The Eye Wakes Up

Welcome to Sonic Eye.

This is my little corner in cyberspace where I can talk about music, musicians, and everything else that has something to do with - well - music and the artists that make them.

Though I intend to dedicate this site to mostly stuff about music, I may occasionally segue into such disparate topics as movies, pet peeves, people, this, that, and everything else - if I feel like it. I mean, what the hey - I have the space; might as well make the most of it, right?

Right.

I grew up always liking music. Lots of different kinds of music. I consciously started to like listening to music when I was around five. I'd turn on the TV and watch some cheesy movie stupidly chugging along to some equally cheesy soundtrack. Being that young, I really didn't care if the songs sucked. In fact, I had no clue at all if a song actually sucked. I just watched and listened. (I guess I was one of the early prototypes for the zombies that would eventually become collectively known as the MTV generation.)

A year later, I discovered The Beatles. An uncle who was visiting brought a copy of A Hard Day's Night. I was fascinated by the sleeve art. I thought the multiple-photo montage of the Fab Four at the album's back cover was the coolest thing ever. I actually didn't know who The Beatles were at that time. What I did know was that they sounded really great to my uninitiated 7-year old ears. They still do.

Then I discovered Elvis. (Don't laugh, but back when he still wasn't crowned by the money-grubbing music industry as The King, Elvis Presley was actually everything the press eventually hailed him to be: fresh, trailblazing, dangerous, mean, moody, and magnificent.)

I actually kind of accidentally "ran into" Elvis (and, unknowingly, into rockabilly music as well) one day while switching channels on the old black-and-white TV. I think I saw him first on one of those reruns that TV stations show between 7 to 9 a.m. Anyway, there he was: dressed in black leather, hair slicked back into a neat pompadour, an acoustic guitar on his lap, his ass parked on a tall stool. He was on this tiny stage with his backing band (which, if I remember correctly, still included guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black - I dunno) and was surrounded 360 degrees by the audience. Man, he ran through a lot of his early hits: the ones he made when he was still with Sun Records and his early RCA chart toppers. Later on, I would catch The King in reruns of the movies (aaargh! those dreaded movies!) he made during the 60's. Still later, in 1977, I would hear that he had died of a (cough!) heart attack.

My musical education didn't stop with the passing of The King though. I spent the later part of the 70's listening to music representing genres and styles that were totally new to me. I got hooked for a time on ELO (that's Electric Light Orchestra, whose members were from the defunct psychedelic 60's band The Move) and their radio hit "Midnight Blue". In fact, "Midnight Blue" was the first 45 I ever bought. I was also introduced to Queen, Freddie Mercury, and Bohemian Rhapsody. (To this day, it still blows my mind wondering how just four dudes could actually sound like the entire cast of an opera!) Snippets of Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, The Eagles, Eric Clapton, Wings, Cheap Trick, Boston, and a host of other hot bands of the 70's managed to make their way into my consciousness (thanks to an older cousin). Everything sounded new, everything sounded different. So, like a sponge, I took it all in. But I wasn't aware that the best musical kick-in-the-head I'll ever have was still to come.

Around 1979, a song came out that featured snappy drumwork, off-the-wall lyrics, weird 60's-like surf guitar riffs, go-go girl backup vocals, and a deadpan drawl of a male lead singer. Welcome to the world of "New Wave Rock"! "Rock Lobster" by Athens, GA band The B-52's (from their eponymous "Yellow Album") gave me an intoxicating dose of quirkiness, hip riffs, and addictive hooks. This was followed by another New Wave assault that boasted of an ultra-tight groove and an enjoyably long and addictive guitar solo. The Knack's "My Sharona" effectively sealed the coffin on my Classic Rock past. This was it, I thought. Nothing can probably top what these guys do. And, most people I know don't like this stuff! Perfect!

However, with the advent of the 80's, I became adventurous and anxious in seeking out music that mainstream audiences wouldn't care to touch. I feverishly dug for the roots of this exhilerating new music. I wanted to find out: where did all this fantastic stuff come from?

Punk was, for me, the epiphany that would become a major guiding light in a lot of things I would eventually do. I know it sounds cheesy, but bands like the Sex Pistols, The Clash, The Ramones, Cockney Rejects, Husker Du, and a lot of other off-the-radar bands (well, as far as the environment I grew up in was concerned, they were off-the-radar) have influenced me in other ways aside from music. In fact the DIY ethos and the egalitarian mentality of the punk scene I still cherish to this day.

The 80's became the 90's. And, along with the return of bell-bottom pants came the rise (and fall) of grunge and "alternative music". Well, there were a lot of interesting bands that came out in the 90's. Lots of diversity, both in musical style and in the lyrical territory that the artists mined. But, compared to the mayhem, chaos, and experimentation of the bands from the 80's, the acts that came out in the 90's seemed to lack something. I dunno, it just seems that there was something missing.

With the coming of the new millennium, the direction of almost all musical acts these days is towards becoming "all-around family entertainers". Not that there's anything wrong with that. It's just that, for me, a rock n roll band is a bunch of guys (or girls) who set out to change the system, not to get swallowed by it.

Who knows? Things may still get interesting. I hope that somebody somewhere is getting bored of the complacency that ails the music scene today. That'll give guys like me a lot to write about again.