Another story concerns the convenience store I worked at during college. The store owner let me play music in the store, and didn't seem to care what I played. I began experimenting by playing all kinds of music, and seeing people's reactions to it in the store. I mean, I played the first Black Sabbath record one morning at 6 AM! Nobody said a word, though. One Friday evening around rush hour, I got the devilish idea to play John Coltrane's "Om". I put it on and the rush hit. People were forced to stand in line and listen to 8 middle aged jazz guys take acid and try to play music! I saw one country type fellow beginning to turn red, he started pacing nervously, and then once his turn to pay came, shouted at me, "I hate your music!" threw his money down and literally ran out the door. Not the nicest thing I ever did, but one evening a guy came in, stopped cold, looked at me with incredulity and exclaimed "Sonny Sharrock!" We've been close friends ever since so I guess my experiments weren't entirely negative.
I had many similar experiences while cashiering in a convenience store that was located in the lobby of Boston University's freshman dorm, in the early 80's. The manager refused to pay for a Muzak license and actually encouraged us to bring in our own music. The expression's on the shoppers faces when we'd play The Art Bears or Captain Beefheart were priceless. A guy in his mid 20's walked in one day, looked up and told me "You can't play Robert Wyatt in a Store 24", but my favorite memory is of an italian girl whose jaw dropped and almost wept upon hearing Area's vocalist Demetrious Stratos. It seems she was feeling terribly homesick, and Area were her brother's favorite band. It was also fun to watch the reactions of the folks who attended the different boston music school's. I left a copy of trout mask at a Berklee piano major's house, and he called me up a day later somewhat pissed that he had listened to all four sides and claimed that he could no longer play the piano or even walk straight. though within a few months he was transcribing Henry Cow charts for class. Rich