Me and against the Music (part 1)

"Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes. "A magic beyond all we do here (Hogwarts)! ~ Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore

I remember the time when I was young, I used to despise all forms of music. It took a few years (4 or 5) and a bit of persuasion from my cousins to start liking it. I started off with film songs (tamil). I used to watch tamil films like crazy when my cousins were around, but never really cared for the songs. But a few songs were actually good, and being the record-whatever-I-see freak I am, I used to record songs from DD 1. (mind you, I was 5 and only my grandma's house had a VCR, but no cable)

At the same time (1995-96), my cousin sister, who was going to her 11th std. tried to make me give a chance to listen to a few English songs. She even recorded an audio casette for me, which got lost when I shifted my house in 1998. Her attempts were not working though, as I had not acquired a taste for English music … yet.

Fast forward 5-6 years. The millennium was really a new beginning to me. I had changed a lot. During my 4th to 5th std. vacation, I went to Singapore with my cousins and my mom. We stayed with a relative, who showed my Real Player 4 or 5 IIRC, the first version which had a theme with blue being the most abundant colour. (The previous ones had an icon of a speaker and was mostly greyish) (I'm sure it wasn't 6, cause 6 was dubbed G2, which released IIRC after I came back)

The first ever music video (English) I ever saw was "…Baby One More Time" by Britney Spears. I used to love that song. And I hope this is an answer to the abysmal question I get of why I'm a big fan of Britney. The answer is for sentimental reasons, since she was the first artist I listened to.

When we came back, I got my cousin brother to download the song for me, which he did. For the next few years, that was the only song I knew in English.

Then, when I payed a visit to the same cousin brother in Mumbai, I got a chance to listen to my second-ever song. I didn't know what it was, but ironically, it just had to be another song by Britney. It was "Oops… I Did It Again", which I promptly sent to myself via e-mail.

Later, in 2003, just before my birthday, I got hooked into the WWE (which I should say was pretty late, considering that the very same cousin brother mentioned above used to treat it like a religion and tried to get me to watch it). I was impressed with some of the songs which were used as entrance themes for the WWE superstars. With my newly (actually, I knew it 2 years earlier) found knowledge of P2P, I downloaded some of them and loved them. I remember the first 5 themes I downloaded….
1) Shawn Michaels – Sexy Boy
2) Motorhead – Time To Play The Game
3) Finger Eleven – Slow Chemical
4) Breaking Point – One Of A Kind
5) LIMP Bizkit – Rollin' (Deadman Mix)

As the days went on, I began to like WWE a lot. During my exams, in March, I saw my first ever PPV, No Way Out. (which is a Feb PPV, but since India was 3 weeks back in time)
The PPV's theme song was "Bring Me To Life" by Evanescence.
It instantly became my favourite song (at that time), and Evanescence, my all time favourite band.

Later, I visited my cousin at Mumbai in my holidays. He was watching TV, while I was on the floor drawing or something like that, absent-mindedly singing Bring Me To Life. Imagine my surprise when I heard the TV sing the same. That marked the first time I saw the video of Bring Me To Life.

The next 2 years were the time I spent most of my time getting songs. I had a wide collection of songs of various artists/bands and genres. Then later, I got an iPod from my aunt. That was one of the best gifts I've ever got in my life. Sadly, my computer was an Intel Pentium MMX, 128 MB Ram, 133 GHz, and I was on Windows 98. Then on some day (I've got it marked in my diary, too lazy to check) my computer finally died after so many years. The one week I spent without it was literally hell. Finally I got a new computer, and got my iPod up and running. I owe half my songs to my cousin, who also got an iPod along with me.

Then, in the later half of 2005, I don't know how, but I just remembered 2 songs which my sister recorded for me on tape. They were "Mysterious Girl" by Peter Andre, and "Mr. Boombastic" by Shaggy. I accept that it took me a bit of research to find out them completely, but I really don't know how they got into my head after 10 years.

The pleasant surprise I got here was the fact that I share a birthday with Peter Andre.

Then recently, I changed my internet scheme to one which provided me with no download limit. I used this to my advantage and started my mad download spree. If you saw how much I downloaded within the last 3 months, you'd go mad trying to count it. 😛

Then lastly, I finally found out the tape my sister made, and downloaded more of them. They're really great. Then moving on to the latest band I heard, "Within Temptation". I was introduced to it by my friend, who like me was a BIG fan of Evanescence. She turned heel on Evanescence by siding with Within Temptation. But after sometime, ironically, I also did get to listen to one of it's songs, which I should admit, was pretty good.

This is the end of part 1, and maybe later, I'll finish part 2.