The joy that comes with listening to classic rock is something that has stuck with me from the minute I listened to it. When I was a short eight-year-old, my parents told me to sit down in our silver Honda minivan. I did what I was told and buckled my red and black seatbelt. My dad opened the garage door and groaned as it reset halfway through the opening. He got out of the car and pulled the heavy white door up manually. As he got back in the car, a bit of his cologne found its way over to me. He backed the car out of our long driveway and drove up the hilly street. The leaves were red and orange, a few were yellow. No trees were full of green leaves, and most of them were barely holding on to the red, orange, and yellow ones. My dad turned on the radio. After about ten minutes, I heard the familiar tune of Shakedown Street by the Grateful Dead come on. My dad had played this many times when I was younger. I tapped my short fingers along to the beat on my leg, a hangnail occasionally getting caught in my pink pants.
“Daddy? What is this song called?” I asked
“Shakedown Street” he replied.
I leaned my small head back against the red and black car seat. I felt incredibly relaxed, like every muscle in my body has melted away like chocolate in the hot sun. After about 20 minutes of listening to the Grateful Dead, I closed my eyes. Although my hazel eyes were closed, I could still hear Jerry Garcia’s recognizable voice in my head.
When I woke up, the Grateful Dead was no longer playing through the speakers of our car. Disappointedly, I asked my father why he turned it off.
He said, “I want you to give The Who a try.”
Very quickly, the beginning of Who Are You started playing loudly through the speakers. I looked out the windows to see other cars driving and their passengers jamming out to music unknown to me. I was jamming out too. I was so happy that I was jumping up in down in my car seat; which got quite exhausting. Rather quickly, I fell back asleep. When I woke up forty-five minutes later, my father had turned The Who off. I was not as disappointed, especially since he started playing The Rolling Stones. I could not place a name to the song we were listening to, but I knew that I had heard it before. Having heard it before, I had too much pride to ask what the song was called. I sat in my car seat and focused on the song. I focused on the lyrics and the rhythm. I focused on the guitar notes. I focused on the piano notes. I tried to focus on every little detail of the song, just so I could place the song name. My father looked at me through his rearview mirror.
“Beast of -” he said.
“BURDEN” I screamed.
He laughed at me and went back to focusing more on the road while I sat in my car seat and continued to listen to Beast of Burden. The song was very relaxing. The guitar chords went in one ear and swirled around inside of my head. To this day, the song is still playing inside of my head.
After about three hours of driving, we finally pulled into my grandparent’s driveway. I unbuckled my seatbelt and got out of the van. My grandparents were waiting for us on the sidewalk. I ran over to them and told them all about the music that my dad had played for me in the car. They gave him a rather stern and disappointed look but he laughed it off.
My father knew what music was best for me as soon as I expressed an interest in music. He always played different music for me in the car. By the time that I was eight years old, I knew that I loved bands like The Grateful Dead, The Who, and The Rolling Stones. Although it is nearly nine years later, I still listen to the same music and to this day I thank my dad for introducing it to me.
