate, you and your friends who can't play for beans at this point won't be able to pull it off at all, and you'll get discouraged, so keep it simple. So, y'know, you might wanna go with The Ramones, AC/DC, Chuck Berry, Nirvana, and such. But the hard truth is that you're gonna sound like crap imitating that stuff, too, at first. So, do it for a while. Imitate anything you want for a while. Then (and this is true with anyone I've ever known who got good at playing with other people) very early on, give up trying to play other people's songs. Just write your own, no matter how simple and bad they are. Play 'em your way, whatever that is, but try to gradually incorporate some more and more complex elements of style from people that you hear. But the thing is, if these kids are really enjoying it and really wanna learn to play, they'll figure that out for themselves. We all did back in the day. It was a survival technique, writing all those songs. I just wanted something for us to play. But definitely, you can't get anywhere until you learn something about basic blues rock patterns, so thus I'd say number 1, get 'em a Chuck Berry CD. The Great 28 oughta do it. And you won't get anywhere until you learn something about locking together as a solid rhythmic unit (especially bass and drums), so get 'em an AC/DC cd, not Back in Black but I'd say Powerage or High Voltage. And after you've learned something about basic blues patterns and solid rhythm, you'll want something to aspire to, something which uses all of that to some degree but goes beyond it and gives you something to shoot for, so give 'em The White Album. Lots of songs on that one. Some simple enough to play. Some head shakingly complex.

There you go.

i recently spent a long weekend with a 13 yr old and 16 year old male(both white european extraction)
after 72 hours with my record collection, they requested burns of:

london calling

double nickels on the dime

the ramones

youth...

caveat on rock lists:

NO WHO!

"who" is for owls to find some one to love. not for luring children...

i am glad we are not arguing about war anymore...

and n. o. to the ro. ll. ing. ston. es toooooooooo....

if i could stick a knife in mick's heart (suicide o'er the galaxy.)

Well, duh...Amazing what a little time and sleep will do. Didn't Lenny Kaye already do most of this work for us? Turn him on to the Nuggets stuff, at least the first couple of volumes. And as much of the commentary as you can get him to read. Twenty years on, it's still about as fucking salient as you can get. So now I'd say, let that stand for the 60's and 70's, The Cramps for the 80's, and the whole lo-fi thing from the 90's, The Vaselines, The Flaming Lips, Guided By Voices...

first of all a website for garage rock:

http://www.littlestevensundergroundgarage.com/play/archive.html


my choices (in no particular order):

Rolling Stones - Big Hits (High Tides and Green Grass)
The Ventures - Walk Don't Run (the best of The Ventures)
B52s first album (although someone will have to explain Ricky Wilson's whacked 5 string tuning).

Mix well....season to taste

I would suggest burning 3 cds' worth of individual tracks. For a true crash course that seems a lot more reasonable. More effort, I guess, but probably less money? That said, I think I'm saying:

1. Patti Smith- Horses
2. You Really Got Me-era Kinks
3. The Sweet, circa 1975 tied with The Knack, circa 1979

I'm assuming that you want him to understand that the goal is to make music that makes people want to kick holes in the wall...from a sheer frenzy of joy. And I imagine he's probably heard "Rock&Roll Pt. 1" since that's been bastardized by the sports world, but try to put it into context for him, poor soul.

Now, I'm positive this list will help generate the kind of climate some have missed on this here blog, but take the pepsi challenge: take everybody's list, eliminate the duplications, and play 'em three at a time against each other, try to imagine being fifteen again, and ask yourself, if you were on the verge of committing suicide, if you had the gun to your head, which three discs would stay your hand? Those would be the three I'd send him.

For those you may have ended up at this site as a result of a word search involving country music lyrics,,,

THERE ARE NO TRUCK STOPS IN JOHNSON CITY, TENNESSEE. THE NEAREST ONE IS ABOUT 35 MILES AWAY. Thank you for your time and attention to this public service announcement.

Now Brook onto your problem, London Calling is a good choice but would not make my top 3 list.
I would suggest any two of the pre- Phil Spector Ramones (prior to End of the Century) and the Sex Pistols Never Mind The Bollocks. Three is a short list to choose from though,,, any of our regular readers could suggest a hundred more, and all would make good additions,,,, somewhere on my list would be a couple of Led Zepp albums (a band that now puts me to sleep) and Who's Next (my choice for best album ever!) Oddly enough, most of my list for albums every rock and roll picker should be familier with would include a bunch that I never listen to anymore,

Well put Roland, it's high time somebody put things straight and brought these important socialogical issues forward for discussion. I applaud you and your courage in coming forward.

OK, somebody say something to piss someone off so we can get this thing rolling again....

I tried to go to the Otter a few weeks back, for its grand re-opening (I think.) Ridiculous. Trust-fund college babies as far as the eye could see. I couldn't get waited on. After 10 minutes, I left. I think there was beer there.

I NEVER miss free beer.

Great time. Too bad the crowd was, how do you say? - ah yes, sparse.

I hope this doesn't discourage them to come back to the area.

Next chance to see The Shazam will be at the Sophisticated Otter on May 16th.

Plez here. I hope to see as many of you as possible at Hans's (the Shazam's) show tonight at the Casbah. I can't watch the news lately. Really. I need rock, and the Shazam is one fine "rock and roll outfit."

I click here occasionally to look for old JC stories, but nobody's telling any. Have we quit doing that? I hope not. There's more to tell. C'mon, people, tell me a funny story. I could use one about now.

Ok, that's it. Now get your butts to the Casbah tonight. One free beer on the Plez for anybody who comes and mentions this ad.