what were you listening to at 15?

Let's see, I turned 15 in Nov 95, so...

Oasis - Definitely Maybe, What's The Story (oh dear)
Blur - Great Escape (oh dear)
Supergrass - I Should Coco
Black Grape - It's Great When You're Straight
Teenage Fanclub - Grand Prix
Radiohead - The Bends
REM - Monster, Automatic, New Adventures
Manic Street Preachers - Everything Must Go

15 was a key year now I think of it. I think the Bends and REM definitely brought me into indie-rock pastures and away from Britpop. And then during summer '96 Dancing In The Street aired, which meant I heard the Velvet Underground for the first time. This, and getting Odelay for my 16th birthday, really opened things up.

circle jerks
dead kennedys
bad religion
crass
rudimentary peni
ssd
youth brigade
7 seconds
subhumans (uk)
x
buzzcocks
husker du
specials
selector
8 eyed spy
yaz
bauhaus
velvet underground
whodini
fat boys
kurtis blow
run dmc
joy division
new order
bronski beat
bow wow wow
echo & the bunnymen
stranglers
the jam

and other stuff. and whatever was on the radio. i turned 16 in october of 84, so some of this stuff i might have been listening to after my 16th birthday. i do remember that i listened to husker du all night ON my 16th birthday, drunk and alone in my dorm room at the bad boy's school that my parents had shipped me away to.

Concrete by 999 (I was inexplicably obsessed...pardon the pun...with this record)
Generation X by Generation X....older by a few years, but I bought it at the same time as the 999 record
Give the People What they Want by the Kinks
Joe's Garage Act I by Frank Zappa
The Number of the Beast by Iron Maiden
Fire of Unknown Origin by Blue Oyster Cult
Oh No! It's Devo by Devo
Wild in the Streets by the Circle Jerks
Stukas Over Disneyland by the Dickies
Troops of Tomorrow by The Exploited
Let Them Eat Jellybeans by various artists (Alternative Tentacles)
Ghost in the Machine by the Police
Rio by Duran Duran

also, richard hell, the velvet underground, and random punk rock and elephant six-ish indie pop

Dark Side of the Moon Pink Floyd
Live at Fillmore East
Brothers and Sisters
Eat A Peach
Idelwild South Allman Brothers Band
Hot Rocks Rolling Stones
Mott
All The Young Dudes Mott the Hoople
Houses of the Holy Led Zeppelin
Marshall Tucker Band
Aerosmith
Alladin Sane David Bowie esp "Panic in Detroit"
Live Dates Wishbone Ash
American Beauty Grateful Dead
Quadrophenia The Who

lots of Sly, Spinners and O Jays on AM radio

I remember being slightly obsessed w/the New York Dolls debut but the cover scared me away from buying it!

My Rush infatuation was just around the corner.

(It's my latent Catholic urge to confess.)

I meant you (Daniel) did.

I was very into music but was teased for basically having advanced tatses for my age (due to cool parents and sisters)

...more or less...

For me, the Smashing Pumpkins had pretty much taken over my life, and I listened to Dark Side of the Moon almost every night before I went to bed. Also, I loved CCR, and didn't know music got much better than Live's Throwing Copper, Dookie, Weezer, and KISS: MTV Unplugged.

How much of everyone's tastes then was heavily influenced by what was available in the "Alternative" section of those music clubs?

oh, man...i could just go on and on. this was right smack at the peak of OCD record/tape buying.

Japan
Bauhaus
the Cure
Cocteau Twins
the Waterboys for some reason
the Church
Echo & the Bunnymen
the Alarm (arrrrgh! wtf I was obsessed with them)

OK that was embarrasing.

Later in the same year I was listening to:
The Sex Pistols
The Ramones
The Clash
Blondie
Devo

and the next year 1980, well *that* was golden. 16 in 1980, going to ALL the punk/new wave shows....I'll have to wait for the "what were you listening to when you were 16" thread to tell you about that, old coot that I am.

...but it took me a while to own up to the stuff that I didn't WANT to remember...

Hothouse Flowers - Home [was on a weird Celtic kick, their Gaelic song prompted me to try to teach myself Gaelic with aid of a library book, failed miserably as you can imagine]
Simple Minds - greatest hits [same Celtic kick. patchy, I know]
Pink Floyd - Momentary Lapse Of Reason (ugh. a guy I had a crush on copied it for me. I listened to it all the time while smitten. I still can't listen to it to this day without cringing)
The Cream of Eric Clapton (same guy got me into this. but I actually still enjoy Cream, and fuck it, I can predict the tracklisting for this in my sleep!)
U2 - Achtung Baby
Ratcat - I didn't like Blind Love much, but I was still wearing out the Tingles EP
Twin Peaks soundtrack (wore this one OUT. Was even given the 'Secret Diary of Laura Palmer' book for my 15th birthday.)

alice cooper - killer & schools out
led zeppelin - III & IV
peter frampton - wind of change
atomic rooster - death walks behind you
humble pie - smokin
the guess who - so long,bannatyne
the who - who's next
fleetwood mac - bare trees
rory gallagher - rory gallagher
deep purple - machine head
capt. beefheart - clear spot

...i am sure most kids in nanaimo,bc were listening to this stuff save for the beefheart. CKLG-FM used to be a lot more eclectic back then and "lo yo-yo stuff" [which i loved] was on pretty steady rotation back then.

Pretty much mainstream, you might say.

TECHNO TECHNO TECHNO TECHNO!

And Europop and rap too.

And (*gasp*) The Cranberries and Bangles.

Oh, and it was the year of "Music for the Jilted Generation", that was massive! It made the number one spot on the Finnish charts, the first time (I think) a techno record made such a feat back here, and I remember thinking, "OK, this the beginning of a new era! No more boring rock'n'roll!".

mighty lemon drops
echo and the bunnymen
cure
new order
chameleons
the the
forgotten rebels
clash
p/i/l
ultravox
book of love
bauhaus
love and rockets
depeche mode
violent femmes
jesus and mary chain
front 242
the cult
CFNY (toronto radio station)

fuck knows what else. 1977

The Beatles, Mega City Four, Green Day... I can't really remember I was 16/17 when i started going mad for all sorts of different things.

Pixies
The Cure
Ride
Jesus & Mary Chain
The Smiths
Wonder Stuff
Carter USM
Nirvana
Senseless Things
Slowdive
Spacemen 3
Sisters of Mercy
Ned's Atomic Dustbin
The Police
"The Sound of the Suburbs" compilation
Beatles/Stones/Animals/Monkees
The Stranglers

This was the age I really became a CIF I think!! Prior to 15 I primarily listened to house/hip hop and Queen.

Never Understand in the spring, You Trip Me Up in the summer, Just Like Honey in the autumn, then Psychocandy just before Christmas. Interspersed with these were a couple of John Peel sessions, the first Primal Scream single, the Shop Assistants ep, and several attempts to dye white school shirts black.