Growing up a middle-class white kid in Los Angeles, I idolized Michael Jackson. Age four was precisely when I knew I wanted to do something in music. Thriller was blaring from my "ghetto blaster" and I became inspired. So inspired that I marched right into the bathroom and decided I was going to BE the gloved one himself. I wanted to look like him, talk like him, and of course do the moonwalk like him. After locating my mother's haircutting scissors, I went to work on my beautiful blond bowl cut in hopes of attaining the wet glowing curl that my idol Michael had so gracefully attained. I remember how he had that little strand of hair that hung over his forehead and curled to the side as well. While butchering my perfectly groomed hair into a disastrous mess, I remembered to leave that little strand of hair in the front for that final curl. Later I proceeded to find my mother's curling iron and go to work on my new haircut. While in the process of curling that final surviving clump of hair, I seriously burned my forehead with the curling iron, sending loud prepubescent shrieks through the house. Moments later, my parents came in screaming and I ended up grounded from the medicine cabinet for a year. But nonetheless, the music that inspired me to do something as moronic as that also drove me to become the passionate writer I am today.
I think of myself as the most determined person of my kind. I'm a 19-year-old college student who has been holding writing jobs with companies like MTV and E! Online since I was 17. When everyone in high school was partying and flunking out, I was interning at a local radio station and eventually becoming a disc jockey at the ripe old age of 17. I am determined to become one of the best writers in the field of music. ~ Rob Goldstein
Rob Goldstein's Desert Island List (In no particular order)
Bob Dylan - Blonde on Blonde
David Bowie - Young Americans
The Beatles - White Album
Led Zeppelin - Houses of the Holy
Barenaked Ladies - Gordon
Police - Live!
Bob Marley - Legend
Mick Jagger - Wandering Spirit
Van Morrison - Moondance
Wyclef Jean - The Carnival
Frank Zappa - Joe's Garage
Various Artists - Beautiful Girls Soundtrack
Run-D.M.C. - Raising Hell
Peter Wolf - Fools Parade
Mötley Crüe - Greatest Hits
Elvis Costello - My Aim Is True
Frank Sinatra - The Very Good Years
10,000 Maniacs - Unplugged
R.E.M. - Automatic for the People
Offspring - Smash
Beach Boys - Pet Sounds
Dean Martin - The Collector's Series
Dave Matthews Band - Live at Red Rocks 8-15-95
Rolling Stones - Some Girls
Grateful Dead - American Beauty