Forgotten Hits

Even MORE of Your FIRST 45's!!!

The popularity of this topic just keeps growing ... we've now had to add a THIRD Page of FIRST 45's Memories!!!  (Special thanks to SCOTT SHANNON of THE TRUE OLDIES CHANNEL, RON SMITH of oldiesmusic.com and Rich Appel of HzSoGood for helping us to cross-promote this feature ... and get more of your FIRST 45's Memories up on the web page!!!)

My first 45 was the "Jailhouse Rock" EP by Elvis. But I didn't buy it until five years after it came out!         Ron Smith

I walked into a record store and said to the clerk, "Gimme My Coloring Book". He said "By who?" I said "I dunno, I just heard it on the radio, I dont know who did it". So he gave me Sandy Stewart and I walked out the door. George Dailey  

From 6/56 to 6/58, I enjoyed life in the tropics on the Pacific island of Guam, my Dad being the US Navy officer he was. However, now and then, he would take the family and motor to the north end of the island to Anderson AFB, just to put a little variety in our shopping habits.
I had already bought some 45's by Les Paul and Mary Ford, but those had been birthday gifts for Dad, and while I could play them, they weren't mine.
As you might guess, we keen teens had very limited access to the current pop music scene. 1 hour a day on KUAM-AM, between 4-5 PM. On Saturday, they had the Top 10 countdown, so I had heard a bit of the current stuff. Also, whenever new kids showed up, they always seemed to have at least a few 45's with them, so I did hear those at our Saturday dances.
As we snooped the Base Exchange on the AF base, I found the record section. They had just received some of the latest tunes, so dad allowed as how I could get two of them.
Since it was the spring of '57, I went for the big one, "Party Doll" by Buddy Knox. For my second choice, I stayed in house and went with "I'm Sticking With You" by Jimmy Bowen. However, I must confess that I bought it for the flip side, "Ever Lovin' Fingers", which had been the inspiration of many a lewd comment among the bunch that I ran around with.
21 years later, it was a thrill to see Buddy in person at a bar in Coos Bay, OR as he put on a show. After the gig, I walked up and introduced myself, and we spent a delightful 15 minutes or so talking about music, West Texas (where I had been a radio DJ), and other fun stuff. He was a great guy, and meeting him rates right up there with Bill Haley and the Everly Brothers as artists I met that were big in the 50's.     

Jim Southern

I believe my first 45 purchase was "Duke of Earl" by Gene Chandler, from the Tunis Record Shop on Lake Street in Oak Park (IL) back in 1962.
Back in those days there were no music videos, and most 45s did not have picture sleeves. Unless you saw the artist on TV (e.g., American Bandstand or local shows like Chicago Bandstand, with Jim Lounsberry) you probably didn't know what they looked like. In this case, I didn't know if Chandler was black or white and didn't know about his "duke costume". I just knew I liked the record.
Seems appropriate he was a Chicago artist on a Chicago record label, but I didn't know that at the time.      BJ the DJ

Yup, being a big fan of classic monster movies and a budding "survey guy" from the ripe old age of 5, I was thrilled to be given a copy of Buchanan and Goodman's "Frankenstein of '59" somewhere between 1959 and 1962. So I played this rare find combining two of my passions over and over and over again, my friend. To the point that the 45 had a slight crack on the very edge. Trying to "fix" it by aligning the vinyl crack resulted in my breaking off ALL of the vinyl of one of my favorite, and one of the rarest, 45 rpms of all time - leaving me with just the inner label and a big hole. 47 years later and I STILL haven't replaced it. And to add insult to injury, I can't even find that vinyl-less label ... or the hole!  Thank the Lord for YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4pjjaz1a-g

Mike Riccio

After somehow teaching myself to read at age 3, I started receiving lots of Little Golden Books, a children's book series that began in 1948 and continues to this day. I had copies of  "The Little Red Hen", "The Poky Little Puppy", several Disney movie stories, including "Bambi" and "Cinderella", and many others. Then Golden Records started issuing 6-inch yellow plastic 78-rpm records. Many of the records were adaptations of the books. I could listen to the music and dialogue and follow along in the book.

When KFWB switched to a top-40 format in January 1958, I started hearing songs by Elvis Presley, Sam Cooke, Pat Boone, Chuck Berry, Bill Haley, the Everly Brothers, and Danny & the Juniors. I decided that I had to have a "real" record player, so that Christmas I got a phonograph that played 45-rpm records. The first records I had were "The End" by Earl Grant, "Non Dimenticar" by Nat "King" Cole, "Catch A Falling Star" by Perry Como, and that ubiquitous Christmas hit, "The Chipmunk Song."

I didn't keep the Golden Books and Golden Records and I wish I still had them. At least I still have those 45s.

Steve Thompson in Boss Angeles

It’s October 1966. WLS and WCFL, two great Chicago stations, have begun playing “Nineteen Days” by the Dave Clark Five (oh, how I prefer the moniker DC5). I liked the DC5 better than the Beatles. Mike Smith, charmer, rest in peace. Your butch vocals are making Heaven livable. 

“Nineteen Days” didn’t make the national Top 40. Oh, sick national Top 40! Yet how healthy you were despite such a grandiose error. I rode my bike (I was in seventh grade, a briefcase-carrying nerd) to the Villa Park (Illinois) Record Store. There it was. “Nineteen Days” — had it been out even 19 days at that point? I paid for it, not with my grandpa’s money — he so generously gave me the cash to build a singles (and later albums) collection. I put it in my bike’s basket and pedaled home.

Our stereo was part of our living room TV. Was this what adults meant by console? What a groovy word, console. Soul. But no con. And there it was — Mike Smith celebrating the joy that comes knowing being separated from someone you’re nuts about will indeed come to an end. It wasn’t The Beatles. Or The Stones. Or Gordy. It was Tottenham Dave and being mucho cool.

I flipped it over on our notcon / soul.  “Sittin’ Here Baby.” The DC5 sipping a cup of Spoonful. Epic. Yellow label. Yellow dreams breaking off of each note — and there weren’t many notes. Dave, you sly dawg, knowing the virtue of life in under two minutes. 

Charge art at the door. A lot. Just be fun. And yellow. And let your thumpdrum be the blood that makes breath possible.

Ken Pobo

It is fall 1965 and I just couldn't get enough of the song "A Taste of Honey" by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. I must have played it at the local Pizzeria at least a half a dozen times before someone said to me, for all the money you've spent you could have bought the record. I went to R&D Records on White Plains Road in the Bronx.  It was the first of over 5000 45s that I purchased or borrowed from radio stations I worked at.      Steve Nadel

I'll turn 62 this summer.  The first 45 I bought was Marty Robbins' Ballad of the Alamo, using my paperboy money, in late 1960.  A month or two later, I bought Shop Around by the Miracles.  But really, not too many 45s after that until the British invasion conquered my wallet.

My first album, in the summer of 1965, was Eve of Destruction by Barry McGuire. And his Dylan covers in that album turned me on to Bob, bigtime.

Now the strange thing is, I still love all of these records. As much now as I did then.

Dan Hughes

http://danhughes.net

As I approached my 9th birthday in the spring of 1959, I decided I wanted to start owning some music.  I was just a little too late to get my faves "Witch Doctor" and "Purple People Eater," but was lucky enough to find a song called "Purple People Eater Meets the Witch Doctor" on a rack of 45s at the Loblaw's food store, and got my mom to buy it for me.  I played it as soon as I got home, and liked it okay.

Nearly a year and a half later, WKBW in Buffalo was celebrating 2 years of being what, radiosonic or something??? - 2 years of being top 40 style radio - by playing "OLDIES."

My older friend was explaining the death of the Big Bopper etc. as "Chantilly Lace" was playing.  "Hey, I've got a record by the Big Bopper!"  I went in the other room and found it, and there on the "flip side" was the as-yet-never-played "Chantilly Lace"! 

Tom Taber

Ya got me again ... a radio industry wannabe (who loves the business but is glad he is not in it), I am once again intrigued by one of your questions. So here are some of my happy memories of my 45s (all of which I still have, by the way, in my psychedelic colored cardboard boxes purchased at Discount Records, or worse, CALDOR!!!)

I got my first 45s in the fall of 1974 at the ripe old age of 12.  I had only started listening to the radio that summer while a bored camper at Briarton Day Camp in Hawthorne, NY and took my radio with me to listed to baseball games in the afternoons, but found that there was music playing on other stations that I actually enjoyed.

I got my first 45s at Discount Records in Eastchester, NY.  They were: "The Entertainer" by Marvin Hamlisch, 'The Night Chicago Died" by Paper Lace, and what has turned out to be my favorite song of all time, "You're The First, The Last, My Everything", by Barry White.  All three of these were purchased on that first of what would turn out to be many visits to Discount Records.

As I played these and the other early 45s on my record player at home, I began to wonder if Harry Harrison, then the morning host on Musicradio 77, WABC, or any of the other disck jockeys at the station were staring at those same record labels spinning on the turntable like I was.  (I had no idea that  by that time they used cartridge tapes which was then the industry standard).  Thus started a love affair with the radio insustry, as it seemed so cool to sit around listening to music for 4 hours a day and get paid for it, though I am ever so thankful that I did not pursue radio as a career.

One of my most maddening experiences with 45s involved another favorite song, "Longfellow Serenade" by Neil Diamond. There was a "skip" in the record I got so I brought it back and got a replacement. This one "skipped" in the exact same location also so I brought it back and got yet another replacement which also skipped.  I brought that third one back and thinking I was scamming them, they played it on their record player, on which it naturally did not skip. (something to do with the weighting of the tone arm, they said).  Unfortunately, I could not modify the weight of the tone arm on my machine at home, so when I got copy #3 home and got to the offending location on the record, I placed a little bit of finger pressure on the tone arm to get it to go through the "skip".  I amazingly was successful, but by doing this, I created a gash in the vinyl which was audible when the record was played.  But at least it did not skip!

I wrote to Columbia Records to complain about their poor quality and got a lovely letter back telling me about how they manufacture records to exacting standards and how the problem could not possibly have been their fault, blah blah blah. For Chanukkah that year, my parents got me the LP on which "Longfellow Serenade" appeared, and it did not skip when played on my record player.  However, years later when I played that LP on my new expensive component stereo system, it did skip, and in approximately the same location as it did on that little 45.  Bizarre, huh?

Overall, I always loved listening to my 45s and still periodically do.  I know it sounds crazy, but I think that the music just sounds better on vinyl (though others tell me I'm crazy).

Scott Ornstein

[My copy of Neil Diamond's "Holly Holy" skipped ... in an absolutely infuriating way!!!  It became SO entrenched in my memory that to this day whenever this song comes on the radio I wait for it to skip in that exact same spot ... because it was the ONLY way I heard it growing up!!!]

I have about 10,000 records and roughly 5,000 CDs, but as a collector, I get most excited about 45s! It started when I was age two; my mother brought home a General Electric Show & Tell record player. It looked like a television with a kiddie turntable on top.   It wasn’t really a TV, GE sold story records that came with a film slide that could be inserted and the picture would change every few seconds in sync with the record. 

Around that time, the first few current pop records I remember owning were; Billy Paul “Me & Mrs. Jones”, Roberta Flack “Killing Me Softly” and Stevie Wonder “Superstition.” 

Yes, I’m still buying 45s today! New singles are still being pressed, mostly in the Alternative Rock genre. In some cases, the disc labels have retro logos.

In England, new 45 Pop singles are still commonly found in all major record outlets such as HMV. I picked up a Lady Gaga picture discs while I was there. I also stopped in every used shop I could find and scored lots of vintage gems from the 1960s at 50 pence each!

Scott Lowe

WHTG-FM,

Asbury Park

I grew up in a strongly musical environment, but one in which rock and roll was a wayward by-product, completely undeserving of notice. Dad was a theatre major, Mom was a voice major, and the house was full of classical and Broadway LP's, but no 45's. But one day when I was about 9, a friend of mine lent me a bunch of singles his dad had cleaned out from a jukebox at the hotel bar he worked at, and among them was the one tune that totally caught my fancy --- I commandeered the family "record player" (nowhere close to a hi-fi, much less a stereo) and played it over, and over, and over, and over. Beatles? Stones? Elvis? 
Naw, it was "I'm Henry The 8th (I Am)." And in retrospect, I can only imagine how that must have driven my folks right up the wall. But it was rhythmic, catchy, bouncy, cute ... I was hooked. Unfortunately, right around that time, my folks split up -- I guess my pop really DID hate Peter Noone -- and money became extremely tight for a couple of years. I started collecting the WLS weekly music surveys in '69, and even though I could come up with 49 cents for singles out of the Woolworth's bin -- and it really was a bin, a big circular fixture with hundreds of 45's just rolling around loose in their sleeves -- I didn't have anything to play them on, 'cuz Dad took the record player. 
So I begged and whined, and finally got a small player for Christmas '69 -- a little above a close-and-play, but not much, with a squarish black adapter that slid right onto the spindle and USUALLY let down a stack of vinyl one disc at a time -- and started my collection. My first 45 rpm purchase? "No Time" by the Guess Who. (That was SO heavy for an 11 year-old, but then, I was now from a "broken home," and thereby older than my years.) My two little sisters each got to pick one out, too -- the Cuff Links' "Tracy" and of course, the omnipresent "Sugar Sugar," two tunes that I loved, but would never admit to. 
Around that same time, my mom bought me a little 45 carrying case, with a groovy psychedelic orange swirl on the side and a little lid that buckled. Came complete with little number decals that you could attach to the labels, so you'd remember where in the box to stash them. I still have them all, too, and those little numbers, in most cases, are still stuck right on there. 
Now I was saving my spare change for more important things than Hostess cupcakes and Whiz bars. I'd make weekly trips to the mall with my buds, and more weeks than not, come home with another 45 to add to the collection. The four of us would crowd into the listening booth at Recordland and make requests until the clerk got tired of us and sent us away (usually after two plays, or five minutes.)
Coolest thing about this whole chapter in my life was when we realized there was a jukebox in the back of the mall's shoe store. We'd go back there and hang out, and talk music, and the store manager, a rather tolerant sort, actually started asking us what tunes he should add to the jukebox. So at the tender age of 11, I got my first gig as a retail music consultant. 
Fast forward ten years, and I finally got my dream job working in the retail record biz. And at every store I worked, I became the "singles buyer," a job no one really wanted, due to the low profit margin and the abysmal "hipness" quotient. But everywhere I went, singles sales went through the roof. You just had to care about those little seven-inchers, and keep your fingers on the pulse of the radio-listening nation. 
And now, fast-forward again, about thirty years, and Americais once again buying (or stealing) individual songs ... "singles," as it were.  And the rationale's the same -- why bother with a whole album when there's just one good song? 
All that's missing is that clunky 45 adapter ... which I don't miss too much ...

RC Price

Next month marks the 40th anniversary of buying my first record player and my first four 45s.

My dad bought me a Philco / Ford record changer for $19.95 at Macy's in Garden City. That's right, when you think record players, think Ford Motor Company (didn't some company actually put record players in cars in the 50s or 60s?).

Anyways. it was mostly plastic, four speed, mono and could stack five records comfortably, seven if you wanted to live dangerously. A piece of crap machine that I loved and used for five years. I still have it somewhere in the attic and the damned thing still works.

I guess Macy's didn't sell 45s then, cuz I bought my first records at Dee-Jay Records in my hometown of Rockville Centre: 

* Atlantis – Donovan

* Bad Moon Rising - Creedence Clearwater Revival

* One - Three Dog Night

* In the Ghetto - Elvis Presley

Although I love my collection, I don't miss the format. The sound mostly sucked and the record companies released inferior / shorter versions of the songs to try and get me to buy the LP.

I wasn't the first on the block to have a CD player, but I was probably second or third in 1985. I embraced that now-doomed format. And yes, I have now replicated about 70% of my 45 collection on CDs, so the record companies (and record clubs) finally got their pound of flesh out of me.

I bought my 480th and last 45 on 12/31/1989 (an oldie, Sinatra's "My Way" seemed a good way to close it out). Not that many records over twenty years, but I insist to this day that, pound for pound, I have the greatest singles collection in the world. Don't you?

Roy Currlin

In 1971 I was 9 years old. I had my dad's old record player and some of his old 45's (Kookie Lend Me Your Comb, Cindy Lou My Cinderella, Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny ...) but I didn't have any of my own. I had some birthday money and literally begged my mom into letting me buy my first 45. It was Don't Pull Your Love by Hamilton, Joe Frank, and Reynolds, and I treasured it more than anything else I owned.  I still have it, and it's still my favorite song. 
Val

My first 45 was actually a 78 as 45's hadn't yet hit the market. I saved up the 79 cents (yep 79 cents) from my allowance and raced to the record store to buy Elvis' "Too Much" and ran home to play it. I bounded halfway up the stairs to get to my room and tripped and fell on top of the record breaking it into 2 pieces. I screamed a profanity at the top of my lungs which immediately caused my mother to run in -- basically not to see if I was OK but to chastise me for saying "damn" which was a very very bad word in the 1950's. But since I was on the verge of tears holding the 2 halves of my broken treasure she just waggled her finger at me and took the broken record from me to throw away. But the next morning when I woke up, there on my desk was a brand new 78 record of "Too Much" with a note from mom telling me "try not to break this one!".  It's now 50 years later and I still have it.
Steve Davidson
PS - I'm embarrassed to say that my first 45 was "Green Door" by Jim Lowe. So don't tell anyone. (And I didn't keep that one for 50 years either).

I lived in Aurora, Ill in 1962, about 45 miles southwest of Chicago, Illinois.  I turned 13 on 8-4-62 so then I was officially a teenager!  My first 45 record was He's A Rebel by The Crystals, bought around October of 1962. I played it to death I think!!  The cost was $1.00 and the cost of 45's stayed at that price until sometime in the early / mid 1970"s. But there is even more to this story. When I was about 6 years old, a friend of the family bought me a RCA Victor record player for my birthday. It was one of those small ones that looked like a tiny suitcase. It played 45's, 33's and 78 rpm records. They also included my first record -- Love Me Tender by Elvis Presley!!!  I never played records much until I got He's A Rebel, then I played and played and played. In June, 1965 (I remember this well) I was at a friend's house. We spent about half the day playing records. I brought over my collection and we played my records and his. I had about 50 records by then. Then I did a very stupid thing! I gave him my Love Me Tender  Elvis record!!!!!!! I was STUPID!!!!!!  Fast forward to 2009. I'll be 60 years old in 2 days. Old rock music from the 50's thru 80's is my main hobby after all these years. I have about 10,000 45's and about 1000 albums. I have a 1961 Seeburg jukebox filled with 45 records.I still play rock music just as if it was still 1965. And, last but not least, I have several copies of Love Me Tender by Elvis.

1971 Was the year i bought my first single. I had to decide between the right ear and the left ear which to pick. It was at the Sears down there at Hawthorne / Sepulveda (you LA people must know this well ... it turned into the biggest mall this way of Mars a few years later ... Mars has a bigger mall ... trust me, hehe)

Kidding aside, i had to choose between 'I Just Want To Celebrate' and 'Signs' ... I only had a buck, so it was one or the other. I chose 'Signs'. Loved that tune as a kid. Had a record player that used to actually go down to 16 rpm (you guys remember those) ... I'd mess around with the record at different speeds ... when it got to the part where dude goes 'sign says you gotta have a membership card to get inside ... uhhhh!' If you want a good laugh, play that at 16 rpm. Just a word to the wise, hehe (still love that tune.)

Great job you're doing here, Kent, keep it up.