Over a year ago, I wrote a couple of pieces about the music I most loved as a child. They weren’t your typical children’s songs, but pop heard on the radio and television. Up to age eight, it was stylistically scattered among mostly novelty songs. They were a mix of pop, country, folk, and rock. After age eight, it was rock ‘n’ roll and R&B all the way.
As I reread those tales of musical precociousness, I remember other songs I loved. Please allow me to share part two of my Earliest Musical Memories.
1. Dock of the Bay – Otis Redding (1968)
In the late summer of 1968, my family experienced tough times. My dad’s union, the United Steelworkers, went on strike. The Hutters were without a paycheck, and we were briefly on welfare. My dad drove to the fairgrounds to pick up commodity food, which looked remarkably like the generic grocery products sold a decade later. To make matters worse, my mild chest cold turned into pneumonia, which required daily visits to the family doctor for shots of sulfa drugs.
On those trips back and forth to the doctor, I rode in my dad’s 1963 Oldsmobile Dynamic 88. With the radio turned to 610 WTVN, I became smitten with a song played on those daily jaunts, Otis Redding’s “Dock of the Bay.”
My mom commented that Otis Redding was a young singer who recently died in a plane crash. Understanding little about death, I found it remarkable that his music could still be heard. The song certainly has notes of finality; the thoughts of a man down on his luck who can do little more than sit on a dock in San Francisco Bay and reflect upon his failures. I found the song very haunting and still consider it a masterpiece.
2. Snoopy vs. the Red Baron – The Royal Guardsmen (1966)
One Saturday afternoon, my dad returned from Simplex Auto Parts with a surprise for me. It was a children’s album called Snoopy vs. the Red Baron. The cover art featured a cartoon of the notorious German aviator, drawn more like a Spanish pirate than a Teutonic nobleman. Being a huge Peanuts fan, I just had to listen.
I absolutely fell in love with the tale of Snoopy flying into combat against Baron Manfred Von Richthofen, set to a garage-rock beat. I sang along, “Ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, or more. The bloody Red Baron, he rolled up a score,” with a ridiculously serious look on my face. My teenage brother found me hilarious and would mock my Bulldog-like expression. I didn’t care. I had too much fun.
3. American Pie – Don McLean (1971)
When I was in first grade, the kids in my class liked one of two songs. It was either John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads” or Don McLean’s “American Pie.” I favored the latter. Not sure why. I think I loved the sing-song wordplay of the chorus. At that age, I had no idea that “The Day the Music Died” referred to the tragic deaths of The Big Bopper, Richie Valens, and Buddy Holly in a plane crash. Kind of a harbinger of my love of the bespectacled one from Lubbock, Texas.
4. Popcorn – Hot Butter (1972)
It is easy to understand why I liked this 1972 novelty instrumental. The all-synthesizer arrangement used staccato high notes to emulate the sound of corn popping. The melody is also amazing, incredibly full of catchy hooks. I also remember driving my mom crazy by clucking my tongue to the melody. Yes, I received a few house slippers across my keister over that one. I also suspect this was a harbinger of my short-lived love of 1980s synth-pop.
5. Crocodile Rock – Elton John (1972)
This song fits my concept because it was a pop song that I loved before discovering The Beatles and The Who in 1973.
In early grade school, I had an inexplicable fondness for 1950s rock ‘n’ roll. Not sure where that came from. My dad thought all rock was garbage, and my brother thought anything before The Beatles was naff. When I started hearing a 1950’s-like song on the radio, I took notice. I loved the catchy doo-wop chorus, sang in falsetto. It ended up becoming the first single I ever bought.
As Paul Harvey used to bellow, “Now you know the rest of the story.”
Jim Hutter is a veteran Columbus musician, journalist, and ASCAP songwriter who has been active in these arts since the 1980's.