I grew up in a very religious family.We had no TV or radio when I was a kid, but my Dad loved music and we would sit around listening to Johhny Cash and Hank Williams while others were watching TV.
When I was about 9 years old (68/69) the family joined a noisy, happy clappy Pentecostal church, which had electric guitars, drums and a Hammond organ.
I found all this very exciting and started nagging my parents for a guitar. They were piss poor and couldn't afford one, so an uncle gave me his old guitar for Christmas 1969. My Dad got a guy from the church to teach me how to tune it, and three chords, D G and A.
This was my one and only music lesson.
I then started trying to play along with Dads music tapes and after about a year, proudly played my rendition of Walk the line, by Johnny Cash.
Once I got to the teenage years, I gave up on the church thing, and started watching TOTP on our newly acquired TV, so then started trying to copy people like Marc Bolan and Slade.
Not long after a friend of my older sister ( who I later got friendly with) by the name of George Lowden** loaned her a pile of albums.
My sister was more interested in walking around with some of them under her arm, than actually listening to them, but when she wasn't around I was listening to them constantly.
There was BB King, Fletwood Mac, Claptons first solo album, and most importantly, Disreali Gears by cream. I fell in love with this music called The Blues, although I didn't even know it was called that at the time, but it touched something deep inside in a way I never knew was possible.
I knew these sounds I heard were being made by a guitar, but I couldn't imagine how a guitar could be made to sound like that.
I had to try and find out though, so I talked the parents into buying me an electric guitar and amplifier, if I got a paper round to pay the HP payments.The guitar was nothing special (Watkins Rapier 44) but had a better neck than any Fender or Gibson Ive played since. The amplifier was a Vox AC30, which I later learned was used by the Beatles, Hank Marvin, and my soon to be hero, hero Rory Gallagher.
When the parents weren't at home, the volume control was always at maximum - in 3bed council house ?
No wonder the neighbours hated me, and my hearing is shot.
Around this time I went to my first proper gig. Some bloke called Rory Gallagher at the Ulster hall in Belfast. I found it strange that there were several TV cameras or similar there and a lot of recording equipment, but it turned out that a film and album was being recorded called Irish Tour 74. I saw him another 6 or 7 times in the next few years and they were the best gigs Ive ever been to.
Anyway, this experience was mind blowing to me at 14 and I became completely obsessed with listening to and playing blues and rock music.
I had no interest in school or career plans. I was going to play guitar - end of.
I was very taken with Gallaghers old battered sunburst Stratocaster, and eventually got my self a lovely sunburst version and improved my skills further, even playing lead guitar in a couple of little bands that quickly fell apart.
Then just as my teens were coming to an end, I had some kind of inexplicable brainstorm. Had my (very long) hair cut, sold my guitar for next to nothing, dumped my girlfriend of 3 years and moved to England, where I had almost no interest in anything but cars and motorbikes, and soon after marriage, kids, normal job and domesticity.
A visit to Belfast and some old friends about 10 years ago kicked off a minor mid life crisis. Someone put a guitar in my hands (after a few beers) and I started playing again. I was embarrassed to hear afterwards that this mate had told everyone, before I arrived that I was an awesome guitarist who could have played in any band in the world, if I hadn't given it up.
Anyway, I now listen to and occasionally even play music again, and regret all the years I didn't.
John Miles puts it better than I could.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAsvjVx-Mg4**George Lowden was always banging on about how he wanted to make guitars for a living, which I thought pretty bizarre.
Not long after I got to know him he packed in his job as a sales rep and announced he was to become a guitar maker, even though he didn't really know where to start.
He persevered though and it worked out pretty well for him. His cheapest model is now around £3000 !
He was always a big Clapton fan, and I had to smile when I heard that Clapton had used one of his guitars on a couple of acoustic tracks on one of his albums about 10 years ago.
http://www.lowdenguitars.com/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lnu50cXnXiMWell, theres 10 minutes of your life you will never get back.