TODAY: Our Boppin' gallery presents a collection of collections.
Technically, I've never owned this particular LP. It belonged to a girlfriend. She still has it, in fact. She picked up her copy on a trip to the flea market in Syracuse in the late '70s. She'd gotten into The Kinks through me, and this was her first Kinks record. She favored soul, disco, folk, and singer-songwriter stuff, especially Carole King. Nearly four decades later, Brenda and I are still together. In the early days of our courtship, we tried to share and blend our seemingly disparate musical tastes. She couldn't stand The Sex Pistols, but quickly developed an appreciation of The Ramones. I never warmed to Dr. Buzzard's Original Savannah Band or Rose Royce, but came to like and eventually love Earth, Wind & Fire. We both liked The Rolling Stones and The Dave Clark Five. Brenda didn't really know The Kinks, but found herself digging what she heard from me, and she eagerly spent the one dollar required to add The Kinks' Greatest Hits to her own expanding rock 'n' roll library. When we moved in together in 1980, and subsequently got married in 1984, our record collections merged as one. All day and all of the night.
DC Comics' 80-Page Giant format was a Godsend for kids in the '60s: for the cost of a quarter, a fan was treated to a treasure trove of reprints from DC's vaults. My first comic book was an 80-Page Giant starring Lois Lane, and the 80-Page Superboy # 129 was my favorite single comic book as a child. The Batman giants were the best, though, and I can say that now even though I didn't actually read many of them in the '60s. Man, even the house ads I did see for these Bat-books evoked a feeling of awe, teasing a glimpse into Batman's past adventures. As an adolescent in the early '70s, I tracked down copies of most of them. The only one I had roughly contemporary to its publication was Batman # 203 from 1968, spotlighting "Secrets Of The Batcave!" I later got 1969's Batman # 208 ("The Women In Batman's Life!") in a comics swap at school circa 1970 or '71, and gradually accumulated most of them therafter. I could not possibly pick a favorite among all of these, so I've chosen Batman # 187 (January 1967) to represent the lot.
The same flea market trip that led Brenda to The Kinks' Greatest Hits also netted me a 35-cent copy of The Who's Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy. Productive trip, that. I knew the album already; my sister had a copy in the family music stash, so I had opportunity to play "Pinball Wizard" at will when I was a young teen. But I didn't care all that much about The Who until my friend Lissa and I attended a Rock Of The '60s video presentation at Syracuse University in 1977. When The Who's Shindig! performance of "I Can't Explain" concluded, I turned to Lissa and whispered that I had just spontaneously developed an interest in The Who. By '78, that burgeoning interest dovetailed with my growing awareness of power pop, and Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy served as a compact summary of The Who's singles during that period when they helped create the genre. I think I picked up a two-fer reissue of My Generation/Magic Bus as my first Who album, and added Meaty Beaty Big And Bouncy on that fateful flea market visit with Brenda in...well, it musta been 1979.
DC's arch-rival Marvel Comics also mined the vault for giant reprint collections in the '60s. Marvel Tales and Marvel Collectors' Item Classics were regularly scheduled titles, toplining previously-viewed exploits of The Amazing Spider-Man and The Fantastic Four respectively. Before becoming a bi-monthly with its third issue in 1966, Marvel Tales began as King-Size Annuals for its first two issues. I don't recall how/when/where I acquired my beat-up, taped-up, mixed-up/muddled-up/shook-up copy of 1965's Marvel Tales # 2, but I'm thinking I probably scored it on a budget-bin dive in Buffalo in the '80s. It was my first opportunity to read the origins of The Mighty Avengers, The X-Men, and Dr. Strange, though I may have seen The Hulk's tussle with The Ring-Master in an Incredible Hulk paperback collection when I was a kid.
After graduating from college in 1980, I continued my ongoing efforts to investigate and accumulate as much of the rockin' pop of the past and present as I could lay hands upon. United Artists' The Very Best Of... series offered budget introductory crash courses on the works of many a fine artist. The Very Best Of The Hollies had been my first dip into that well back when I was in high school, and post-college dips brought me my first records by The Ventures and Eddie Cochran. I didn't know much about Little Richard beyond "Tutti Frutti" and the songs The Beatles covered, so this LP served as my primer in the wild abandon of the Right Reverend Richard Penniman. It wasn't until years later that I realized that the version of "The Girl Can't Help It" contained herein was an alternate take, a later take, or whatever adjective take that didn't match the sheer exuberance and thrill of Little Richard wailin' at the start of the first great rock 'n' roll movie, The Girl Can't Help It with Jayne Mansfield. Crushed, disillusioned, I discarded my copy of The Very Best Of Little Richard in favor of a truly rockin' best-of CD, The Georgia Peach.
Avengers King-Size Special # 2--one of my favorite comic books that summer of 1968--was my first exposure to elements from the story in 1963's The Avengers # 2. Reading that special's incidental retelling of The Avengers' battle with The Space Phantom (and how that lead to The Hulk ultimately ditching the team with mighty and incredible acrimony) really, really made me want to read the original story. When I learned of the existence of Marvel Super-Heroes # 1, a 1966 collection that had reprinted "The Avengers Battle The Space Phantom!" alongside Daredevil's origin and a Golden Age story pitting The Sub-Mariner against the original Human Torch, I wanted it nearly as much as I wanted to woo Miss February. I have no recollection of how this came into my possession in the '70s, but it did not disappoint. (In contrast, Miss February never wrote, never called.)
Although I have some vivid memories of pop music in the '60s, I was a latecomer to Motown. I'm sure I knew The Supremes, and it seems likely I at least heard The Temptations and maybe The Four Tops, but the first Motown track that really connected with me was when "The Tears Of A Clown" by Smokey Robinson & the Miracles became a massive hit in 1970. By the decade's end, I'd discovered a few older Motown cuts ("The Happening" by The Supremes, "My Girl" by The Temptations, and the splendor of The Four Tops), as well as newer Hitsville, USA juggernauts like The Temptations' "Papa Was A Rolling Stone." I confess that I was unmoved by Stevie Wonder at the time, but I've reversed that opinion over time. Other than a budget (and seemingly random) Motown collection that became another of my many flea market finds, my first real Motown anthology was this five-LP set The Motown Story, a used purchase at Brockport's Main Street Records in the early '80s. As promising as it seemed, I was immediately disappointed with its documentary approach, which included spoken introductions to the tracks, often speaking over the intros of the tracks. Not what this pop-starved young adult had in mind.
The summer of 1968 was a big moment for me and my comic books (as detailed as part of my de facto '60s autobiography Singers, Superheroes, And Songs On The Radio). We mentioned Avengers King-Size Special # 2 in passing above, and the 80-Page Superman # 207 was right up there among my most cherished and re-read funnybooks in '68. I'm not ashamed to admit that the tale of Superman's super-counterpart Hyper-Man made me cry. Sniff. Excuse me for a sec, willya...?
My disappointment with The Motown Story meant I was still in the market for a decent Motown comp, and the 2-LP 25 # 1 Hits From 25 Years filled the bill immediately. I already had a Four Tops best-of set by then, so I was okay with the omission of my top Tops fave "It's The Same Old Song." And this gave me The Marvelettes' "Please Mr. Postman," Eddie Kendricks' "Keep On Truckin' (Part 1)," and sundry other hits by the Tops 'n' Temps, Supremes, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, and The Jackson Five, all without someone ruining things by chatting over James Jamerson's basslines. There was also Thelma Houston's "Don't Leave Me This Way" (one of the few disco hits I enjoyed), and the then-recent "Give It To Me Baby" by Rick James, which (along with "Super Freak") had caught my ear when James performed on Saturday Night Live. I was willing to put up with The Commodores' two tracks and with Diana Ross and Lionel Richie's "Endless Love" in exchange for the sheer bounty that more than compensated.
The first great comics anthology book, this 1965 hardcover combines Jules Feiffer's wonderfully evocative reminiscences of life as a young comics fan in the '30s and early '40s with a stunning color selection of complete vintage comics stories starring Superman, Batman, The Human Torch, The Flash, The Green Lantern, The Spectre, Hawkman, Wonder Woman, Sub-Mariner, Captain America, Plastic Man, and my first exposure to Will Eisner's The Spirit, plus a teasing single page of the original Captain Marvel. In the early '70s, The Great Comic Book Heroes was still kicking around bookstores as I began delving more deeply into the history of comics, and I received my copy as a present from my sister on my 13th birthday in 1973. Many books and records have been purged from my collection over the years; this one will stay with me forever and always. Thanks again, Denise!
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Our new compilation CD This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4 is now available from Kool Kat Musik! 29 tracks of irresistible rockin' pop, starring Pop Co-Op, Ray Paul, Circe Link & Christian Nesmith, Vegas With Randolph Featuring Lannie Flowers, The Slapbacks, P. Hux, Irene Peña, Michael Oliver & the Sacred Band Featuring Dave Merritt, The Rubinoos, Stepford Knives, The Grip Weeds, Popdudes, Ronnie Dark, The Flashcubes,Chris von Sneidern, The Bottle Kids, 1.4.5., The Smithereens, Paul Collins' Beat, The Hit Squad, The Rulers, The Legal Matters, Maura & the Bright Lights, Lisa Mychols, and Mr. Encrypto & the Cyphers. You gotta have it, so order it here.
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