Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Goth Challenge, Day 13

Day 13 – What was your first band t-shirt?

I got this Cure shirt in, I think, 1987. I was about 14.


My mom took me out of school for a special day together. We went to downtown Pittsburgh, had lunch, and did some shopping. I remember asking her to take me to Eide's Entertainment store. I remember being excited to find this shirt in a size small enough to fit me without looking like a tent as this was well before the advent of the Girly-Tee.

I also remember the first time I wore it because I was disappointed that no one else that I knew at the time was excited about the Cure. In fact, I had several people actually ask me who the Cure was.

Looking back, I'm not really surprised. After all, this was the Pittsburgh area in the mid-80s. Pittsburgh was, and still is, stuck on "classic rock." In fact their current "alternative" radio station seems stuck in thee early 90s - they have a heavy rotation of Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and Stone Temple Pilots... But back then, if it wasn't 80s hair metal, Zeppelin or Floyd, or top 40 crap, 99% of people in my high school didn't know it. In the next couple years, they did know the Cure and Depeche Mode, as each band had radio hits then. The Cure had Pictures of You and Depeche Mode had Personal Jesus and Enjoy the Silence.

But this shirt became symbolic to me of realizing that I existed somewhere on the fringes - outside the norm.

1 comment:

  1. When I was around 6 or 7 years old, I went to my first school disco in my older brother's Adam Ant t-shirt (as he had decided to become a mod!) It was too big so I wore it as a dress with a silver belt around my middle and to be honest, I'm not sure I knew who Adam was at the time...super cool me then :)

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