The Afterword

Musings on the byways of popular culture

Menu

Navigation

You are here: Home / Forum / First record you bought

First record you bought

by 163 Comments

First single: King – Love & Pride (ouch)

First album: Now That’s What I Call Music 5

First individual artist album: Bryan Adams – Reckless

So, no, I didn’t start out cool. I hope some of you can do better.

0

Comments

  1. First single: Stevie Wonder – Master Blaster (also the coolest record I bought for many years after, and there’s nothing wrong with Love and Pride. It’s a banger.)

    First album: Rainbow – Long Live Rock and Roll

    First individual artist album: I really don’t know. For my early music buying years I went much ore in the Rainbow direction than the Stevie direction, and rock is almost always more of a band thing.

      • No, they were bought at almost the same time. I did the rock thing if acquiring a classic rather than a current hit. To be honest, I think my father bought it. I had saved for a second hand record player and my parents went halves in it, and bought me an album from a shortlist I had given them into the bargain.

    • Same album as me BT, but it was bought for me as a Christmas present when I was young. I was disconcerted a few weeks ago when GG was mentioned on the news and ‘Lonely Boy’ started playing in my head – fuckin’ hell, I knew every word of it.

      First album I bought myself was Led Zeppelin IV but that was a few years after it was released, about ’77 or so.

      I wasn’t much of a singles buyer but when I was very young I asked my mother to buy me ‘The Helicopter Song’ by The Wolfe Tones, a rousing singalong about an escape from Mountjoy prison by three depraved terrorists. It pains me to this day that even a tiny fraction of my mother’s widow’s pension went into the coffers of those fuckers. I was very young and didn’t know better. They are still going strong, making a living with happy-clappy tunes promoting hatred and celebrating murderers.

    • I played Out of the Blue last night all the way through for the first time in a long time and explained to my wife and daughter how I had got it as a Christmas or Birthday present when (like you) I was 13 (or just turned 14).

      They were not interested in my nostalgic wittering.

  10. First single Status Quo – Caroline. A cracker, still love it. Cool or not cool? No idea.

    First album Elton John – Greatest Hits. First greatest hits he did. Elton’s music I like without ever getting too excited about it. Crocodile Rock was a great fun song for a young kid.

    I also got a K-tel 20 Golden Greats that had things like Albatross and Let’s Dance on it. Original versions. Like a primer that gave you ideas of what to listen to.

  12. First Single: Beat the Clock by Sparks. Pretty cool, but then again, in 1979 you could have given a chimpanzee a pound and let him into Woolworths and he would have come out with a great single. Unless he spotted the Pick n Mix first of course.
    First Album: The Fine Art of Surfacing by the Boomtown Rats. Don’t still have it. I don’t think they’ve aged that well.

  14. I agree with Gatz – Love & Pride is a very cool single for the first to have bought. Extended mullets and spray painted DMs!

    I would like to say my first single bought was Tears For Fears – Pale Shelter (on green vinyl), or Eurythmics – Right By Your Side, or even Eartha Kitt – Where Is My Man. All great songs I still love. But no. It was The Flying Pickets – Only You. Definitely not cool, but still stands up to my ears today (as long as you don’t have to watch the video – those faces, those hairstyles, those clothes!)

    The first album as cassette would have been earlier – 12 Gold Bars, probably, though it might have been Whitesnake – Love Hunter (I know, but the songs are good).

    The first album as LP was probably Sade – Diamond Life, though I was given Alison Moyet – Alf for Christmas before that.

    • Inspired by my own post I’ve just listened to Love & Pride for the first time in maybe 35 years (on Spotify, the 7 inch has long since disappeared). It’s not terrible, but neither is it very good!

  16. First single – Night of Fear – The Move

    I was 8 years old and still have it in my collection.

    First Album – Space Oddity – David Bowie

    Still have it in my collection and last played it in on the day he died.

  17. Will answer in two parts.first with earned money eg paper round milk boy tattie picking.single Hey Jude album led zeppelin 4. First bought after leaving school.Rocket man by Elton and the album who will save the world that mighty groundhogs

  18. Single: 2 in one day- Shakin Stevens: Green Door and Bad Manners Can Can.
    I was about 6

    First Album was Queen: Jazz on the Fame label..
    Not a great record looking back but loved it at the time.
    Mustapha is still an enjoyable piece of nonsense I reckon

  19. First Single : SAHB – Anthem
    First Album : SAHB – Next

    (Still have the single, the LP is in the wind, but I did listen to it again as part of the amazing 14 CD Box Set, The Last Of The Teenage Idols)

  21. Single: Hoots Mon! by Lord Rockingham’s XI
    Album: The Rolling Stones

    In mitigation m’lud, I was very young when using my birthday money to purchase the good Lord Rockingham’s masterwork.

    As to the album, I still play it and, for me, it has claims to be one of the best debut albums by anybody.

    • Hoots Mon! is brilliant, nothing to be embarrassed about there. I mean, there’s a Richard Thompson cover version, so none more Afterword. And also the punchline of a Nigel joke at the last HMHB gig in Edinburgh: “Visited the Scottish Owl Sanctuary. They missed a trick there – should’ve called it…”

  22. First single – shape of things by The Yardbirds or Kerp on Running by Spencer Davis Group – pretty sure bought them on same day.

    First album with my own money – Deep Purple in rock

    First CD – Eric Clapton unplugged and Pat Metheny Secret History

  23. Single: either Saturday Night’s Alright for Fighting by Elton John OR Take Me Bak ‘ome by Slade – couldn’t have bought them more than a week apart and I can’t remember which one was first. I think I still have them.

    LP: Led Zeppelin 2 – bought in January 1975 with Christmas money, probably from the big Menzies in Argyle Street, Glasgow. The first LP that I owned was Country Life by Roxy Music – guess what – a Christmas present in December 1974. I definitely still have them both – and still play them.

    Comp: I remember being bought a cassette of Pure Gold on EMI.

    Since Steve T has mentioned it –
    First CD: von Karajan, BPO, 1960s stereo recording of Sibelius’ 4th symphony and Swan of Tuonela…..I stuck with vinyl for pop, rock, jazz, etc for ages.

  25. Single – The Freeze – Spandau Ballet
    Album(s) – Replicas, Tubeway Army and The Pleasure Principle, Gary Numan. A Christmas present twofer from my parents. I think the first LP I bought with my own money was Discovery by ELO.

    I was lucky enough to have older brothers that tolerated me borrowing their records. By the time I was actually buying records myself I had access to a huge prog to punk library already.

  26. First single(s): Squeeze – Cool for Cats & Ian Dury – Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick.
    I think the latter might have been in a remainder bin at the time.

    First individual artist album: Blondie – Parallel Lines of a friend at school and Eric Clapton’s Just One Night in a shop – WH Smith, I think.

    Similarly, I had an older sister whose boyfriend helped distract me by bringing LPs round.

  27. Some good choices above. For me:

    1st single bought – Sweet Dream – Jethro Tull

    1st album bought – Five Bridges – The Nice

    … but first album owned – Abbey Road – The Beatles – a present on my fifteenth birthday. Still play it, albeit on CD. Still love it. Haven’t heard Five Bridges for many decades and still don’t want to.

    1st individual artist – no idea and can’t even begin to imagine. Other than Paul Simon’s latest, can’t remember the last time either.

    Edited as just remembered – Hot Rats – Frank Zappa was my first individual album, although it could be argued it wasn’t exactly an individual effort!

  28. First single was a pack of (5 or 7?) from Woolworths which included Summertime by Mungo Jerry – I’ve no recollection of the others.

    First LP Honky Chateau, Elton, which I still play to this day.

  32. I’ve never bought a single but the first one I ever owned was Memphis Tennessee by Chuck Berry a gift from my Sister.
    The first album I ever owned was With The Beatles another gift from my Sister but the first album I bought for cash money was either Just A Collection Of Antiques And Curios by the Strawbs or Tumbleweed Connection by Elton John. I can’t remember which one I bought first or for the life of me what motivated me to buy either of them. I don’t remember listening to them overly much and I haven’t listened to them in the intervening years since I bought them fifty three years ago.

  34. First single – Let’s Dance by Chris Montez. Bought in cahoots with my 2 older brothers and, probably costing about a half crown, my input was probably about sixpence.

    First album – I bought 2 second-hand from big Kenny McFadyen. Morituri Te Salutant by Colosseum and Getting to This by Blodwyn Pig. The first brand new album I bought was Stand Up by Jethro Tull

  35. First single was ‘Lightning Tree’ – The Settlers (1971) (on the York label). Entirely due to the fact that I was utterly in love with Dora from Follyfoot. I didn’t routinely buy singles. Great choon, all the same.

    First album was ‘Strings for Pleasure play Simon and Garfunkel’ (1970) (on the mighty MFP label). It took me about 45 mins (the time it took to walk home, reading the sleeve notes as I did so), before the awful truth dawned upon me. I’d wasted £1.50 of my scant pocket money. I put on a brave face and started saving for the King Crimson album that I should have gone for.

  36. First single bought ( for me) ‘Israelites’ – Desmond Dekker

    First single bought with my own pocket money in person: ‘Metal Guru’ – T. Rex

    First album ‘Piledriver’ – Status Quo.

    I’m happy with that. There were obviously numerous shockers after a pretty good start.

  39. First single bought for me: Abba’s Waterloo (I was 4).

    First single I bought myself: Buggles – Video Killed the Radio Star.

    First album bought for me: Grease OST

    First albums I bought myself: The Human League – Dare and Depeche Mode – Speak & Spell, both bought in the Virgin Megastore, Oxford Street, late Decemeber 1981, paid for with Christmas record tokens. If only they’d both been crap, it would have saved me a lifetime of expense.

  41. Can’t remember with 100% certainty, but most likely:
    Single: T.Rex -The Groover
    Album: T.Rex – Electric Warrior

    Looking back on those school days, most girls were into Donny and David and most boys into Slade. The more interesting, thoughtful, sensitive and intelligent boys like me (and, I suppose, everyone above who said T.Rex) were more into T.Rex. Which makes me wonder why I don’t recall anyone being particularly into Bowie.

  42. I was given my first record player at Christmas 1963, and dear old mum and dad must have been paying attention (sort of) as they bought me I Want To Hold Your Hand by Fabs and…ahem…You Were Made for Me by Freddie and The Dreamers (I think it was probably 2 or 3 in the chart at the time). As soon as the shops opened, and I remember this very clearly, I bought my 1st LP – With the Beatles

    1st Single was probably Glad All Over by the DC5.

  43. I was a late bloomer and I honestly didn’t buy music of my own until I was 17 – before that I was into comics and Dungeons & Dragons.

    So anyway:
    – First Album: Queen (A Night At The Opera) (on cassette tape, and this was in 1990 so I was well out of sync with my times)
    – First Single: Dire Straits (Calling Elvis) (on seven inch)

    Cooler than thou? Em, nope.

    • I remember in the late 80s there was a poll of the favourite albums of students at the time. Can’t remember what was number 1, but I think The Wall was top 3, and I’m sure Dark Side and Sgt Peppers were up there as well. The NME was scandalised.

      I think it was quite common for young folk in the late 80s to be buying stuff from the 70s and 60s.

  44. First single – The Jean Genie – autumn 1972
    First album – The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars – a week or two later.
    Yes I was one of those (at the age of 8) who was greatly affected by his Starman appearance but I had to wait a few months for my parents, prompted by my older siblings, to acquire a Dansette record player.

  45. The first record I bought was Nillson Without You. It was a birthday present for my sister. I chose it because it was number one and hence the best record out. I can’t remember the first single I bought for myself, but it may have been Slade Cum On Feel The Noize which I bought before it was in the charts so was very happy when it went straight in at number one!

    First album was Slayed.

  46. First Single: This Is Tomorrow by Bryan Ferry. Just listened to it again now, possibly the first time this century. It’s magnificent. What a sound. Swings like an elephant’s willy.

    First Album: Blue For You by Status Quo. The last studio album before the Live one. So ending their existence as a coke-fuelled four piece, knocking the finish off their Telecasters. Soon would come synths, cover songs and singalongs.

    First Individual Artist Album. Cripes, that’s a tough one. I’ll have to search the memory banks and return.

  48. Being the child of divorced parents and having much older, wage-earning siblings, I got by for a long time without having to spend my own money…my sisters left behind most of their LPs (A Hard Day’s Night, Jimi Hendrix, Desmond Dekker, The Band etc) and my older brother had a short stack of singles (Sweet, Jethro Tull, Redbone springs to mind), and Christmas and birthdays they all spoiled me rotten.
    My manipulative skills in combination with dad’s bad conscience about leaving us to start a new family, meant that visits to stores usually delivered a record jackpot, none of my own money changing hands. But I used these tactics mostly because it never occurred to me that I could buy them for myself. Until one day in 1979 when I went along with a friend from school when she was going to buy the OST from Star Wars for her dad.
    We ended up in a super cool record store (I had only been to department stores before, where they didn’t have that many records to sell) and for some reason I got absolutely mesmerized by the double album Queen Live Killers and couldn’t imagine leaving the store without it (a bit strange really, as I’d had very little experience with Queen’s music previously).

    My friend, having no luck with the OST, lent me the money to buy it, and that was it, I was hooked!
    I’m pretty sure that the second album I bought on my own was the Peter Skellern album Astaire, but I feel zero shame – although today I prefer listening to the (several) albums I own where those songs are actually sung by Fred Astaire himself. Pure joy! 🙂

    The first single happened in 1980, when I really wanted Master Blaster (Jammin’) by Stevie Wonder, but didn’t have enough money – so I convinced one of my sisters to contribute the rest, saying that we could take turns owning it. Of course it never became my sister’s turn!

  49. First single was I’m Mandy, Fly Me by 10cc.
    Bought it in Ilkley where we lived at the time, probably from Woolies.
    First album would have been a tape, probably ABBA Arrival, from either Woolies or Smith’s in High Wycombe.

  50. I used to tape music from the radio, as I couldn’t afford records. I was about 16 when I first bought any vinyl.

    First single: Amii Stewart, Knock on Wood (80s re-release) along with Bowie and Jagger’s Dancing in the Street. Bought from good old Woolworths.

    Thanks to some Christmas money from my parents, I bought five ‘first albums’ at once:
    So – Peter Gabriel
    Utter Madness
    The Police – Every Breath You Take
    U2 – The Unforgettable Fire
    Pet Shop Boys – Disco
    I felt like a ‘proper’ music fan when strolling out of Newcastle HMV with them.

  51. First single was The Last Time by the Stones.

    Earlier was my first album, which seems to be a popular choice for first- With The Beatles.
    not really sure what my first with my own money was, but could have been Disraeli Gears. Fresh Cream was a Christmas pressie.

    Before the next thread starts, I’ve absolutely no idea what my first cd was.

  52. I only remember with my own money…

    First LP. Money earned as a one off market research thing. I was paid $10.00 (a shitload for a kid in the mid-70’s) I spent $4.99 on the soundtrack to That’ll Be The Day. I wanted it for Rock On. Didn’t care much for the oldies that filled out the rest of the four sides. They grew on me later.

    First single. My brother and I got roped into pulling weeds in some old ladies backyard. I got $2.00 which was more than enough to get Gudbuy T Jane. The experience was EXACTLY like this very early episode of The Simpsons…

  53. First Single : Maggie May – Rod Stewart

    First Albums : Help – The Beatles / Oldies But Goodies – The Beatles

    I was saving up to buy a Raleigh Chopper bike around 1971 I guess (after the Rod purchase ) but splurged the lot on two albums at once…the first indication of my purchasing choices over other stuff that has lasted a lifetime!
    I never did get that Raleigh Chopper 🙁

    First Individual Artist Album: David Bowie – Aladdin Sane

  56. Like @twang, the first single I owned was She Loves You/I’ll Get You which I was given as a birthday present, and God I wish I still had it. I have bought very few singles over the years but I have a horrible feeling the first was The Pushbike Song by the Mixtures, and I am delighted I no longer own it.

    More positively, the first album was Cosmo’s Factory by Creedence Clearwater Revival and I am pretty confident that that precious copy remains my most played vinyl record ever.

  58. Come to think of it, with paper round money I do remember buying very cheap MFP compilation albums in Woolies. Beatles Rock n Roll Music v1 and a Monkees Greatest Hits LP. Both outstanding and set me on my way with pop music. Comedy records were around as well at the time – the Python ones, Not the Nine O Clock News, Secret Policeman’s Ball, Connolly, Carrot…

    • I had the Rock n Roll compilation on two cassettes – probably my first Beatles recordings, on reflection. Must have been bought by my parents for me, as part of a job lot of cassettes which included Johnny Cash at San Quentin and Dylan’s Times they are a’Changing.

      The Rock n Roll cassettes were still in use when I got my first car.

  59. First single: American Pie (with a Boots record token).

    First album: Beatles Red Album, (followed quickly by Blue)

    First individual artist album: (not a “greatest hits” compilation) – Dark Side Of the Moon.

    Pretty cool for 11 – 12 year old – but spoiled by a John Denver greatest hits and “my ding-a-ling”

  60. First album: “Elton John – Greatest Hits” (The one with Elt in a white suit on the front cover. It sold millions of copies. You know the one)

    First single: You know, I honestly can’t remember. I like to think that it was Sparks’ “This Town Ain’t Big Enough for Both of Us”. But it was probably something like “Ernie (the Fastest Sodding Milkman in the West)” by Benny Hill.

    First non-Greatest Hits album: Elton John – “Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy”. Still like it a lot.

  62. The first single I owned was The Duke Wore Jeans by Tommy Steele – on 78. Can’t remember if I bought it or someone gave it to me – if I bought it I would have had a record token, I suppose.

    I didn’t really start buying elpees until I got a job on the buses between school and university. I did all the overtime going, and suddenly I had an absurd amount of money. I gave a fiver to my mum and spent the rest on vinyl. No idea what the first one was though – might have been something by the Stones or the Kinks. Definitely not the Fabs, my sisters bought those.

  64. Oliver’s Army by Elvis Costello and Scary Monsters by David Bowie. That seems inappropriately cool, so I would add my second single was We Don’t Talk Anymore by Sir Cliff. Don’t recall which was my second LP because SINGLES MATTER..

  66. Single was either Where Do You Go to My Lovely? or Windmills Of Your Mind by Noel Harrison.

    Album was Fill Your Head With Rock a CBS sampler. Introduced me to Leonard Cohen and Al Stewart among many others.

    First album by a single artiste was A Gift From A Flower To A Garden by Donovan.

    You can see from the above I was a sensitive little boy…

  67. Single: Living in the past/Jethro Tull
    Album: Pictures at an Exhibition/ELP
    Individual artist: That’s tough one, as it was all bands at the cusp of the 70s. I think it was the mfp Donovan collection.

  68. First Single : The Legend Of Xanadu ~ Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich

    First Album : Rubber Soul ~ The Beatles

    Both purchased in 1968, the year I started becoming a hoarder.

  69. First using my own money….
    Single – Tokoloshe Man, John Kongo
    Album – Six wives of Henry VIII, Rick Wakeman (had to take the first one back as it was warped)
    First gig – except for numerous ‘turns’ at the Working Men’s Clubs I was taken to from a very young age was Strawbs at Hanley Victoria Hall in Stoke

  70. First single was Ian Dury’s Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick. Album was (using a Boots gift voucher) Darts 1st album. Both very good and not bad for a 10 year old.

  72. First single was Blockbuster by The Sweet. To my eternal shame I told my Mam (who gave me the 50p – I was 13!) that I was going to Rumbelows to buy Daniel by Elton because she liked it as well, then told her afterwards that they didn’t have it.

    The first “proper” album I bought was then actually “Don’t Shoot Me…” so I didn’t feel quite so bad. I’ve still got that original copy as I couldn’t bring myself to part with it when I sold all my vinyl to go digital few years back

  73. With my own money…

    First single – David Bowie – “The Jean Genie”
    – The Sweet – “Blockbuster”

    …went into Boots with Christmas money, gave the lady behind the counter my interpretation of the song’s riff, and she told me it could be either of the above. Luckily, enough money for both.

    First compilation LP – “Pure Gold on EMI”

    First ‘proper’ LP – Slade – “Slayed?”

  74. For th third time in a row on this thread :

    Blockbuster by The Sweet

    Goodbye Yellow Brick Road by Elton John.

    There’s a few years between the single and album purchases. For financial reasons.

  75. Ones I bought myself:
    First single – Denis by Blondie
    First album – Days in Europa by Skids (the original Aryan cover, complete with “pay no more than £3.99” sticker)
    Both still great. I’m not 100% sure about Days in Europa, I did go halves with my brother on London Calling but that was released a couple of months later.

Leave a Reply