A Musical Apology

No I'm not going to sing. As I get older I become softer. Music was and still is a big deal to me. When I was young I had what some might call terrible taste in music. I don't think I did, I think my crime was having limited taste in music. I was listening to a Patton Oswalt CD loaned to me by a friend and Patton talks about how blind he was as a kid. He talks about getting up in everyone's face and declaring that Phil Collins was edgy and punk because on the cover of No Jacket Required he had on a suit with tennis shoes. Then he left his small town for college and discovered Fugazi and a bigger world. I like this story because it applies to me in a couple of ways. First, that was so me as a kid. I'm not talking about thinking Phil Collins was punk, although I did love me some "In The Air Tonight". But I did have that same kind of naive belief. I truly felt that Foreigner was somehow more legit than Toto or Red Rider. I was such a cute kid. I don't even know who the underground bands of my youth were. The Sex Pistols maybe, but I hear (mostly from people who weren't even born then) that they weren't the original punks. So I spent a lot of time making fun of friends and family who liked Journey and Michael Jackson while I was contemplating bands like April Wine, The Michael Schenker Group and UFO (also containing Michael Schenker). My first observation would be that I was a tool. Brent, I'm sorry for making fun of the fact that you liked The Steve Miller Band.

At various times in my life I've made fun of people for liking Paula Abdul (during her first era of success), Natalie Merchant, Michael Bolton (but really that's a gimme), and Eminem. And most of the time it wasn't just a little dig, I kept at it and I knew that on a few of those occasions I hurt some feelings. Music is a very personal thing and even though I knew that at the time it didn't stop me from insulting something meaningful to someone else. Most times I don't mean any harm but having been on the receiving end a few times myself I should know better. So to my cousin and classmates and co-workers, I apologize for making fun of your love of Eminem, Natalie, Paula and even Deee-lite (but not Michael Bolton). And please allow me my Night Ranger obsession.

I like to think I'm growing and maturing (finally, after 42 years) and this one thing as small and insignificant as it seems is the one thing that if I were in a 12 step program would be the first thing I would track people down and apologize for.

I will continue giving my nieces a hard time for liking Akon, and I will continue calling him acorn because they need to believe I'm an old fogey who just doesn't get it, which I am by the way.