My earliest memories of having toys was that I gravitated toward two things
One was a toy Penguin called Sammy Sound that had different sound effects on it like a clicking wing, a squeaking nose and a tom tom tummy
There was a record that went along with it and you were supposed to play the appropriate body part
I played that thing over and over until I had it memorized
Sammy broke and ended up in the trash
My other toy was a set of bongos which I called “Babalus” because I saw Ricky Ricardo sing “Babalu” on TV
Those soon ended in the trash after I broke the heads
https://youtu.be/Baip6gZR4PU

My next memory was visiting my relatives in Georgia and being at someone’s house who had a country band rehearsing there
I can remember heading straight for the drums and they let me hit them with a stick

Next came a plastic guitar that looked like a single cutaway hollowbody Gibson that I spray painted and later destroyed
At the same time, I got a toy drum set
I must have been 1975 or 76
It was made of plastic with plastic heads, had 3 toms, a cymbal, a bass drum with pedal but no snare
Other kid’s drumsets had heads made of paper and those were soon broken
I guess my plastic heads lasted a little longer and it would start to help me shape my ideas a few years down the line
But more of that later…

A very important date is Friday Oct 29th 1976
The scuttlebutt on the playground is that KISS was going to be on The Paul Lynde Halloween Special
I knew who KISS was because “Rock N Roll All Night” was on my first record (that wasn’t made for kids) K-Tel”s “Hit Machine”

That show blew me away because they were dangerous to 8 year old Robert
Being from Texas, my friends’ parents all said KISS was Satanic, smoked marijuana on stage and… get this… released baby chicks on stage and stomped on them
Seeing KISS on TV was a shock to me because I had only seen their headshot picture before, and I couldn’t tell if one or two of them were women
They didn’t look like anything I had ever seen before
They looked like monsters or aliens or superheroes but they sure didn’t look like the other rock musicians I had seen on Tv
I had musical inclinations before but I knew that I wanted to be a musician from that moment on
https://youtu.be/9iPe6hhVPHY

After seeing the performances, I was immediately compelled to spend my allowance on a KISS album
My Mom took me to the Sears at Richardson Square Mall and I bought “Destroyer” because it had the best album cover and it was also new and on display
I listened to that album and looked at the artwork and remember still wondering if Ace or Gene were women (come on, I was 8 years old in 1976)
Luckily Peter Criss was a straight forward drummer who wasn’t too fancy
I think if my first band had been Rush, I wouldn’t have picked up on the drums so early
Just like every kid picks up a broom or toy guitar and acts like their favorite rock star, I used to pretend I was Peter Criss on my toy drumset

Meanwhile I was borrowing my sister’s albums and developing a more broadened palate
I got Queen’s “A Night at the Opera” for Xmas one year and it broadened my musical scope from the limited KISS sound
My pretending to play KISS songs on my plastic drum set evolved to my first concept of a multi-media setup
I set up my sister’s air organ on my right and a tape recorder with lots of silver buttons on the left which I pretended were electronic instruments
I pretended to multi-task a lot with Queen albums and it planted a seed that would sprout decades later
It seemed like I could envision myself playing any instrument and I didn’t have anyone to tell me I was stupid for thinking that
That would happen way later

My obsession with KISS would grow as I collected more albums, magazines and posters
Peter Criss’ drumset got bigger and bigger each year and I started fantasizing about having my own giant drumset
I figured out that you could draw a bass drum with a quarter as a circle and then use it again to provide depth and started drawing big drumsets on everything I could
My drawings got more elaborate as I went on and my drum drawings became fantastical sculputres of technology I didn’t fully understand with multiple bass drums, endless toms and a forest of cymbals
Peter Criss had a few cymbals stacked upside down on other cymbals and I thought they were hi-hats, so I would draw what I thought was a 10 year old kid’s conception of a cable hi-hat hoisted way above the drumset on a boom stand

By now, I had totally destroyed the plastic set which went the way of all my other toys and smashed the plastic guitar
My parents decided it was time I needed something that was more than a toy

Next episode
REAL Drums