I’ve been tagged by my friend Tom, a perfect way to brighten up a day of dreadful boredom and anxiety. The tag is 5 days old but I just found it – I’ve been paying less and less attention to the blog world lately, trying (and failing) not to waste my time.

Digging up early music-related memories… here we go: what were the first 5 pirated audio CD’s you owned?

Foreign readers of this blog should know that pirated CD’s and cassettes were the main source of  for the young music enthusiasts in the 90’s. They were replaced by Russian mp3 CD’s in the early 00’s, before the arrival of broadband internet. The thing with me is, I used to borrow audio CD’s and have my dad make copies for me, that’s how I first got most Metallica and Megadeth albums. I’ve never been fond of paying for pirated music – the only stuff I bought were, I think:

  • Sepultura – Against. On cassette, in 99. As my Metallica phase was coming to an end, I was looking for some new bands, and heard about Sepultura being similar to Metallica, so I got this to play in my walkman. Wasn’t blown away by it, but I grew to like it and I still like it more than anything Sepultura did since Chaos AD.
  • Iron Maiden – Brave New World. Got it a couple of days after it came out, in May 2000. I was already a big Maiden fan back then, and BNW was the first album I’d ever waited for to be released. The album’s sound put me off a bit at first, but I loved the music – I remember having ‘Dream of Mirrors’ as my favourite song.
  • Bruce Dickinson – The Best Of. Got it on the same day as BNW. An ‘unofficial’ best-of collection, it features a good selection of Bruce’s songs and turned me into a Bruce fan :D

That’s about it I think… One purchase that I’m proud of was a pirated Live After Death on VHS I got. I already had Piece of Mind and Number of the Beast and loved them, but LAD is what turned me into a Maiden fan. What were the first 5 original CD’s you owned? Here we go, not mentioning my precious Metallica cassettes:

  • Metallica – Master of Puppets. I found it at a cheap price and bought it at once. I remember a friend giving me an odd look for having bought an album I already had :P
  • Dream Theater – Scenes from a Memory. I had some spare cash in the summer of 2000 and bought this on a whim – incredibly lucky purchase :D I devoured this album, loved everything about it (even LaBrie’s voice :) ).
  • Iron Maiden – Rock in Rio. My guitar teacher went to Hungary, I had him buy it for me. Great packaging.
  • Iron Maiden – Wildest Dreams. 2003, I couldn’t wait for the new Maiden album. I asked my friend Leti to get it for me from abroad; she could only find the newest single so I settled with that.
  • Iron Maiden – Dance of Death. Finally my aunt bought it for me, in Italy :)

Pretty one-sided :) I’ve since stopped buying everything Maiden put out. 5 people who completed your musical preferences in such a way that’d make you ashamed to say “fuck off, man, I think we have different tastes!”

  • My friend Andrei, we discovered Metallica and Maiden together back in 8th grade. We also learned to play guitar together and recorded an epic covers album. Alas, he now listens to shit music.
  • My dad, who brought the first mp3s into the household. Introduced me to the trinity of Zep, Purple and Floyd. Also told me of Sabbath, but I had to track those albums down myself. My mom preferred Pink Floyd, but me&my dad would rather rock out to ‘Immigrant Song’ \m/
  • My friend and bandmate Dani, with whom I explored the guilty-pleasure-trio of Iced Earth, Manowar and ..ugh.. Nightwish.
  • 2 chicks I sometimes hang out with :P Ade for OCS, Luna Amara, Muse and Radiohead, and Diana for countless stuff, from the Bruce Dickinson discography <3, all the way to 10 post rock bands a day nowadays :D
  • Mikael Akerfeldt and opethforum. After getting into Opeth, I read interviews with Mikael and found out about his prog rock influences. Opeth was a band that got many people into extreme metal and 70s progressive rock, and I found out about millions of bands from Mikael and the folks on the Opeth forum (which evolved into ) – they’re largely responsible for getting me where I am now.