Fights With My Father, Part 1 - Thrash Metal

It was tough being the son of a junior high school teacher, especially when I was in junior high.  I was fortunate not to go to the same junior high that my dad taught at, but it was still brutal.  My dad is a judgmental asshole.  He judges everyone, and not based off of anything other than appearance.  I remember my dad telling me about this "troublemaker" he had in class.  I asked him what the kid did that made him a troublemaker.  He then went on to physically describe the boy:  His hair was long, he always wore these AC/DC shirts, and his jeans had holes in them.  I waited for him to tell me what this "troublemaker" did, but was only left with a physical description.  I was probably seven or eight at the time, and I took my dad's word that he had a "troublemaker" in one of his classes.



1981 - Wearing my dad's Ken Stabler Jersey.  This jersey now

resides in my closet.

Years later, I discovered a new music genre:  Thrash Metal.  The thrash scene had already exploded in the Bay Area a couple of years before, but by the time I was in seventh grade, it was beginning to gain nationwide popularity.  And we were right down the street from where it all started (across the bay, actually, except for the Omni, which was right down the street).  Several of my friends had older brothers who would go across the bay into San Francisco to the Fillmore, the Stone, or they would head into Berkeley and hit up Ruthie's Inn or the Keystone.  Us younger boys would sit and listen to their stories and wish we were old enough to go.  The stories were great, but in 1987, as I was entering junior high school, I was at my friend, Marc's house and we discovered his brother's room was unlocked.  We ventured in and found his album collection.  The first one we listened to was the newest one of the set.  It was still in its cellophane.  The cover had a bunch of long-haired guys leaning over a bar, and there were skulls in front of each guy.  The album was Pleasures of the Flesh by Exodus.  Marc tore open the cellophane (this act later earned him a black eye), and we played the record.  The first thing we heard was this lunatic's voice talking about salad and guns, and then the music kicked in.  Marc seemed used to the music, but it was completely different from anything I had ever heard.  The only music I had ever really heard at that point was what my parents would play, which usually involved the Beach Boys, the Moody Blues, or the Beatles.  The sheer energy of the music was intense, and I remember at first I hated it.  It was fast, it was loud, and my ears didn't want to handle what they were hearing, but by the second song, Til Death Do Us Part, I was getting into it. 

We listened for hours to the records we found; Ride the Lightning, Bonded By Blood, Master of Puppets, Reign in Blood, and Peace Sells... but Who's Buying.  We were captivated.  When Eric, Marc's older brother returned, we were immediately kicked out of the room, but we had the bug.  We needed more.  I had a tape player in my room, so the next weekend Marc and I rode our bicycles to a local Sam Goody record store, and I bought the cassette tape of Metallica's Ride the Lightning.  We weren't three feet in the door of my room, when I had the cellophane off and the tape in the player.  We got through Fight Fire With Fire, and about halfway through the title track my dad barged into the room.  He demanded to know what we were listening to.  When I showed him the cassette case, he got really angry, and drove me to the Sam Goody.  He told the clerk at the counter that I wanted to return the tape.  The clerk explained that since the tape had been opened, he couldn't give a full refund.  He allowed my dad to exchange the tape for one of the used tapes in the store.  My dad exchanged Metallica Ride the Lightning for U2 The Joshua Tree.  On the way home he explained that only the "troublemakers" in his class wore Metallica t-shirts, and that the good kids listened to U2.  I tried arguing, but he wasn't listening.  His mind was set.  This was the first moment I truly realized how brainwashed I'd been by my dad.  I decided from then on, I would never take anyone's word again.  I would need to find out the truth by myself, because if a boy can't trust his father, who can he trust?

My new found love, Thrash Metal, was deemed the enemy by my father, so I did what all good children do...  I went back to Sam Goody, bought Metallica's entire collection, brought all three tapes to Marc's house, made copies of the tapes, mislabeled the copies as U2, Pink Floyd, and Three Dog Night, and went home with them.  I asked my dad if I could have a Walkman to listen to my new U2 album.  Seeing that I was inspired by his decision for my taste in music, he agreed.  After I received my new Walkman, I was never without it.  I didn't listen to Thrash Music out loud (at home anyway) for several years, but man, did I listen to Thrash Metal on that Walkman.  The best part was my dad thought I was listening to U2, Pink Floyd, and Three Dog Night.  I'd be sitting on the couch, reading an Isaac Asimov novel, listening to Jump in the Fire, and my dad would just smile.

My collection began to grow as 1988 turned into 1989, and by 1990 I had over thirty albums disguised as other records.  1990 also marked my sophomore year in high school; the year where kids start to turn into adults.  Most sophomores turn sixteen, which allows them to drive, which gives them freedom never before experienced.  1990 also marked the year my family moved from Oakland down to Los Angeles.  I was furious because I was just getting to the age where I might actually get to go to some of the shows at the clubs I'd heard so much about.  I was happier to be closer to my Raiders, who moved away from my home town when I was eight, but I always associated Los Angeles with the poser crowd who listened to Poison, Ratt, WASP, and Winger.  I wanted no part of that Los Angeles.  We moved into a house in North Hollywood, and I was enrolled in the local high school. 

On my first day of high school in LA, I immediately saw a divide in the crowd of students.  There were the typical cliques you see everywhere; the jocks, the stoners, the geeks, and the prima donnas, but I noticed one group was entirely different in LA, than in Oakland; the metalheads.  In Oakland, all the metalheads wore denim and leather, had long hair, and tended to take up a lot of space.  In LA, there were three groups of metalheads.  The largest of the three groups was the Sunset Strip Posers (as I would later refer to them).  They used more hairspray than the girls in the prima donna clique.  They also wore makeup and these loose, button down shirts that they would roll the sleeves up.  The second largest group was a bunch of skinheads.  They weren't really metalheads, but they loved the hardcore punk scene, which I understood, because I had recently been introduced to Crossover Thrash.  The smallest of the metalhead groups was the Thrashers, which included some of the old school metal lovers (The guys who still worshiped Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath).  I wanted to be a part of the Thrashers, but again my dad's criminal profiling mentality was prohibiting me from that.

My dad believed (and still believes) that boys with long hair are "troublemakers," so I always kept my hair cut short.  When I got to Los Angeles, I decided I was going to be who I was.  I got my haircut the first week of August, and decided I wasn't going to cut it again.  The months went by and my hair really started to look long around mid October, and that was when my dad told me to get a haircut.  I told him I would, but just ignored his command.  For the next six weeks he continued to ride me about my hair, telling me I looked like a "troublemaker."  I decided it was time to make a stand.  I took the bus to Tower Records on Sunset Boulevard.  I bought a Megadeth, Rust in Peace t-shirt and put it on.  I rode the bus back home and walked into the house.  My dad was so angry, I think I actually saw steam coming out of his collar.  He screamed, "What the hell do you think you're doing?  You know what you look like?"

I replied, "Probably a troublemaker."

"You're goddamn right!  Take that off now, and get in the car!  You're getting a haircut!" he yelled.

I walked to my room, turned to him and said, "No.  This is who I am.  Deal with it!"

I slammed the door and locked it behind me.  My dad pounded on the door demanding I open it.  I could hear my mother trying to calm my dad down as I put my headphones on and started listening to my new copy of Rust in Peace, which I had also bought at Tower Records.  I could still hear him pounding on the door for a couple of minutes, but then it went away, and I slipped into my own little world of Megadeth's newest album.  After listening to the entire album and finishing a couple of chapters of The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, I took the headphones off and just laid in my bed listening for what was happening outside my room.  After a little bit, my mother knocked on my door and asked if she could come in.  I asked where Dad was, and she assured me that he wouldn't come into my room.  I walked over and opened the door.  My mother and I sat and had a little conversation.  I told her that Dad was wrong labeling people just because of the way they look.  I explained that Dad was being a hypocrite for hating racists because of their close-minded attitude, but then he would turn around and call someone a criminal for having long hair and a band t-shirt.  My mother told me I didn't have to cut my hair, and that she loved me for who I was, and not for what I looked like.  She told me my dad did too, he was just a little upset at the moment.

Eventually I came out of my room that night, but if memory serves me correctly, it wasn't until a couple of weeks later that my dad spoke to me.  The next time he talked to me was when he came home one Sunday and found me watching the Raiders game in the living room.  My hair was still long, but I was wearing my Ken Stabler jersey.  We watched the game together, and I think that was what ended that fight.