The journey began with random singles on a tiny record player… the songs “Penny Lane”, “Just My Imagination”, “Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head”, “Snoopy and the Red Baron”, “Hey Jude”, “Revolution”, “Wouldn’t it be Nice”, “the Boxer”, “Witchita Lineman”, “Peggy Sue”, “Back Home Again”… those are my earliest musical memories.

There are photos of me with my little record player as a toddler. Guess I didn’t have a chance, did I?

When I began playing the piano, I tried to play the entertainer, music box dancer, moon river, and other schmaltzy fare. When I took up the Bass guitar around 10, my entire life changed.

MTV was brand new, and they played a lot of videos of bands in the studios. I was hooked. I knew at 12 my life would be about recording music.

I owe most of my early influences to my brother Shaun, who at the time played guitar, and brought home the albums that would soon define my entire approach to music. Thanks bro. You rock.

I became a huge fan of "Album Oriented Rock" as they called it. That concept has pretty much gone the way of the micro-cassette recorder, and the biz is back to being a "single" driven industry. Which is fine... it just doesn't give groups a chance to develop under a record label.

For example... the top spot on my list belongs to a group that had YEARS of complete backing by a record label, and total access to Abbey Road for as long as they wanted. My guess is that this is the first profitable record they made. If it wasn't for that support, I firmly believe we wouldn't have it, or most of the recordings on this list.

and don't get me started on why we have HD video, yet the lowest fidelity possible for audio as the standard now.

But that's another blog, for another day. On to what is good, and right, and glorious to the ears!

AND NOW>>>>>>

1. DARK SIDE of the MOON.. . PINK FLOYD

I remember the first time I heard this record in its entirety. I was 12. I had a little boom box with a cassette player in it… ordered it out of a Sears catalog, I think. Then I heard it at a friends house, on his fathers Hi-Fi, lights turned out, lava lamp on. I had never heard music like this… growing up in my house, it was folk music, 50’s rock, Johnny Mathis, Anne Murray, or elevator music. Music was just background noise until I heard this. Within moments, I understood music as ART.

After literally thousands of listens, I hear something new every time. This morning was no exception.

I'm not alone on this, I know. But I savor every moment of this recording. No album before, or since, has achieved the emotional, technical, musical, lyrical, and ethereal level of Dark Side. In my opinion, nothing has even come close.