My music addiction began with Toto - IV. I was stuck on the tune "Africa" and my Mom was kind enough to buy the album for me.

I remember the record store well, its wood bins filled with 12" vinyl and promo flats everywhere. The memory as vivid as sifting through CD long boxes to spend my lunch money at Sam Goody as a teenager.

Little Rock, Arkansas is a tornado magnet and 1982 was a record-breaking year with 78 storms. Mom and I got caught on the fringe of what had to be one of the worst of these tornados on the way home from the record store. Before I even had a chance to tear the wrapper off of to the Toto 12", it became my protection from this storm. As golf ball sized hail battered Mom's Buick Regal, with T-tops, I sat in the passenger seat with the album firmly planted over my head.

Thankfully, I survived the tornados that year to listen to the Toto album countless times. IV is among the best albums of its genre and the album sounds as great now as it did then.

Although I long since upgraded to a compact disc copy of Toto - IV, I still have that old vinyl copy. As for the Buick; It was stolen a short time after Mom and I moved to New York. It was identified after being torched and burned somewhere in the Bronx.