The Fab 40: Chronicling my lifelong obsession with music

It's less than two months from my 40th birthday. Like a lot of people who've reached this age, I'm not too psyched about the idea of reaching this particular milestone. Don't get me wrong...I'm not freaking out. In fact, I think I've actually come to terms with this. It's just that, I'd rather be turning 30. Regardless, I've decided that, instead of dreading the occasion, I'm going to celebrate it. To that end, I've been thinking recently about what artists have meant the most to me during my lifetime of listening to music...and, to honor my upcoming birthday, I'm going to narrow the list down to 40.

I'm calling this list the Fab 40, and, of course, The Beatles made the cut. I'll give that one away right off the bat. First, let's get a couple things straight. This is not a list of the best bands of my lifetime, nor are these my current favorites. There's no critical element to this, so unless you were there with me, there's no second guessing allowed. This is purely opinion, and the only opinion that matters is my own. No matter how bad my taste was when I was a kid, this is the list. In a way, this will represent my 40 favorite bands and artists during the course of my days on this earth. But, the most important thing to remember is that 8-year old Dan gets the same vote as 39-year old Dan.

Oh, and the list is going to be chronological, so you'll be hearing from 8-year old Dan (more commonly known back then as Danny) first.

Before I begin with the list, let me make one clarification. It may be a little misleading to say that 8-year old Dan has an equal vote to 39-year old Dan. This might seem to imply that my selections are equally spread across the range of my years, which is not exactly true. For the first half of my time as a music listener (1975-1991), I've selected 15 artists, with 25 artists comprising the second half. I still contend that this distribution makes sense, as I listen to a hell of a lot more music now than I did back then. In fact, I probably listened to nothing but the first band on the list for at least a year after I was introduced to them. In 2006 alone, I listened to 400 new releases. Despite this, there is also a bias against music that I've discovered in the past few years, simply because it hasn't had the time to develop a certain sense of nostalgia. The end result is that the period of 1994-1997 may seem a bit over-represented, as this was the time that I was turned on to many of the bands that would shape my taste for years to come. Alright, now on to the list...