Category: 10 Records

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8 Records.

(If you’re not familiar with my newly-found record collecting habits, you might want to read this entry first.)

The thing about Grace Records is you’d never imagine it being a decent store — if you’re judging record stores based solely on location. It sits in between a Hot Topic or a Box Lunch or a Sephora or a Victoria’s Secret…which is kinda by a Macy’s and just a few blocks from a Dick’s Sporting Goods which is right down the street from Joanne’s…or a Target.

In other words, smack dab in the middle of Suburbia, USA — which is where I now call home.

But the buyers at Grace do a good job — and not only with RSD and new releases. Recent finds include a second pressing of Harry Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music (all three volumes with the ephemera laid in all three boxes!), some great Blue Notes, as well as the 7th and 8th records in my now-resuscitated-but-limited-to-10 record collection: Diet Cig’s Do You Wonder About Me? (in the limited-edition “baby pink” pressing) and Martin Frawley’s Undone at 31 (pressed in blue-marbled vinyl).

Not that it takes a record buying genius with Diet Cig and Frawley. I found them in the price-reduced bin, and since I had never heard of either act, I gave both records a shot. Besides, I liked the album art.

But you know the old saying — never judge a book by its cover. Which isn’t to say either record was bad; in fact, one of the two is going to make a nifty present under the tree for my 17-year-old niece.

Which will bring me back to 7 records.

 

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6 Records.

I wrote about selling my record collection recently. And in that post, I went over the new parameters I’ve set up for myself moving forward. Maybe parameters isn’t the best word?

Limitations.

Here’s the brief preview if you don’t feel like going back to that entry: “What if I kept 10 records at a time? No more. Just less. And once I get to 10, in order to buy a new record or two, I’d have to bring a record or two in to trade? With the five I have, I got room for five more!

Enter “Blues That Kills” by “Wild” Billy Childish and The Chatham Singers, now standing as the 6th acquisition in my newly-revived record collection. (Check out the hand-printed woodcut cover by Billy (printed on brown Kraft card stock) with hand-stamped titles on the back of the sleeve and on the white label in an edition of 300 numbered copies. I ended up with #149.)

I actually ordered this record from The L-13 crew before I sold my collection, but I had it sent to my place in Arizona. There it sat on a stack of unread mail until just recently. What a nice surprise. Billy’s been a friend of synaethesia since The Strangest One of All which was printed and published back in my San Francisco grad school days. Billy’s association came via Johnny Brewton at X-Ray Book & Novelty Co. Thanks again Johnny!

I got to meet Billy once. His band The Buff Medways played Bimbo’s 365. I’m pretty sure it was 1998. It also could have been 1999, and it could have been when he was playing with his band Thee Headcoats. So to confirm I just texted Johnny to ask and he says it was Thee Headcoats — so there ya go.

And here we are. Six records — with room for four more.

 

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10 Records.

I just sold my record collection.

This was a big deal for me. I started buying records in the spring of 1975, when I was in 5th grade. Maybe the fall of ’74. I don’t remember exactly.

I do remember the very first record I bought with my own money — Jim Croce’s Greatest Hits. I don’t remember the records that came next. I do remember, in the 7th grade, asking my mom for permission to buy Kiss Alive! from Smitty’s Big Town on Shea and Tatum.

“No. No Kiss. You won’t like acid rock,” she said. So, instead of Kiss, I bought Jeff Beck’s Wired and hated it so much I stuck it into the toaster after a listen. The next time my parents took me to Smitty’s, I headed back to the record department.

“I’d like to return this.”

“What for,” the dude running the record department said.

I handed him the record. “Look, it’s warped.”

He inspected it carefully, then inspected me, then inspected the record again; then he said, “this looks like you did it.”

I swore that’s the way I got it, and he relented, adding, “Store credit only. No cash back!”

I wish I could tell you I walked out of there with Kiss Alive!, but it was a double record, which meant it was a couple bucks more — and I didn’t have any money. And I wish I could tell you I grabbed something really cool, but that would be a lie, too.

Billy Joel. The Stranger. Why’s he sitting on the bed, staring at the mask on the pillow, barefoot in a suit? What’s up with the boxing gloves hanging on the wall?

A few years later, in the fall of 1980, a kid I played football with called Pat Crane lent me London Calling!, Singles Going Steady,  and an 10″ EP (on green vinyl!) called Klark Kent. Pat’s records changed the way I listened to music. Before that, it was metal bands and whatever was on heavy rotation on KDKB. I’d buy records with the money I made working for my dad. He built houses then. I’d ask for records as gifts, too.

In the late-80’s, everyone started selling their records (or giving them away!) and replacing them with CD’s. By this time, I was friends with Ben Wood and Mike Pawlicki and Clayton Agent. They worked at Zia. I sold some of my records to Ben and Clayton when left Zia to open their own store  in ’87.  (I just wanted to help out Ben a little starting out — although he didn’t take many of mine.) Mike joined the crew almost immediately, and Eastside Records became my go-to. By 2000, records were really cheap and I was buying a lot. But that didn’t last too much longer.

I moved to Los Angeles in 2009. I kept buying, even though records weren’t cheap anymore. Then, seemingly overnight, they got expensive. Really expensive. There were a few more years where you could still score some at a flea market, but those days are pretty much gone, too.

My mom had a stroke. Elder care begins now. There’s no room at her place for 30 boxes of records; and honestly, I’ve been over them for a while. I think what I’m gonna miss most is The Ritual: picking out the LP from my wall of records; sliding it out of its sleeve; placing it on the turntable; gently pulling the trigger on the anti-static gun and then immediately running the brush along the grooves to pull off any dust; then finally listening while I read the linear notes off the back; or, even better, opening the gatefold to check out whatever was going on in there. And the warmth analogue brings to a room!

When I sold the collection, I kinda choked up. Not because I don’t have anymore records. They’re just things. It’s more about the chapters life brings us; ending old ones and starting something new.

But wait! I just found a box of my books at mom’s from last year’s VNSA Sale. Oh, I forgot about these!! And at the bottom of the box? Five records! And would you look at them?! Nothing like it.

What if I kept 10 records at a time? No more. Just less. And once I get to 10, in order to buy a new record or two, I’d have to bring a record or two in to trade? With the five I have, I got room for five more! And what if I wrote about what I get — and what I take back? Not to critique the record but more to tell a story? Records have stories. Just like books do. So why give up a beat-up (but numbered!) White Album or a funky Dave Brubeck EP in order to get, say, something by Big Star or Led Zeppelin III or Ascension or a spoken word Bukowski title?! And now that I have it, why would I ever give up that Leadbelly EP?

The possibilities are endless.