A very dear friend of mine who I miss very much used to call me "Sparky". lol Her name is Chloe or "Chloesebela" and she was my online fruitfly. I think she may have been here once (maybe) . I know several people here may know her. Chloe is full of life and a wonderful person.
This post was edited by Jon at January 16, 2020 6:37 PM MST
From there, my interest/fandom grew both forwards and backwards. Some of their early stuff is a bit rough to my ear, and they went off in a strange avant garde direction towards the end of the 1980s. But they had 15 solid years of excellent music.
I can't seem to, at the moment, recall exact songs. I looked up some stuff but nothing in particular struck me as strongly familiar -- though I liked what I heard - - and the cover to "Big Beat" looked familiar to me.
I hope to come back (right now, I'm getting tired again) and listen some more to the Sparks songs here. I'm thinking I first heard them maybe in what you mention as their avant-garde stuff -- I know I've liked everything I've heard. :)
I have personally never met anyone with the name Sparky. I have however always been intrigued and mildly amused by the name ever since I was a wee lad. So much so that I almost chose it as my stage/performing name. I had second thoughts at the last minute though upon realizing that there had already been a performer in my line of work named Sparky O'Toole years before. Hence I went with a different moniker.
For the record though just because I failed to adopt the name Sparky doesn't mean I am any less capable of giving off hot sparks in flagrante. Just sayin'.
Jon 