I saw him live when I was 11. 1979. I was mesmerized.
That's funny - my father took me to see him in 70 or 71 (guessing on the date here, but I'm pretty sure I was also 10 or 11 years old), and to see Roy Clark the next year. I would not have chosen to see Roy Clark, but that motherfucker can play the hell out of anything with strings, and that's no hype. I remember that Johnny Cash was much LOUDER than Roy Clark though. Maybe all those amphetamines make you want to
turn shit up!
That was the extent of concerts with the old man. They weren't his thing, but sometimes people...um...
paid him for stuff with tickets. This was '69 to '73 or so. Maybe later. He usually gave them away ("Led Zeppelin? What the hell is that? You want these Jim?"), but he loved Johnny Cash and and any of that old American stuff, Hank Williams, pretty much any type of crying in your beer stuff.
I did not appreciate listening to it as a kid, but it is interesting how even involuntary influences affect you later in life. I know that stuff inside out because the old man subjected me to it every weekend (he and my mother didn't see eye to eye and split before I was a year old).
Uh, sorry, I thought this was the autobiography thread.
What I'm listening to now: eggs frying on the sidewalks. LA is in the middle of a 100+ degree heat wave.