You see, my music at his age put me and my dad at a distance. I still remember him stomping my Nazareth, Hair of the Dog, 8-Track, into the fibers of my bedroom carpet, when I was playing a certain track, a little too loud, on a Sunday, just after church.
Hair of the Dog <-- link to song
I remember as a 13-year-old boy, the same age as my son now, seeing the look on my father's face, the anger, the rage, the hatred, and seeming all of it directed at me as he yelled at me his contempt and I backed away. I felt right then, a searing realization that he didn't love me. Me, all of me. This was something about me that he didn't love. There was much more in that look than just hate for a band. It was a face void of love, and full of hatred, not just for Nazareth, for me, for my taste in music and my reckless out-of-bounds playing of it on Sunday. He was calling me out for bad behavior. I loved Nazareth ... still do ... and I don't need to drink and swear, fornicate, get tattoos, or do drugs to do so... You know, the "evil" stuff.
So after my father left in a huff, I, still in shock with my finger hooked on my loosened tie, paused to recover from Crush-afflixion of Nazareth. The room was now in stark silence, and my mind was in "wow, that just happened", mode. I sat down on the edge of my bed, halfway through my routine of undressing from church. I remember sitting there motionless and dejected, as I looked at the broken pieces of plastic, and the tape guts bleeding, spooled over the floor. I loved that album. I thought of the work I would have to do to earn the money to buy a new one.
I realized and clung to the idea among all the evidence from times past, that my Dad still loved me, but he certainly didn't love my music. He hated it. He thought it was evil and vulgar. I understood that. I think that's what attracted me to it in the first place...that, and their kickass artwork of Dragons and Demons and Monsters on their albums. It was like naughty candy to my brain. An escape from the reality of pure white Mormonism... an allowable escape... But, "Not in my house on a Sunday!"
On Sunday, you stayed in the box - On Sunday you honored The SABBATH! ... Makes me wonder if Ronnie and the boys could have rocked my Dad's world on Sunday without retribution with tunes off Heaven and Hell? I'm sure it could have passed muster if done more quietly. I recall my brother Steve rocked the walls a time or two on Sunday, beating on his Drums in the basement. Now that was loud, but devoid of offensive cuss words... well mostly. I'm sure he swore a time or two when he lost grip of his sticks.
If Steve was anything like me, one of the first things we would do after church on Sunday was go down to our room and take off our church clothes, eager to play. Sunday was me-time because dad couldn't make me do chores or work around the yard, neither could mom, and I didn't have school. And during me-time was when I freely explored the things I was interested in. It was my free time. Away from church and away from school. I loved the Sabbath as a kid. 😉. And the time it truly glowed was when I got time off the clock just to be me, and explore what I wanted to explore.... in the days before the internet ...
I was still in my church clothes when the album got destroyed, so Dad won on a technicality. Being dressed as a Saint and listening to Satan, I was out of bounds. Dad=+1, Son= -666 I kept my mouth shut and claimed the loss deserved... knowing now there was something my dad hated about me, enough to crush it to a pulp.
I was still in my church clothes when the album got destroyed, so Dad won on a technicality. Being dressed as a Saint and listening to Satan, I was out of bounds. Dad=+1, Son= -666 I kept my mouth shut and claimed the loss deserved... knowing now there was something my dad hated about me, enough to crush it to a pulp.
The point is, my Dad didn't like my music when I was my son's age, and it put somewhat of a wedge between us ... although he did begin to come around later after my LDS mission, there was never my love for Hard Rock or Metal in his heart.
I didn't know that he secretly loved my Queen albums until I arrived home and found him smiling and happily engaged in the basement theater room, watching them perform live in concert on his big-screen LaserDisc system... What a shock! It was a Twilight Zone moment, one that my current self, had he been there, would have asked, "What the fuck is this!?"
But, thinking about it, I do remember him one Sunday, when I was 12 or 13, coming up behind me as I tried to learn "Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon" on his piano. Curiously, he asked me about the song and I told him it was by a group named Queen and showed him the songbook I'd borrowed from a friend. He sat down next to me on the bench, picked it up, and looked it over, keeping his finger in my page. Satisfied, he set it back down on the music stand, back open to my page, and said, "Carry on." and went back to doing whatever he was doing. Maybe that's where the seed was planted? All I know is, it was a real trip coming home off my mission and seeing my conservative, old-fashioned-music, Lawrence Welk bubble-blowin dad, tripping out to Queen on the big screen. I loved it!
After the shock, or maybe because of it, I sat down on the end of the couch next to him and we watched it together. "Boy, a lot can happen in two years.", I thought. It was a weird arrival back home, fresh off my mission. But this was sacred space. Dad and I, smiling and happy together, in the same room, listening to and enjoying the same music, and admiring the same players and performers. It's one of my best memories with my dad ... that and watching his Gaslight Theater program together ... and I don't mean attending church. It was a series that happened every week late at night, where they played a famous old movie, usually black and white.
After my LDS mission, my musical interests started away from rock and heavy metal, into new wave. I blame groups like The Cars, The Buggles, and Yazoo .... and that guy who threw an early Peter Gabriel cassette at me, saying, "Check this out kid!", as we both rifled through a sea of cassettes in the record store's discount bin. I picked up the cassette and looked back and forth at it and him. I smiled and said "Thanks!", holding up the cassette to him. I was a bit embarrassed, and now feeling somewhat obliged to buy it. It could be any kind of weird stuff this dude likes ... But the album cover had a man with half his face melted off. That alone made it worth $3.99! I had no clue who this Peter Gabriel guy was as I left with him from the record store. Back home I rescued him from the cellophane and let him tell me stories in his songs to some really cool music. What a treasure thrown at me here. And how did I not know that the melty-face guy used to play with Genesis!? I loved Genesis! Duke was a masterpiece.
In his later years, my dad liked Genesis, and Phil Collins, and other popular songs, but not much Peter Gabriel. He liked some of my new music too, like Depeche Mode, Erasure, TFF, New Order, Peter Murphy, and Twins like Thompson and Cocteau ... This was the music I played while I lived with him while attending my last year of college, and he was now living as a free man, with another man. He actually asked me to play the Cocteau Twins one day, and I lent him those albums.
Despite moments of anger and disagreement, I always knew my dad loved me. He loved kids, and he loved being a kid, just like me. Although, his childhood was riddled with the tragedy of losing his mother at 7 years old and later his dad when he was 22. With my mother, fate was kind enough to wait until I was 53 ... and it still hurt horribly. I can't imagine losing someone when you need them so much, but his oldest sister Merle picked up the slack and took him into her life and home. He had a great bunch of beautiful sisters, and one grumpy oldest brother, old enough to be his dad and my grandpa. My father loved his family and his kids. I planned to have kids someday too. It was certainly on my list of LDS things to do... Many times I ponder that, if not for the LDS church, and my father believing their judgment and advice, I wouldn't exist ... but that's another story of iRony.
As I grew up, I'd always heard of the Generation Gap, and I'd often get this fearful assumption and dread that I would hate my kid's music too. I dreaded repeating that separation with my kids. And thinking ahead, I planned on it ... It was a fear that never happened, as I'm not fighting demons anymore, having left the LDS church around 2005. I don't believe in evil forces or evil influences anymore, except those in real people. Nothing supernatural, they're just bad players, all by themselves. I know who I AM... enough to endure, and even embrace what others would call evil, without it changing the goodness in me. Except for my coffee drinking, my love for an occasional beer or alcoholic beverage, and my swearing, I'm still basically that good LDS kid my parents raised to be responsible, honest, kind, etc... well minus the LDS spin on reality too. I continue to learn that honest and kind are often a balancing act, with silence replaced for honesty when honesty would not be kind. This was pretty much the gist of my blog on discretion and lying.
My dad wasn't really angry at me right then. He was afraid of the Devil, and a believer that the influence of evil music, as he was told by the prophets and apostles, would lead to my demise and destruction. He was fighting him that day, with the Foot of Gabriel, The Stomper of Moroni, and The Shoe of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego! ... Righteous indignation is the best high ever...
(Shadrach Meshach & Abednego)
He was fighting foul demons, the ones I was entertaining, and the fear of losing me to Satan's influence made him afraid and angry ... I guess, it was a lot like me trying to get him to quit smoking, something he did till he died, after leaving my mother and living his truth as a gay LDS man. Cigarette smoking was a major cause in his death.
Makes me wonder if my dad were alive today if he'd love Twenty One Pilots too. Maybe it could have been a multi-generational thing ... My son Aaron was the only child of my three that he held in his arms while alive. My dad died when Aaron was just over a year old, in November of 2006. And if life goes on after death, I'm sure he loves my kids. I certainly know that he does, as much as his DNA and life are expressed through me. I hope in knowing me, my children will know what a wonderful man my dad was, even when he was smashing a thing I loved to save me from evil.
It also makes me wonder which of my music he'd still stomp today ... and that makes me glad I have it all backed up electronically. ;)
I know this has been a bit long-winded, but these are the thoughts that exploded in my mind today over the course of just a few minutes, that I had to put to paper, as I realized, "I Love my kid's music!" and What a blessing that love is! 💓
Guns 4 Hands
Despite moments of anger and disagreement, I always knew my dad loved me. He loved kids, and he loved being a kid, just like me. Although, his childhood was riddled with the tragedy of losing his mother at 7 years old and later his dad when he was 22. With my mother, fate was kind enough to wait until I was 53 ... and it still hurt horribly. I can't imagine losing someone when you need them so much, but his oldest sister Merle picked up the slack and took him into her life and home. He had a great bunch of beautiful sisters, and one grumpy oldest brother, old enough to be his dad and my grandpa. My father loved his family and his kids. I planned to have kids someday too. It was certainly on my list of LDS things to do... Many times I ponder that, if not for the LDS church, and my father believing their judgment and advice, I wouldn't exist ... but that's another story of iRony.
As I grew up, I'd always heard of the Generation Gap, and I'd often get this fearful assumption and dread that I would hate my kid's music too. I dreaded repeating that separation with my kids. And thinking ahead, I planned on it ... It was a fear that never happened, as I'm not fighting demons anymore, having left the LDS church around 2005. I don't believe in evil forces or evil influences anymore, except those in real people. Nothing supernatural, they're just bad players, all by themselves. I know who I AM... enough to endure, and even embrace what others would call evil, without it changing the goodness in me. Except for my coffee drinking, my love for an occasional beer or alcoholic beverage, and my swearing, I'm still basically that good LDS kid my parents raised to be responsible, honest, kind, etc... well minus the LDS spin on reality too. I continue to learn that honest and kind are often a balancing act, with silence replaced for honesty when honesty would not be kind. This was pretty much the gist of my blog on discretion and lying.
My dad wasn't really angry at me right then. He was afraid of the Devil, and a believer that the influence of evil music, as he was told by the prophets and apostles, would lead to my demise and destruction. He was fighting him that day, with the Foot of Gabriel, The Stomper of Moroni, and The Shoe of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego! ... Righteous indignation is the best high ever...
(Shadrach Meshach & Abednego)
He was fighting foul demons, the ones I was entertaining, and the fear of losing me to Satan's influence made him afraid and angry ... I guess, it was a lot like me trying to get him to quit smoking, something he did till he died, after leaving my mother and living his truth as a gay LDS man. Cigarette smoking was a major cause in his death.
Makes me wonder if my dad were alive today if he'd love Twenty One Pilots too. Maybe it could have been a multi-generational thing ... My son Aaron was the only child of my three that he held in his arms while alive. My dad died when Aaron was just over a year old, in November of 2006. And if life goes on after death, I'm sure he loves my kids. I certainly know that he does, as much as his DNA and life are expressed through me. I hope in knowing me, my children will know what a wonderful man my dad was, even when he was smashing a thing I loved to save me from evil.
It also makes me wonder which of my music he'd still stomp today ... and that makes me glad I have it all backed up electronically. ;)
I know this has been a bit long-winded, but these are the thoughts that exploded in my mind today over the course of just a few minutes, that I had to put to paper, as I realized, "I Love my kid's music!" and What a blessing that love is! 💓
Guns 4 Hands
