The first tape I ever bought was Nat King Cole’s Greatest Hits. Natalie Cole had just released the song with her father called Unforgettable. It was my favorite song at the moment. I liked love songs back then. I liked old AMC movies about love. Especially the black and white movies like Roman Holiday or any of the kodachrome Elvis movies or anything with Cary Grant. I liked everything to do with love. I was a typical young girl full of heart and dreams. So, I went to the store when I was maybe 12 in 7th grade and I bought Nat King Cole’s tape. I still can recall that day at the mall store.
I learned every love song on that tape, laying on my bed with my Walkman and listening to the songs with my eyes closed and smiling. His songs were so happy and promising and full of optimism. I played the tape over and over and over again. I wore that tape out. His voice was amazing. The songs I loved the best were Walking My Baby Back Home and L-O-V-E. A lot of people today reference Nat King Cole and probably don’t even realize it. The phrase “to love and be loved” comes from a little known song from Nat King Cole called Nature Boy. It actually goes like this…. “the greatest thing you’ll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.” This song is also in the movie, Moulin Rouge.
There’s an urban legend story about Nat King Cole’s wife. Some say it is true. Some say it is not. Here is the story, irregardless. This woulda been in the year 1965:
“An African-American woman is stranded on an Alabama Highway in a rain storm. She flags down a motorist who turns out to be a white man who takes her to where she can get a cab. She’s in a big hurry, writes down his address, and leaves. A week later, there is a knock at the man’s door. It’s the delivery of a giant console color television with a note from the woman he had helped on the rainy highway. She thanks him and says that because of his kindness, she was able to make it to her dying husband’s bedside. It is signed Mrs. Nat King Cole.”
There are other firsts in my life for different types of music playing. The first 8-track tape I ever remember hearing when I was a little girl in the 80s dancing at my grandma’s house with my cousins was the Beegees. I remember dancing to Stayin’ Alive. It was a very happy moment. I must have been four or five.
My mother had a record player and to this day it is in her attic. We only had three records we would play over and over again. They were Michael Jackson’s Thriller, Joan Jett’s I Love Rock and Roll, and then Olivia Newton John. I can’t remember the specific album from Olivia Newton John but I remember her singing I Honestly Love You. My mother liked her a lot.
My first CD, well, that was Wrecks n Effect or maybe Guns n Roses Appetite for Destruction. To this day, Sweet Child of Mine is still one of my favorites.
Once streaming came on board, it was pretty easy to access all sorts of songs and I honestly can’t remember what were my first ones then. But I remember the tape of Nat King Cole the most of all.
How about you? What are your fondest memories of music? What was your first 8-track or your first tape or CD? What songs meant the most to you as a kid?
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