My Sister is Cooler than Your Sister

If you were to ever look at my playlist - it would be hard to determine if I was 17,  35 or 70 years old.  There is everything from BTS and Taylor Swift to Loretta Lynn and Roy Clark from The Carpenters and Talking Heads to Michael Jackson and Little River Band.

I've been trying to figure out for years where I got my taste in music.  I believe I have narrowed it down to one person.   My sister.

She is a couple of years older than me, and of course, the younger sibling always thinks the elder sibling is way cool in all choices.  I have to say, for music, in retrospect, she was pretty cool.

Before we could buy our own records, we had to depend on whatever was in Mom and Dad's collection.    My parents must have had the Oklahoma soundtrack because she introduced me to Surrey with the Fringe on Top.  She also introduced me to Herb Albert and The Tijuana Brass.  Her favorite was A Taste of Honey while I preferred Lonely Bull.     I also remember listening to Merle Haggard's Soldier's Last Letter and Roy Orbison's Oh, Pretty Woman - also from their collection.  Roy Clark, Lynn Anderson, Nat King Cole, Bobby Goldsboro, Sound of Music, Petulia Clark - we listened to it all.

We went to school within walking distance of Pioneer Music.  Pioneer was awesome because it had little cubbies where you could listen to 45's before your bought them - or more likely, just listened to them.   I don't remember the first record she brought home, but her collection was pretty eclectic.  The first record could have been Aerosmith's Dream On or Sylvia's (R&B not country) Pillow Talk or possibly The Locomotion by Grand Funk Railroad.   Later she brought home everything from Paul Anka's You're Having My Baby to Cheech and Chong's Earache My Eye from Chicago's Harry Truman to  David Bowie's Fame.  Throw in The Partridge Family and a few KTel albums - and life sure was good in the 70's.

Our names are both on the record, but since it was released in 1964 - I'm guessing it was from Mom and Dad's collection.

Again, both our names are written, but mine appears to be scratched out.

                                    Kelly decided to play for keeps and write her name in nail polish.  My name is nowhere to be seen.

"An earache my eye.  How would you like a butt ache?"  No ownership on this one!

At some point she graduated from 45's to albums and 8 track tapes.  Some favorites were the soundtrack to Saturday Night Fever, Rolling Stones' Some Girls and the Heavy Metal soundtrack.  REO's Hi Infidelity was always in the 8 track in the car.   I have some of the albums but I wish I'd kept the 8 tracks.  Klymaxx Blues Band isn't nearly as easy to find as Styx Cornerstone!

We are going to the band America's 50th Anniversary concert this weekend.  I sure hope they play this song.  Thanks for the introduction to great music, Kelly!