Sleeve notes

Anyone even vaguely interested in record collecting will know the importance of condition. The Goldmine methodology regards a Very Good condition record as being worth just 25% of one that's Near Mint, and Good condition drops that to 10-15%.

Sleeves are a factor in this. "Someone might have written on it or stamped a price tag on it" it states for Very Good, whereas "a Good to VG– cover has ring wear to the point of distraction, has seam splits obvious on sight and may have even heavier writing".

Writing may on occasion, though, make up for its value-decreasing impact in other ways. It can reveal a bit of that record's history. I note I posted about the writing on the inner sleeve of my copy of Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd back in 2016 but it was brought back into sharp focus following the passing of Peter Tork earlier this week. 

Whoever originally owned my copy of Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd must be particularly sad today. #petertork pic.twitter.com/A5TkedZAxj

— Darryl Wilks (@dgwilks) February 21, 2019

Curiously three other Monkees LPs I own carry the name and address of a past owner (Cheryl Croker of Bridgwater), along with, I suspect, the date they bought them and, in two cases, they also went to the bother of noting who took the lead vocal on each track. 

I have a Kinks album once owned by Annita Bennett and two (by the Rolling Stones and the Yardbirds) from the collection of Sylvie Carpos of St Leonards. Whereas on the one hand I could begrudge Sylvie for not looking after her records particularly well (the Stones LP would fetch around £75 if VG; I'd be lucky to make my pound back on Sylvie's copy), I can appreciate the fact that she clearly enjoyed them. 


One I passed up on (not sure why) featured a critique of some of Aretha Franklin's back catalogue:

Aretha's end of term report. Must try harder. pic.twitter.com/6nOq5cD0i4

— Darryl Wilks (@dgwilks) January 23, 2016

Surprisingly I haven't found any notes or letters; the nearest I've had are the below in a music book. I'll just have to keep on looking.

Like I said... here are a couple of notes I just found inside a book from a charity shop. #haveapintonme pic.twitter.com/g92GL2io4a

— Darryl Wilks (@dgwilks) January 21, 2017

Back to Back to Vinyl

Incredible to see I've gone almost ten months without posting. There are a few reasons for this.

For one, the odds seem far more stacked against any good finds these days. Vinyl has become a 'thing' again and demand is high - even if some people never listen to what they buy. And when The Works start selling a turntable that your records really won't thank you for being played on (as part of their 'Making Music Cool' tie-in with Intempo) it's clear that it's gone beyond the mainstream and into a completely different commercial zone.

There are now three independent record shops in Cambridge, all of which stock second-hand vinyl. So supply is arguably up but two are based near the primary locations of the city's charity shops - could well be that collections that would have been given away are being sold instead. I've also noted before (and I'm not alone in this) that some charity shops are adopting crazy prices for vinyl. In some of the national charity shops vinyl seems to have vanished altogether locally which makes me think it's being sent to a central location to evaluate. CDs on the other hand are turning up in bigger numbers and smaller prices.

But although my gut, and the lack of entries here, says I'm having much less success, a quick look back at some of what I've picked up this year suggests otherwise. Only I've posted them on Twitter instead - it's a quick fix, and at weekends my timeline is awash with impressive finds from other users around the country. And a lot of pictures of No Parlez, but that's another story.

So it's still possible to pick up some genuine bargains with a fair bit of persistence and rather more luck. Here are some of my favourites from 2016.

Prince's death in April drove me to do something that I've never been compelled to do before - I immediately bought a couple of his LPs that I was missing. I was also reminded of the Hindu Love Gods album with its cover of Raspberry Beret - which I picked up a month later during a rare car boot visit (I'm not really a Sunday morning person) for £2.50, part of a four-for-£10 deal along with New Order's Technique, The Beach Boys Love You and a budget Otis Redding compilation.

No, it doesn't have a plum Atlantic label. Misty Mountain Hop is correct on the label. Indeed, it's definitely a relatively late pressing but I think no later than early 80s as there's no barcode (assuming one was placed on copies from the mid-80s onwards).

But I'm absolutely certain that this is the only time I've ever seen a Led Zeppelin LP in a charity shop. And it was very prominent, catching my eye immediately. A mere £1.

This wasn't a sleeve I was familiar with but it looked interesting enough in amongst a pretty uninspiring batch of LPs in a charity shop that very rarely put any out. I'm glad I flipped it over, revealing it to be Anymore For Anymore by Ronnie Lane. I didn't mind running to a whopping £3.99 for this.

It's not always charity shops and car boot sales that throw up decent finds. I had the good fortune to pass a house on my street where the owner had been putting various things outside in advance of moving out - and one Saturday morning there was a batch of records. Curiously they owned 3 copies of Rumours (the sleeve on mine was a bit damaged so I took one) but even more curiously they were discarding a recent re-issue of Big Star's 3rd LP. I can't really mock them for having three copies of Rumours though - my wife went down to have a look at what else they were giving away and brought back the other two copies, so we now have four ...

There are only two charity shops remotely close to where I work. One of them is often piled high with bags of donations they've been unable to sort. They were using what passes as a changing room to store several of these bags, and underneath them was a plastic box full of records. Mostly junk of course. Until I reached a Moody Blues LP, with a gatefold sleeve. So far, so whatever. But there was another LP in the gatefold - and it was only a first pressing (I think) of Pink Floyd's second LP. In rather good nick too. And for £2 I rather did nick it.

I felt almost guilty over this one. It was in the window of a local charity bookshop that rarely has any records so I don't tend to go in. Presumably they'd had a large collection donated and put them out at 50p each or 3 for £1. As I went to to remove this from the window someone else came in right behind me; they were going to do the same. Knowing that I, umm, already owned this (albeit a copy with a lot of sticky residue that I've yet to remove) I did offer them first look through everything else, which they declined (and rightly so - it was all tat).

Other honourable mentions for Self Destruction Blues and Two Steps From The Move (with comic) by Hanoi Rocks at £2 each; a battered but still playable With The Beatles in the same box as the Floyd LP, also £2; assorted new wave singles bought for an appropriate 45p each on Record Store Day (and I didn't have to queue overnight); Soft Boys & Robyn Hitchcock LPs for a pound each; and Lou Reed's Perfect Day / Walk On The Wild Side single for 50p - an A- and B-side combination that's hard to top.

Flying Vinyl - January 2016 issue

With the February edition landing (albeit not quite addressed to me; more on that another time) I thought I should re-visit what January had on offer.

When it arrived we took our lead from the final round of Pointless and, having flicked through the accompanying booklet, put the 5 singles in order of how much we thought we would like each one, leaving the possible best to last.

Flying Vinyl: The Class of January 2016

Thankfully, and quite brilliantly, we were proved wrong. January's stand-out single was one of the first we played: step forward Cameron AG. If we'd adopted the same approach on Spotify we may never have heard the stripped-down joy that is Lost Direction. 

I don't think there's a single act in the January box that I wouldn't be interested in seeing live. So if Phobophobes, Storms, Otherkin, Junk Son or Cameron AG want to add a Cambridge date to their next tours, they can expect an audience of at least two. 

The Monkees: snog, marry or avoid?

Kids. They think they know it all. They think they're the first to do certain things, things us old folk would never have dreamed of doing. Well no. We've been there. Done that. And judging by this inner sleeve, a variation of snog, marry & avoid has been around since the 60s.

The verdict: Snog Mickey Dolenz, marry Peter Tork, avoid both Mike Nesmith & Davy Jones.

Flying Vinyl - December 2015 issue

For those of a certain age, the mere mention of a mail-order music club will bring back memories of packages from Ilford landing on doormats nationwide as once again Britannia Music Club members neglected to cancel the latest 'album of the month'. That introductory offer, which seemed such a great deal in the Sunday supplement, felt less so with each unwanted arrival. But at least you were one more full-priced album closer to fulfilling their membership terms.

A more credible variation was that run by Rough Trade, who I was surprised to discover (just now) are not currently offering new subscriptions. This appears to be a recent, and possibly temporary, development.

I was the recipient on an appropriately-numbered birthday of a subscription to Flying Vinyl. And, having failed to notify them earlier that I didn't want it, thank you very much, I found myself spending Christmas trying to convince myself of the merits of my recently delivered CD of Take That's III.

Now I'm sure I don't need to point out that some of the above may not be true, as I did of course actually receive a nice little box housing five well-packaged 7" singles, some tasting notes and a reminder that The Revolution Will Not Be Digital. My apologies for not broadcasting this on long wave.

Flying Vinyl: The Class of December 2015

Having only limited existing knowledge of two of the five artists, and having briefly heard just one of them, the scene was set and each single was played in its entirety. Both sides. No impatient skipping during intros. No leaving the room and no checking Twitter or Facebook. This was indeed a time for analogue to come to the fore.

Ten sides of vinyl later it was felt that Sweden's Magic Potion just edged it ahead of Glasgow's Temperance Movement. A slightly younger me strongly lobbied for the latter but I think I haven't quite got over the fact that someone once recommended them to me, only for me to find that they had played less than a mile away from my home the day before. But ultimately there were no losers - all five singles will be played again and chewed over. Further recordings and gigs will be sought. And an eager eye will keep watch on the letterbox around January 18th.

Subscribe here or if an artist wishing to get involved, see here for details.

Six sevens (or the the answer to the meaning of life, the universe, and everything)

Well, not quite. More a case of six 7" singles picked up over the years from charity shops which were either unexpected (prototype NY punk in E17?) or unknown to me. But perhaps between them they are the answer to the ultimate question.

Seems only right to start with this, a fresh acquisition that rather stood out amongst the Smokie and Racey singles in my local Cats Protection shop. The stamped labels with their minimal information screamed DIY but I had no idea what the grooves might contain. I took a look online before parting with my 50p and was able to quickly gauge that it was one of only two singles released by Industrial Accident Records, and with a run of 500 copies. On playing it The Institution revealed themselves as a band that tapped into a new wave / reggae sound, not quite ska but also not The Police either. Mrs DGW commented, quite fairly, that it sounded a little like The Libertines. The Discogs listing for Jane And Jon didn't provide much additional information but on clicking through to the label's only other release, Don't Go Away by Sonic Tonix, I found that both bands featured members that went on to form cult indie legends The Jazz Butcher. Nice to find an early slice of that band's history.

I had no difficulty identifying this single. The very song that famously saw the New York Dolls derided as 'mock rock' by smug looking, sorry, Whispering Bob Harris, it was a surprise find in a Walthamstow charity shop, sometime back in the early 1990s. Note the songwriting credit with unnecessary apostrophe. When your record company does that you know they're not wholly supporting your band.


Another purchase from the 90s. Given its release year (1978) and the image of the band, No Dice, on the back of the sleeve I figured this would probably be an underwhelming single from the footnotes of the post-punk era. Instead Why Sugar is the best record the Faces never made.



As discussed in the BBCs 'The Joy Of The Single' documentary, sometimes the b-side of a single is where it's at. Here, the Casinos put out a pretty inoffensive ballad, Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye as the a-side but flip it over and I Still Love You, although not ground-breaking, has one hell of a hook in its verse.

The contribution of The Birds to 60s pop history rests on two things. Firstly, not being The Byrds and secondly, having Ronnie Wood in their ranks. I was aware of their existence and the rarity value of their few releases so I wouldn't have expected to find this in a pile of otherwise junk sleeveless singles. But there it was, far from mint and its over-sized hole suggesting it had spent some time waiting patiently in a jukebox. It's crackly but no worse for it.

I can't claim to have known who I Giganti were. But they looked like they were worth a punt. And again it's the b-side, La Bomba Atomica, that stands out. Curiously I was in a local independent Italian pizzeria recently that was playing 60s Italian guitar pop and I joked that maybe some I Giganti would come on; mid-meal the a-side, Tema, duly made an appearance. When occasionally DJing at a friend's club in the 1990s, La Bomba Atomica was the only song that was allowed to breach its 'nothing pre-1970' rule. Not even the first Stooges album, or the likes of Beggars Banquet or Let It Bleed, got a look in.
 

Eyes down ....

Anyone following Car Boot Vinyl Diaries will be familiar with their list of perennial LPs to be found at car boot sales (also available as a handy bingo card here). Ultimately these are albums that sold in vast quantities in their day but which no longer hold the interest of the casual listener. For that's who would have sent their sales into overdrive - people who didn't regularly buy music but who found themselves at the record counter in Woolies, creating a snowball effect on sales. Put it this way: if you find someone with a record collection comprising mainly of those 12 LPs, you could comfortably say - or sing, if you wish - to them: "You don't really care for music, do you?" and they either won't know what you're talking about or, worse, will get all excited and say "I know that - it's that X-Factor song!".

That is not to say that these are all bad LPs. I was dragged up to the sounds of those Carpenters singles albums, and with its re-recording and segueing of tracks the 1969-1973 collection is far more appealing than the more recent cash-in trick of padding out a best-of with one or two, often poor, new recordings. And although Abba spent most of the 1980s being ridiculed their resurgence in the 1990s with the success of ‘Abba Gold’, topped-off by ‘Mamma Mia’, brought home the fact that although some of their lyrics might have been questionable (but could you do better in Swedish?) their melodies contained more hooks than any medicine show might muster up. 'No Parlez' on the other hand seems unlikely to ever regain the public's imagination; but if it does, I can point you in the direction of one Cambridge charity shop that has at least three copies in stock, along with assorted other selections from Mr Young's back catalogue.

The same phenomenon is being repeated with CDs (which incidentally are getting cheaper in charity shops). So who are the modern day equivalents of the Carpenters and Dr Hook? Apart from one extreme example (along with Lance Armstrong biographies, people have understandably been quick to offload their Lost Prophets collections, though by donating them to charity shops are they seriously expecting anyone to buy them?) they generally fall into the same pattern as their 70s & 80s predecessors – sell by the bucketload and then fall out of fashion.

Brit bubble popped
Blur may have won that battle but there's no denying who won the war, even if Damon & co are the ones getting the plaudits in 2015. As a result it was Oasis who truly crossed over and one CD in particular rears its ugly head rather too often. 'Definitely, Maybe' is too much of a fan's favourite, and even though '(What's The Story) Morning Glory?' was their biggest seller it remains popular and so it's 1997's 'Be Here Now', initially adored by the press, subsequently denounced as bloated and sometimes referred to as the album that killed Britpop, that people are discarding with relish. With estimated UK sales of 1.8 million (only 'Heathen Chemistry' is believed to have made it to 7 figures since), many of those are now available to you for as little as 50p.

Nods from this period also go to the Lightning Seeds best of 'Like You Do', Kula Shaker's 'K' (the K section of Reckless Records' now closed Islington branch consisted of little else) and The Verve's Urban Hymns.

Sisters are doing it for themselves
Eminem's 'Stan' famously featured an extract from Dido's 'Thank You'. This was arguably the best part of either song but the sales of ‘Life For Rent’ and it’s follow-up, ‘No Angel’ showed that several million people were keen to hear more. But not perpetually it would seem. Duffy’s ‘Rockferry’ is another staple, and I’ve noticed a recent rise in copies of Lily Allen’s ‘Alright, Still’. On the flip-side I don’t think I’ve ever seen any Adele (though if she doesn’t hurry up and release a new album the public may turn against her and send her CDs out into the wilderness), and rarely any Amy Winehouse.

Boys Keep Swinging

Or at least Robbie does according to ‘Swing When You’re Winning’, one of many CDs by the ex-Take Thatter you can pick up at your leisure. David Gray’s ‘White Ladder’ used to be prominent; I don’t think it’s recent lack of visibility is down to a new-found love for the album, more that everyone who wanted shot of it did so a while back. Jack Johnson and Army-man-turned-Twitter-comedian James Blunt are common finds.

And the rest ...
From the 90s you can expect to find Simply Red's 'Stars' and Robson & Jerome; the noughties offer up The Scissor Sisters self-titled debut and follow-up 'Ta-Dah' and Mika's 'Life In Cartoon Motion'. It's possibly too early to see any significant trends for whatever the current decade is supposed to be called, although the Only Men Aloud! CD is becoming a regular spot. I'd have predicted Florence & The Machine but their recent promotion to Glastonbury headliners has bought them at least another couple of years in people's collections. 1D look vulnerable, as do Mumford and Sons following the lukewarm reaction to their latest album. Time will tell ...

MELODY MAKER November 4 1978

MELODY MAKER
November 4 1978
Cover: Keith Richards
Lead album review: 'Dub Housing', Pere Ubu
Lead live review: The Clash
Single of the week: 'Nothing New', Bethnal

The chances are that any TV show setting itself at the tail-end of 1978 would be using punk/new-wave music and imagery to help set its scenes, with maybe some disco elements thrown in for good measure. One look at the front of this issue of Melody Maker paints a very different picture, featuring as it does Keith Richards, Rod Stewart and Mike Oldfield. The Clash & Third World get a look in next to a piece referred to as 'Kraftwerk The Movie'. No such film exists as far as I know but instead ties to an article written in the style of a film script. 

The lead piece on Keef relates to him taking to the stage in New York after his trial following his legendary drugs bust in Canada, which ultimately triggered him finally kicking heroin. I used to have a poster of photos of Keef from 1962 through to around 1990 and it always seemed to be that his appearance changed significantly around this time; it was almost as if the heroin had been slowing down his ageing process. There's a gallery here where you can judge for yourself. 

Richards has also claimed that he never had a cold during his heroin years, and that governments knew full well it was the cure for the common cold but didn't want to admit it. It can be assumed then that Eddie & The Hot Rods weren't users as p3 reveals they were cancelling a short run of Scottish dates as various members of the band had flu. 

I was pleased to see an ad for Our Price inside the front cover, having worked there over a couple of stints a decade or so later. I was there when they were a fully-fledged national chain and opened their 300th store; in November 1978 they had 10, all with 01 telephone numbers. Alongside a Top 60 rundown ('Grease' at #1), the ad prominently features the Fabulous Poodles. From flicking through this pile of issues they, along with several other bands I'm not familiar with, crop up quite a lot although my route to them was via seeing their singer (Tony de Meur when he was a Poodle; Ronnie Golden when I saw him; his website reveals more on his various personas) provide the musical backing for 'Arthur Smith Sings Leonard Cohen' (downloadable here).

Johnny Rotten may have worn a customised 'I Hate Pink Floyd' t-shirt but Melody Maker were happy to give keyboardist Rick Wright a platform to discuss his recent solo album while also dropping hints about a new project Floyd were about to start work on: "I can't say what it is .... it's Roger's baby, his thing ....it is a very strong idea .... a very involved thing and we're doing a film as well. It's a film based on the idea of the music that Roger has written for the album". The elongated recording process of the resulting album, The Wall, would see Wright leave the band albeit remaining as a session musician for the record and as a hired hand on the subsequent tour.

Paul Weller reviews the singles, name-dropping that he's a "personal friend of the band" before saying that Blondie's 'Hanging On the Telephone' just "doesn't do a lot for me". That's certainly not the only new release he dismisses, but the fact that he says on three occasions that he prefers the b-side shows he was pretty thorough. 

His appearance in the office doesn't prevent All Mod Cons from getting almost as good a kicking as the man who was down in the tube station at midnight; "If Paul Weller were to be a little less enthusiastic, a little less concerned with churning out singles like a bottle factory, and a little more selective in his approach, The Jam would not be in danger of becoming tiresome".

All the way through to its merger into the NME, Melody Maker was the go-to magazine for musicians wanted ads. Assorted tales exist of careers that owe their existence to those pages. Given he was born a few weeks after the ad to the right was placed, it's a fair guess that Mike Skinner didn't take almost a quarter of a century to go from a manager-less hopeful 'ready to roll' to the man behind Original Pirate Material. Whether Iver's Sledgehammer found themselves a vocalist, or Fanni from the Stillettos took any worthwhile calls from drummers may never be known. At a different level, a Mr Luigi was seeking a synth player to accompany a drummer on Friday & Saturday evenings, from nine until one pm in an Italian restaurant. Given that reads to me as a 16 hour shift I'm hoping the money was extremely good.

But my favourite ad has to be this one. I'm not entirely convinced this would be acceptable under current-day equal opportunities legislation. Is the 'warning' paragraph a description of their predecessor? Though it should be noted that to be (r)ejected you'd have to be all of those things and it's a pretty niche list. So if you're still determined you know what to do.

SOUNDS June 17 1978

I recently visited my local Freecycle group's page for the first time in a while and was immediately drawn to the following listing:

Melody Makers, 1978-1982. Over 20 copies, plus odd copies of Sounds, Record Mirror, Hot Press from that area.

Even better, they were only round the corner from me so I fired off a hopeful email. It turned out I was the only respondent and a few hours later I had them in my possession. Seems like a good idea to work through them, starting with ....

SOUNDS
June 17 1978
Cover: The Clash
Lead album review: 'Tonic For The Troops', Boomtown Rats
Lead live review: Ian Gillan Band
Alternative chart #1: 'Ain't Got No Clue', Lurkers
Single of the week: 'Under The Eye', Dennis Linde

1978. I should really have done some research on what was happening back then so I could pretend in the style of those ‘I Love The 70s’ shows that I have crystal-clear memories of things that I was obviously far too young to have shown even the slightest bit of interest in at the time, let alone recall.

It's a fair guess that I was either down the park playing football or out on my bike trying to clock up a few extra miles on my mileometer (okay, allow me a brief moment to reminisce – it was a hand-me-down Raleigh Strika, essentially a junior version of the Grifter but one-up on the Boxer, and with a pedal-back brake).

Hello (hello) hello (hello, hello)

What I definitely wasn’t interested in, or even aware of, was The Clash, yet here they are adorning the front page. Arguably punk's front-runners at this point given Johnny Rotten's recent departure from the Sex Pistols (page 2 references their search for a replacement singer along with details of Rotten's new, as-yet un-named band with Keith Levene & Jah Wobble), it's only right that I take this opportunity to slip on their debut LP, purchased nearly twenty-five years ago in a charity shop in, appropriately, Hammersmith.

Paul Simonon

It's a curious article, prefaced thus: "Pete Silverton gets them to talk. Chalkie Davies gets them to dress up in silly clothes and pose for pix". And it's true that Davies does just that, and recalling Mick Jones & Paul Simonon in their sailor outfits during their time with the Gorillaz makes me wonder whether this photo session gave them a taste for daft outfits.

Squeeze also command a large article as they tour the U.S. before they truly hit the UK charts, and their stride, the following year. At this stage they had the (largely) John Cale produced debut album under their belts; significantly, the two singles released from it were songs he didn't work on.

The issue's centre pages are taken up by a reasonably minimalist ad for Ijahman's debut LP, 'a joyous symphony that will enrich the spirit' apparently. Indeed it gets a 4* review a few pages on and the album's musicians get name-checked including the familiar-sounding rhythm section of Sly on drums and Robbie on bass.

Other LP reviews heap praise and 5* on the Boomtown Rats ("an outright masterpiece that gives rock and roll a good name") and the Real Kids ("one member of staff reckons it sounds like The Ramones meets Status Quo, which when you think of it is a pretty good gap to bridge"), while Dire Straits find themselves in just that with a mere 2.5* for their debut, with its "monotonous vocals" and a "lack of variety in momentum".

The fact that the live reviews kick off with ex-Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan, with Meat Loaf on the opposite page (they have Suicide in-between them), hammers home the fact that music magazines in 1978 didn't elect to limit themselves to specific genres. They were more all-encompassing (one issue I have to look forward to has Cliff Richard as its cover-star), with Sounds also carrying columns such as the 'Ranking Records' reviews of the latest roots & reggae releases.

Wot, no Judas?

The letters page proves that some activities now carried out online had their equivalents in 1978, hence Neil from Shepherds Bush criticising Sounds for allowing people to advertise Bob Dylan tickets at inflated prices. However the fact he didn't call anyone a Judas makes me think he wasn't really a true fan anyway.

Rachel, a "13 and a half year old XTC fan" from Caterham thanked Swindon's finest for putting on an under-16s concert at the Marquee, calling it "the best 60p I have ever spent" and adding that she hopes "Sounds do not ridicule my heroes again".

I couldn't find the single of the week (sorry, "this week's leading legend") on Spotify, but thankfully YouTube came to the rescue. "Hopefully this one won't be missed by the masses" they said. It was. But fear not. Dennis had the fact that he wrote 'Burning Love', a hit for a guy called Elvis who didn't work down the chip shop, to keep his spirits, and bank balance, up.

Indeed their are a few artists with singles out that I've never heard of. Listening to some of these today I'm thinking Mr Albarn may have heard Patrik Fitzgerald's 'Backstreet Boys' ("unique urchin makes good EP shock"); elsewhere there was Humphrey Ocean's Ian Dury-penned 'Whoops A Daisy' ("sounding not surprisingly Dury-esque"); and Johnny Rubbish with 'Living in NW3 4JR', who also doesn't make it to Spotify, maybe due to him apparently being "rubbish by name and nature".

My head is going round in circles ...

It's been easy for me to avoid getting caught up in Record Store Day. Without a dedicated independent record shop in Cambridge it's not really been on my radar. Heffers, predominantly a bookshop, has maintained a small offering but for 2015 they have been joined by two vinyl-only retailers in the city - Relevant and Lost In Vinyl. I can cycle (this is Cambridge after all) to the former in under 5 minutes and so I took more interest in this year's releases than ever before.

Thankfully there wasn't too much on the list that appealed and so I wasn't tempted to join the queues that reportedly started forming outside Relevant at 4.15am. Sure, I could see some good titles on there - some that I already had (Otis Blue; L.A.M.F; Roger The Engineer; Don't Stand Me Down), some that I could see the appeal of should you be so inclined (the Creation Artifact boxed set; and the album that went on to top that week's vinyl-only chart, The Holy Bible) but there was only one title on the list of 550 exclusive products that truly caught my eye: Ogden's Nut Gone Flake by the Small Faces, predominantly due to the fact that it came with the circular sleeve.

Ogdens' Nut Gone Flake - Record Store Day 2015

This is something I've kept half-an-eye out for a while and I wasn't going to get an original copy on the cheap. Buoyed by the fact that I'd just picked up some bargains in local charity shops (amongst them Bowie's Young Americans; Madonna's Immaculate Collection; a few Nancy Sinatra singles and a selection of new wave 7-inches such as Jilted John and Rock Lobster) I felt I could justify picking it up.

In doing so I was reminded that my brother had this, and if I recall correctly had bought it at Tower Records somewhere around 1985. Which in itself surprised me - that far after its release they were still producing the, presumably expensive, circular sleeve? Checking on Discogs I can see a 1980 reissue and expect it was that, but bear in mind this isn't something that was solely released as a tie-in to a one-day event. It was released in that sleeve as someone presumably decided it should be available again rather than just re-issuing the rather unsatisfactory square sleeve with the circular image.

On further reflection and again in the mid-80s, I bought The White Album in my local Our Price and it came with the inserts. A few years later I was on the other side of the counter in that exact same shop in my first full-time job; vinyl sales were tailing off and we had a gradually dwindling range but I can confirm that The White Album still came with the inserts as late as 1990. Maybe EMI over-printed back in 1968. I can't say the same for Sgt Pepper, and although we did still stock New Order's Blue Monday 12" it was no longer being produced with the die-cut sleeve. I don't recall Their Satanic Majesties Request being stocked but if it was I'm certain it would have been in a similar sleeve to the copy I picked up cheaply around four years ago.

That's The Internet. You are not The Internet.

If there was ever any doubt that the second-hand vinyl market is on the up then I've seen the final shreds of evidence in the last few months as two local charity shops have decided to dispense with their time-honoured £1 maximum price for all LPs and instead apply, to be polite, some rather ambitious pricing.

Now I understand that their raison d'etre is to raise the maximum funds from the items that come their way, and that's fine. I have no issue with that at all. I don't have a god-given right to walk into one with a crisp £5 note and expect to come out with a butchers cover edition of 'Yesterday & Today' and 'God Save The Queen' on A&M and still have change for a latte with an extra shot. It's a fine-line and these two shops have crossed over to the wrong side.

Conversations with staff in these two stores both led to the ever-so-predictable statement:

"We looked them up on the internet to price them up."

Again, fine. The internet is a marvellous source of information. But that information needs to be interpreted and used correctly. And, crucially, the internet has the capability to reach billions of people around the world. Applying a price from eBay (the price for that completed listing was in red for a very good reason), putting the sticker on first and then writing the price on in biro so that it will leave an indent, assuming the sticker doesn't tear off part of the sleeve in the first place, before putting the LP in the window to warp, sorry, to attract customers is not the same as the internet.

To be fair this is not a new phenomenon. I have fond memories of a charity shop by the bus station in Gloucester approximately 20 years which amongst the usual Semprini and Studio-2-Stereo LPs (all £1 each) had a copy of Midge Ure's ground-breaking 1985 LP 'The Gift'. For whatever reason it was a fiver. As this was pre-internet a member of staff must have decided that he still had a huge following. Either that or Joe Dolce volunteered there and was taunting Midge's fans one last time.

Back to the present day, and in the first shop the member of staff was keen to tell me about a couple of things they had behind the counter as they were definitely valuable. One was - whisper it - signed. Naturally I asked if I could see what it was, already excited by the fact that I was absolutely, definitely about to get my grubby mitts on a fully-signed, low-numbered copy of The White Album.

Instead I was handed a signed LP by Mike & Bernie Winters.

The conversation moved to the other likely reason for their belief that they could increase their prices for LPs - the new record shop down the road. "Do they take second-hand records do you know?". Yes they do I replied. "Great. Maybe I'll take this down there and see if they're interested".

I so wish I'd been there for that.

A couple of weeks later they (the charity shop, not the record shop) had the Mike & Bernie Winters LP out priced at £20. It is, of course, still there.

In shop number two the item that leapt out at me was a Japanese pressing of a Brenda Lee LP, complete with the OBI strip. It was £7.95. For a Brenda Lee LP. I admit, the packaging was quite lovely and if it had been 80p like the majority of what they had I may have been tempted. But what chance is there that someone will walk in and pay 10 times that? Actually, I have previous form here, when the same charity shop went down a similar path a few years ago. And to that end I remain confident that this is a mere blip. It'll take a little while for the penny to drop but normal service will be resumed within six months and I'll be sipping that double-shot latte while listening to Johnny Rotten remind me at 45rpm that there is no future.

Update, June 13th 2015. Mike & Bernie Winters are still up for grabs ....

The Cream of the crop

Manuel and the Music of the Mountains. Geoff Love and his Orchestra. So far so typical. Abba's Greatest Hits. Don't really need it, but go on then. Saturday Night Fever - maybe. Ah, it's only record one. Pop that back. The Seekers, Leo Sayer, Peters & Lee, Five Live Yardbirds,

Harry Secombe ... What? Hang on. Five Live Yardbirds? That was unexpected. Herb Alpert. More Leo Sayer. A Now! compilation, again with one LP missing. Back to business as usual. The Rolling Stones No.2. Fresh Cream. We're onto something here! Not wishing to sound greedy but sadly that was as good as it got. The Stones LP has a heavy scuff across most of side 2 (I could feel it through the cleaning cloth) and the laminate is coming off the sleeve but for a quid? Bargain. And thanks to Sylvia Carpos of St Leonards-on-Sea, who was a past owner of at least two of these.

A night in with alcohol & music

Despite many years of owning records I've never taken cleaning them too seriously. Sure, I'll remove surface dust and I do own a fairly basic brush for this but more often than not if I'm wearing a long-sleeve top then the chances are I'll just motion over the LP with my arm instead.

But a few charity shop purchases, ones that were too good to pass up despite the previous owner looking like they've tried the 1980s 'eat your dinner off a CD' challenge across other formats, have made it necessary for me to look at alternatives. Plus it's getting warmer and I'll be reverting to wearing t-shirts soon.

I considered dropping a few LPs into Sister Ray, who clean records at 50p per side, but I rarely venture into central London. I looked into machines such as the Disco-Antistat Record Cleaner; reviews were generally favourable but even the positive ones made reference to using home-made fluid rather than the one supplied, the active ingredient being isopropyl.

Further research suggested the machine may have not been necessary. As such I obtained a supply of isopropyl from Maplins (£14.99 for 1 litre) - it can be bought for less online - a small bottle of deionsed water (Robert Dyas, 99p for 500ml - many sites mention distilled water) and a pack of microfibre cloths, also from Robert Dyas at £3.49 for 4 (again, lint free cloths are mentioned elsewhere).

On opening the isopropyl it was clear that this was not the sort of alcohol that would make a drinkable cocktail. I poured a small amount into a bowl and diluted with the deionised water. I wasn't overly scientific about this but the common consensus is the mix should be around 20% isopropyl to 80% water. Ready to go, I pulled out the chosen test LP - 'Hi-Fidelity' by REO Speedwagon (yeah, I know, but come on, it's got 'Take It On The Run' on it). This was pretty mouldy on one side, which I had previously tried to rectify with a splash of tap water. It cleared most of the mould but was still noisy when played; this was most likely due to mineral deposits from the tap water, hence the need to use the distilled or deionised variety. A few wipes with the isopropyl solution and the remaining mould was quickly gone; the LP developed a definite shine. I dried off the excess solution with a second cloth and left it to dry. On playing it the worst of the background noise had gone.

Encouraged by this I decided to jump straight in with the filthiest LP I knew I had; Fleetwood Mac's self-titled debut. The previous owner - Tony Moore according to the annotation on the sleeve - clearly did not wear long-sleeved shirts (or if he did, he never washed them). It was precisely the sort of LP that record companies would have pointed at 30 years ago and said 'This is why CDs are a good idea'. I had tried to play it once and one side in particular was unlistenable. I made the mistake of not photographing the LP in its pre-cleaned state, though I can offer (right) a picture of what came off its grubbiest side. Now it's fair to say that an LP with that much dirt on it won't suddenly reveal itself to be in mint condition; indeed, the dirt was obscuring significant wear. But crucially it does now play pretty well and doesn't skip.

I ended up tackling half-a-dozen LPs with excellent results. For an outlay of less than £20 I reckon I have sufficient materials to clean upwards of 50 albums before I'll need any more deionised water; I may never need to buy isopropyl ever again. Some rubber gloves wouldn't go amiss though, particularly when cleaning a large batch.

Relevant Record Cafe - Cambridge

Photo: Ben Attenborough

By the time I moved to Cambridge it was an independent record shop free zone. We had a HMV and a Fopp, both of which survived when HMV entered administration in 2011; Zavvi until its demise on Christmas Eve 2009 (coincidentally the only day I ever bought anything in there, completely unaware that it was about to shut for good) and a branch of Head briefly operated in 2012/3. Visual evidence of past emporia still exists, such the Hot Numbers mural on Kingston Street (right), the name having more recently been brought back to life in the form of a thriving coffee shop - and more - on parallel Gwydir Street.

Photo: found0bjects.blogspot.co.uk

At the other end of the latter street can be found the seemingly abandoned store front for Roll On Blank Tapes (left), where a hand-written price list reveals that a C30 Ferric tape would have set you back 55p; an extra 10p would have got you an upgrade to Chrome. A MiniDisc sign in the window shows that the shop did try to diversify but it was too little too late.

Nearby Mill Road also saw the first permanent branch of independent chain Andy's, its founder Andy Gray, having previously traded at Cambridge market. Gray currently runs BGO records, a reissue label named after Andy's sister store, The Beat Goes On, which focused more on second-hand and rarities. King Street was also home to numerous record shops; as I understand, Parrot was, to steal a phrase from Graham Jones, the last shop standing on that particular street, closing in 2002.

And it's Mill Road where the Relevant Record Cafe has taken up residence. As the name suggests its more than just a record shop, with a cafe on the ground floor and the all-important vinyl in the basement, Note: vinyl. There's not a CD to be seen, and if you don't have anything to play vinyl on panic not, as Relevant stock a range of turntables (only this morning I saw a couple walking along Mill Road, each carrying a freshly purchased Steepletone turntable). The vinyl is split roughly 50/50 between new and second-hand. The 'new' is a healthy split between recent releases and back catalogue. The second-hand section would have made my own quest to rebuild my collection far simpler, spying as I did things such as the Quadrophenia soundtrack for a very reasonable £9. And not a tatty sleeve to be seen; all the second-hand LPs would by my reckoning be graded as VG at the very least; and unlike buying online you can see & feel exactly what you get.

They've included a small seating area in the basement - a nice panoramic shot can be found here, courtesy of @ChrisRandWrites - which doubles-up as an in-store performance area (and for such occasions you can make use of the cafe's alcohol licence). And rather brilliantly Relevant is operating extended opening hours, meaning that after spending much of Black Friday scoffing at videos of people fighting over 40" TVs I was able to drop in at 7pm that evening to pick up the 'Morrissey Curates The Ramones' RSD release.

Welcome to the area Relevant - not least for encouraging me to write a blog post for the first time in over a year!

Relevant Record Cafe, 260 Mill Road, Cambridge
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Andrew Matheson - Monterey Shoes

Andrew Matheson
Monterey Shoes
Ariola ARL 5025
£1
Filed between The Matadors (self-titled) and Sergio Mendes & Brasil '66 'Greatest Hits'






Released while fellow former Hollywood Brat Casino Steel's band The Boys were still a going concern (but still a year before the Hollywood Brats LP, recorded in 1973, had been granted a UK release), Matheson's solo LP is far less punk although it wouldn't sound too out-of-place if spun alongside 'new wavers' such as Joe Jackson and Graham Parker.

The Corpse Grinders - The Legend of the Corpse Grinders

The Corpse Grinders
The Legend of the Corpse Grinders
New Rose
99p + £2 p&p
Filed between and Alice Cooper 'Killer' and The Corpse Grinders 'Valley Of Fear'



Given the band's links back to the New York Dolls I'm surprised that I went this long without ever hearing The Corpse Grinders (and just to make sure, I bought their 1982 LP 'Valley Of Fear' at the same time).

The most immediate thought: was Rick Rivets mimicking Johnny Thunders' guitar style or was it his style first from when he was an original Doll? There's nothing in this LP to elevate the Corpse Grinders to anything other than a footnote but it's decent enough Dolls-esque trash.

Lords of the New Church - self-titled

Lords of the New Church
Self-titled
Illegal Records ILP009
£1.04 + £2 p&p
Filed between Lords of the New Church - self-titled and Lords of the New Church 'Method To My Madness'



Oops. Ah yes, forgot I already had this one. I got a little carried away placing bids on various LPs one seller had listed; was outbid on most but this was one of two LPs that eventually came my way. But at least it has a different cover to my other copy.

Lead-out grooves & Porky Prime Cuts

Back in 1999, my band Taxi Driver issued a 7" single. It was mastered at Abbey Road and, following a fine tradition, we had the engineer engrave a message into the lead-out groove. Should have been simple enough. However we were mortified to find he made a key grammatical error:

'Your in the jungle baby'.

A conversation in the pub with that band's singer lead to me having a late-night look at the lead-out grooves on some of my other records. Often the artist has a specific message engraved here, or the mastering engineer with leave their own mark (the best-known being that of George "Porky" Peckham, engraved as a 'Porky Prime Cut'). As well as the above our single also included the word 'Orlake', something which I subsequently also found on 'The Best Of Hanoi Rocks'. A little bit of research shows this to have been the pressing plant used, and it closed for business in 2007.

Some of the best examples:

Jane's Addiction self-titled: 'What made you look here?';
Dave Kusworth 'The Bounty Hunters': 'Cherchez vous wives, weddings and roses' (this was the title of his next LP);
Jacobites self-titled 'Hey that's my tie thing' & 'somebody just stepped on my french fries';
Jacobites 'Robespierre's Velvet Basement': 'Guten morgen Nikki ich bin ein hamburger';
Jacobites 'When The Rain Comes': 'The cheques in the post. Love Dave Barber';
Wreckless Eric 'The World According To Wreckless Eric': 'There's no message here! Why!' & 'Due to lack of inspiration -!';
The Only Ones 'Out There In The Night': 'Meow' (the song was about Pete Perrett's cat).

Engineers spotted include:
'Porky prime cut' (George Peckham) - Deaf School '2nd Honeymoon'; Jacobites self-titled and Robespierres Velvet Basement; Nikki Sudden 'The Bible Belt'.
'Arun' (Arun Chakraverty) - Dexys Midnight Runners 'Searching For The Young Soul Rebels'; The Boomtown Rats 'The Fine Art Of Surfacing'.
Jonz (John Dent) - The Only Ones self-titled
Tim D Masterpiece (Tim Dennen) - Belle & Sebastian 'Dog On Wheels'

The Kinks - Well Respected Kinks

The Kinks
Well Respected Kinks
Marble Arch MAL612
50p
Filed between The Kinks 'Best of 1964-65' and The Kinks 'Village Green Preservation Society'


There's a charity shop that can't seem to make its mind up when it comes to pricing up vinyl. I assume it comes down to whoever is there on the day. For example on one visit they had Prince's '1999' LP available for a very optimistic £25; at the same time they were putting out a large collection that had presumably just been donated and I left the shop with half-a-dozen Northern Soul compilations for 95p each and a tip-off that they were putting more out later in the day.

For over a year I kept an eye on a copy of 'Silver Missiles & Nightingales' by the Suicide Twins, which they had priced up at £8.95 (actually about right judging by eBay), in the knowledge that I was probably the only person in Cambridge likely to buy it. It eventually made it to the 50p section and subsequently into my possession.

This was one of a handful of 60s LPs that I picked up for 50p, although on my next visit the 50p section had suddenly risen to 95p. That's inflation for you.

John Lennon & Yoko Ono - Double Fantasy

John Lennon & Yoko Ono
Double Fantasy
Geffen K99131
£1
Filed between John Lennon 'Shaved Fish' and John Lennon 'The John Lennon Collection'



Despite not having heard of John Lennon at the time, I have some very clear memories from December 9th 1980 as the news of his death the night before came through from New York. I was 10 at the time and the only member of the Beatles I knew of was Paul McCartney – perhaps not surprising given that in the preceding years he had been the only one in the public eye, not least with 1977’s ‘Mull Of Kintyre’, with Lennon having only just emerged from his self-imposed five year hiatus and the solo careers of George Harrison and Ringo Starr peaking back in the early 70s (the latter had yet to take the narrator’s role on Thomas The Tank Engine, otherwise I may have known who he was).

Music was not that prevalent in our household and the impact on me cannot be understated, as a whole new world seemed to open up. That evening the BBC broadcasted the 1965 film ‘Help!’ and something was almost immediately triggered throughout our home. My dad bought Double Fantasy and my older brother invested in the Red and Blue albums. It was shortly after this that I also started to buy records, pocket money permitting (my earliest purchases incidentally were ELO's Greatest Hits and viral video star Kim Wilde's debut album). Music for me became an obsession and rather than waste my teenage money on cigarettes I spent more and more on records. In 1985 I bought my first guitar and by 1988 I had a vague idea of how how to play it. I stumbled onto a stage for the first time the following year.

This can all be traced back to that day thirty-two years ago - my musical epiphany if you must. Hardly a replacement for the world when compared to the loss of someone of Lennon's status, but hugely important to me on a personal level.

Mention of this LP on Twitter recently also led to a suggestion that the lyrics towards the end of 'Watching The Wheels' echoed the final pasages of 'Catcher In The Rye'. I knew this was the book Mark Chapman was carrying on that fateful day but was unaware of this other potential link - more can be read at http://www.dpdotcom.com/freebie/TTMGRexcerpt.pdf.