I’ve finally knocked something off my “to-do” list that I have been putting off and putting off. And it’s one of the most simple and easy things that can be done… Thanking people for adding me as a MySpace friend.
I’ve gotten busy and when I get that way… I get lazy. That’s why I have to put it on my “to-do” list.
And speaking of MySpace… Check out my new number one friend of the week!
It’s Danny Fonorow!
Here’s the story with Danny…
I used to work at a huge record store in Greensboro… Peaches Music & Video on High Point Road. I would see hundreds, if not thousands of people every week. It was a great workplace for pretentious geek-fans of any kind of music. I was the resident hard rocker with the discerning ear… My passionate dislikes included Poison, Trixter, Bon Jovi, and Britney Fox. And I was fully embracing the alternative rock. It was burying the pretty boys with hairstyles so good that many women took in photos of hard rockers to show their stylist exactly what they wanted. Now, of course, I miss the hard rock of the 80’s along with their over-the-top kind of concerts.
I also found an appreciation for country music while working there… And I’m still fairly snobbish about that… I like GOOD country music. Not the drivel that fills the airwaves… Real heartfelt music that wasn’t part of the Nashville assembly line. Folks like Dwight Yoakam, Marty Brown, and Steve Earle.
I had a few customers that trusted my opinions. We would chat over time and get to know each other. It was basically a swapping of opinions meant to turn us on to different things.
I think the first time that I met Danny… He was like 10 years old. We hit it off right away. He was a diehard KISS fan since he was 4 years old. That warmed my dark little heart.
Danny would come in about every 2 weeks to purchase 2 cassette tapes. And in most cases, he would choose one of my suggestions. We would talk and talk about music while his parents patiently let him do his thing. I liked the guy and I didn’t treat him like a kid. His love for music and thirst for musical knowledge was greater than mine. I always looked forward to seeing him and I even made him a mix tape once.
Well, I left Peaches in the early 90’s and I lost touch with Danny. I always wondered what happened to him over the years, but I never imagined what I would discover one day.
I was doing a college radio show on WQFS (Guilford College Radio and my musical choice of the day is a tape of one of my shows) and there was this band’s CD in the rotation… They were Stickboy from Greensboro. It looked like it was right up my alley and so I listened to the first few cuts. IT WAS AWESOME!
I would play Stickboy songs every week. I went out and purchased the CD for myself. I even tried to see them play a couple of times, but my ex-fiancée refused to go. When I said that I’d go on my own… You would have thought that I was saying something like “Gonna go see Stickboy… Score some chicks… And bring you back a venereal disease just for kicks” to her.
So to keep the peace, I didn’t go to any of their shows.
All the jocks got an invite to a Grand Opening of a downtown recording studio. I was one of the few to take advantage of free beer and food. And when I was walking in… I noticed this guy that seemed real familiar. I searched my mind for any clue as to where I knew the guy, but nothing was coming.
Later that night… The guy was standing in the same conversation circle that I was in. Apparently he couldn’t take it anymore and asked, “Is your name Eugene?”
“Yeah,” I said. “And I know you from somewhere too… Is your name Kevin?”
I still don’t know where that name came from… But you know the rest… Yes. It was Danny!
We got to chatting and catching up when something came out that blew my fracking mind… He was the singer and one of the guitarists in Stickboy! My new favorite band!
How is that for weird?
And it seemed that I was responsible for a lot of the influences that contributed to the music he wrote and performed. So there’s no question as to why I loved Stickboy!
A short time later, Stickboy’s ‘Sings My Songs’ CD was the album that helped me deal with my ex-fiancée’s backstabbing maneuvers. ‘Sings My Songs’ is one of those great breakup albums. I found it very therapeutic.
Danny and I once again found each other. So drop on by and check out his MySpace page.
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