Old Enough to Forget

My friend Wes has a deceivingly sinister sense of humour. A couple of Christmases ago he'd come over for a rehearsal and instead of bringing beer he brought me a record saying it was an early Christmas present. It was wonderfully shiny, and there was a sticker on the cover saying this a factory sealed direct import from Germany. I thanked him and put the album in a place of prominence ... until he left, and then it went into the processing pile. It stayed there for a couple of years. I'd see it now and again and then shuffle it back into the pile. It's not like I had anything against James Last. As a kid there always seemed to be an advertisement on the T.V. pushing his latest Non Stop Dancing album. He always seemed to me to be the used car salesman equivalent of Lawrence Welk without the bubbles. This was party music for old people who wanted to be in with the kids. He was older than my parents, and my parents were out of step with music and it never occurred to me they ...

My parents, particularly my mum loved strings. Lush and syrupy and shrill. That's how she liked it. I bought a Frank Chacksfield record just so she could hear her favourite song of all time, "Ebb Tide" when she visits. When she was moving out of her house she had to downsize just about everything and I went through the remaining records in the cabinet. I found quite a few that came home with me. Some I was genuinely curious to hear, and some were for her to listen to when she comes over. Hits of the 70's was released in 1972 and the essay on the back cover says the album contains the main themes to three of the most successful motion pictures of the decade. Yup, two years in and they're calling it. Then whoever wrote the back piece went even further by stating, "70's music is the most feeling popular music in the history of man."  I gotta say I was hooked even before dropping the needle, and boy the album delivered the goods. In fact I'd go so f...