growing up without music in the house?

My parents had two records, Simon and Garfunkle and Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band. I ruined their record player as a small child, they never replaced it so I never actually listened to those records.

I was an MTV and radio fanatic from an early age, and started buying cassettes when I was about 8 or so(1985). When I turned 14 and got a cd player for my birthday I started becoming a serious music buyer.

Right here. My love for music came purely through the family watching Countdown every Sunday. Other than that there was bugger all music in the house - a copy of Queen's Night at the Opera and a Ted Mulry Gang LP that I never listened to.

Straight up, my pops was and is the most humorless, predictable piece of robot shit ever shat in all respects, and music was no exception.......he owned zero music, listened to zero music, hated or was indifferent to all music he heard.....it was like the very existence of music insulted his core being......think that's inhuman? get this......he also disliked sweets.....SWEETS.....all candy was kryptonite to him.....I am sure he is the only cunt on earth that doesn't even like the SMELL of sweet goods.....when mom dukes was baking cupcakes, she'd have to do it hours before he came home from work because he'd freak out and get cursey then depressed if he had to breathe it in......this guy's pleasure sensors must have gotten reversed at birth or some shit.....next time I visit I should mace him to see if he finds it delicious.......thankfully he has always been a quite adept provider.

Mom dukes, though, she's always been down with music......she'd take us downstairs and school us on Patsy Cline, The Beatles, even some jazz, whatever.....when Fugees "Killing Me Softly" came on the radio she'd sing along, make little ironic hip-hop dance lunges, and then make us listen to the OG shit from which KMS was sampled. When new high school friends' moms saw my mom pick me up from their houses, they'd think mom was my older sister in college......must have been her ponytail.....she still rocks it, it's still very shiny.....she's a lady......your momma got rosacea.

My folks were old before their time. At the age when everyone else was listening to the Beatles and Hendrix, my dad was listening to choral arrangements and show tunes. My mom listened to Dean Martin and "muzak". Basically, all I had to do to musically rebel in that house was to play anything that had been recorded in the last 25 years.

My parents were the classic 12-album people, and half of those were a Longines Symphonette set they got suckered into buying (buy your own muzak!) They did listen to the quasi-classical station on Sundays, but that was mostly just background for reading the paper. On the plus side, my 4-year-older brother was into rock, and got a guitar at age 13, thereby guiding me into it before I would have naturally found it, I think.

My dad has never owned any music, as far as I know. He certainly never listened to it.
My mom had a small collection, but she never listened to it.

They have about 10 albums on vinyl: Elvis, perry como. They like easy listening but I've never seen them putting a record on and listening to it. My mum has some Nat king cole/Bing crosby tapes but again they are too busy to listen to this.

I told them I could sell it and get some money for it (or for me heh) but they are not for it: ''They should be there'' and all that...

Yeah I grew up with not much music around. My Dad likes country but he only really got into it when he started working 200 miles away and living on his own during the week, so I didn't hear it. Mum likes classical music but she never played it much.

What conclusions do the people with music-loving parents draw about the ILMers who didn't have them, then?

My mum likes Neil Diamond, Rod Stewart, Hollies etc and still listens to them even now. I think my dad is one of those people who was into music a bit when he was younger but sort of grew out of it which I think is really common. He has a reasonable collection of singles which includes Beatles, Stones, Hollies, Dylan, The Association, Tremeloes etc. I grew up listening to almost nothing but his Beatles Lps. These days he listens to ELO, ABBA, Everly Brothers, Elton John, Fats Domino, music from musicals, mostly in the car.

Music has never been as important in his life as it has in mine but at least he still listens to music and listens to things that I don't feel in pain when i have to hear them.

My mom had a small collection, but she never listened to it.
Nickelback CDs she used as frisbees?

Nickelback CDs she used as frisbees?

Some Beatles, Joni Mitchell, James Taylor, Jackson Browne, etc. Mostly stuff she listened to as a teenager.

The only records I can remember my parents owning were a lot of Showbands records (Dickie Rock, Brendan Bowyer), a Perry Como record, Elvis Presley's "Kissin' cousins" and that "Yummy yummy yummy, I got love in my tummy" 45. The idea of sitting down and listening to music is totally alien to my folks.

somebody gave my folks sgt. peppers, and they taped it on a reel to reel and then gave it away again. so my first sgt. pepper was a cassette copy of a reel to reel. other than that they didn't have much records. my dad had some glenn miller that I've now got but the most amazing one was Fred McDowell - Mississippi Delta Blues. They also had a Dumi/ Minzani Marimba Ensemble record.

My mother buys two CDs a year or so and they're both NPR-recommended adult-contempo-cocktail-party types. O Brother... and Love and Theft last year, I think. She never listens to them, though-- I once took like half the stereo out of the living room (pillaging for components) and no one noticed for 6 months or so.

I used to get a lot of shit for how many CDs I bought. I still do but it's long distance now.

What conclusions do the people with music-loving parents draw about the ILMers who didn't have them, then?

Well, I've got music-loving parents and my conclusion is...I don't really have one. I mean, it seems like regardless of our backgrounds there we all got bit by the music bug hard and pursued it.

I'll repeat what I said on Billy Dods' thread about his son's compilation: My parents' total lifetime record collection: a Reader's Digest classical box-set (4 or 5 LPs), never played to my knowledge except once by me, a cheapo MFP Bachelors compilation, I've Got A Brand New Combine Harvester by the Wurzels and The Birdie Song.

I got NOTHING from my parents. The only three records I remember having around were Beethoven's Fifth, Phantom of the Opera, and the Ghostbusters 7". Getting into music was purely a result of my friends and through playing (which I was forced into doing my mom, admittedly).

....I was forced into doing my mom, admittedly.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

Rap was the only real form of rebillion in my house, and my brothers not my father took care to see it didnt get to far. Im told my father had an amazingly rare record collection but as I wrote else where, one of my brothers sold it all to buy a hifi cd player back when they were still eXpensive. All i remeber is his love of Tina Turner, Tom Waits, Cyndi Lauper, Andrew Loyd Weber/musicals in General and 60/70s Country and Western tunes.

My parents had some records, but my mom considered buying records to be a luxury and never even got copies of recordings of some of her favorite artists like Louis Armstrong. She didn't have any Billie Holiday until I bought some for her after getting to appreciate that music a little. But still, they had some records. Big band oldies, a smattering of classical, and religious music, primarily. There were some strange 45s around that must have been bought in the 1950s or 1960s, but I was the only one who ever listened to them, and nobody seemed to like them (including my mom). I don't know where they came from. We also had some old 78's, Caruso (sp?), the laughing record, and stuff like that, which were occasionally brought out as a special treat from the attic. (I'm sure my dad eventually sold those and probably got ripped off in the process.) My mom sometimes listened to the radio enthusiastically--when I discovered my weird college radio station in junior high, she sometimes listened to its early jazz show--but it didn't carry over into record buying.

I have an older brother and sister, however, so I had exposure to more current recordings through them. My brother had a decent size mainstream rock-oriented collection.

My dad liked the Beach Boys and Nana Miskouri sp? my mum liked Luke Kelly.

Once I was watching TV with my dad in the room and Breath by the Prodigy came on, he began tapping his fingers on the arm of the chair to the bassline, he had the control and left it on till the end too. It was strange.

My mom used to watch "Entertainment Tonight" fairly often (to my general chagrin). I remember that there was some band (possibly the Romantics?) discussing the "New Romantics" movement who said something like, "We think of ourselves as being the new normals, actually," which seemed to mean, in the context, that they were striking a less alienated stance, wearing nice suits, and weren't acting like Johnny Rotten, etc. She seemed to like that.

I also remember (as I may have posted elsewhere) that after watching a segment on Prince, she declared Prince to be a genius. She may have just been repeating what she had heard, but that wouldn't have been like her. I suspect that there was something about what had been said, or possibly an interview with Prine, that actually impressed her. It was funny though, since I'm sure she was unfamiliar with Prince's music.

I love it when my dad starts to bang his fingers to the tapes i put it in the car and then he says that its a decent tape

I can't believe it would be possible. I LIVE for music!

I sorely wish my parents liked music actually. We discuss politics sometimes, but other than that there's never anything to say beyond pleasantries. I'm sure this is quite annoying for them since noone else lives at home really, but I can't help it.

I mean if they liked music things would be so much easier. It'd be all "hey dad rave on feel the vibe". So to all you ILMers whose parents like music, go and phone them now and tell them how much they mean to you. Feel the love. You don't know how lucky you are.