Their love for the Beatles quickly imprinted itself on me, and like millions of others I was fascinated by them at an early age. In fact, both of my parents were huge Beatles fans, and if music was playing (and it usually was), odds are it was the Beatles. My dad had a collection of albums that he added to periodically, including Three Dog Night, The Doobie Brothers, Eagles, lots of Santana, Bread, Bob Seger, Paul McCartney & Wings ( Band on the Run was a huge favorite) and, of course, the Beatles (and most of these albums, scratched as they may be, are now sitting on a shelf here in my music room).

“Play the Beatles!! Play the Eagles!!” My mom had a box of 45s from the ‘60s, everything from R&B to guitar pop, that I practically memorized. It was about 1976 by the time I was old enough to really play the records myself although, of course before that I happily listened to what my parents were playing, often at my prompting. My mom was a big music fan as well, so I had a small but nice library of music to choose from, and sometimes live music as dad’s band rehearsed, or dad would practice his guitar. My dad was coal miner for 37 years - we lived in rural West Virginia - but on the side he was a guitarist and singer in a rock band. When I was a kid, I was far more likely to be camped out in front of my dad’s record player than outside scooping around in the dirt with my toy trucks.

Tell me why you cry beatles