Vinyl Love

I love the smell of vinyl in the morning … well … mmm … actually only my old vinyl records. Vinyl beanbags, coats and briefcases don’t do much for me  (now or then) but a record … that’s another matter.

I was shopping in an inner city neighbourhood a couple of weeks ago and came across a great small record store called Egg Records. I can’t find a website for them so I can’t provide a link, but if you’re ever in Brisbane go to West End – the shop’s in the main street. It was crammed with old singles, EPs and LPs as well as other music memorabilia. Now I know it’s not unique and there are plenty of little shops dotted around the planet like this, but it provided a personal wakeup call for me to get home and rummage through my old collection.

I bought my first 45 in 1967 – Green Tambourine by the Lemon Pipers (still have it). Why was that the first one? Well it was a Top 40 song at the time but it had more to do with events at the point of purchase when I finally plucked up the courage to go into a record store and buy something.

I’d been hanging around the local record bar (yes that’s what they we called) for a few months but didn’t have the funds to buy anything and wasn’t sure what was the appropriate way of buying it anyway. There was no handbook for how to act cool while buying your first single.

The guy who normally served behind the counter looked like he’d just stepped off the plane from London – Brian Jones haircut, Nehru jacket and pointy boots. Too cool to believe. As a spotty 12 year old there was rather a large gap in looks, presentation and experience between the two of us, but I imagined that if I could go in and buy a record I’d finally be one of THEM rather than one of US – my scruffy group of local lads who were only just beginning to realise that there was another sex out there.

On the big day I rummaged around and found some clothes that I felt gave me some semblance of rebellion and headed off on my bike. Strategically parking it around the corner, I strode purposefully into the store expecting to exchange a knowing nod with ‘Brian’ behind the counter.

Now the record bar was actually part of a larger electrical store. Record shops as we know them today just weren’t around – in my town anyway. So to get to the record section you had to manoeuvre your way past people buying electric kettles, irons, refrigerators etc.   

By the time I made it to the record section I found that Brian was absent but his mum appeared to be there in all her mid-sixties suburban glory – permed hair, startling frock and horn rimmed glasses a bit like Dame Edna Everidge.

She took one look at me and determined immediately that I was either on an errand for my mother or was some form of delinquent up to no good.

“Well what can I do for you young man?” (in shrill tones)

Where’s err … , you know, … err… I don’t know his name … the bloke who normally serves here?”

He’s away. What do you want? Something to pick up for your mother?”

“We’ll no  … err … I want to buy a record.” (mumbling)

“Speak up! What record? I’m a busy person (says she in an empty shop) I just can’t have you hanging around.”

Then it hit me that I hadn’t really come to buy anything in particular. I had been so focussed on making the purchase with the appropriate level of panache that I hadn’t decided what it would be.

Under her steely gaze I backed up to the record shelves where the singles were laid out alphabetically by artist. However unlike today, there were only letter markers ‘A’,  ‘B’ etc, - not artists’ names displayed and the singles being in paper slip covers were hard to identify until you actual pulled them out and read the label through the central hole.

I fumbled around for probably no more than 30 seconds although it felt like half an hour, with her making harrumphing noises behind me and her eyes burning a hole in the back of my neck. All the labels started looking blurry and I realised I had to make an escape.

I grabbed the nearest 45 in desperation, hurried to the counter, paid for it (not sure what it cost but it was less than a dollar and all I had in my pocket was loose change anyway), watched as she placed it agonisingly slowly in a plain white paper bag and sticky taped it shut (no doubt to stop me filling it with purloined goods).

I raced out of the store almost knocking over some old gent who was bending over to check out an electric heater. He shouted something which I’m sure reaffirmed the opinion of Dame Edna on the record bar.

Then I was free … I pedalled homewards at breakneck speed clutching my prize.  Now strange as it may seem I didn’t own a record player. The only one in the neighbourhood belonged to my friend Gavin. Gavin was a year older than me and had a rather trendy mother who let him grow his hair down so that the fringe almost covered his eyes (he Brylcreemed it back for school).

I raced in, told him what I’d done and we ripped open the packet – Green Tambourine by the Lemon Pipers. That was OK, in my state I could have picked up Pearly Shells by Burl Ives. Anyway we played the thing about 10 times in a row.  I took it home, played it in my mind all night and the rest, as they say, is history.

Brian reappeared at the record bar. I made regular, very hip, purchases; bought a record player; graduated to buying my first LP (Disraeli Gears by Cream); grew my hair; begged a guitar from the older brother of a friend; started a band; figured out girls; and by the Summer of 69 (thanks Brian Adams) I was having a fine old time.

Now I wasn’t planning to tell this story, just really to waffle on a bit about some of my singles and EPs (a few are shown in this post - LPs in a later post) that I still really get a kick out of playing, but it’s amazing the reflective power of an artefact in your hands. Couple that with the great memory trigger that is music and suddenly the past starts flooding back.

Much as I love the convenience of my iPod, I still get the urge to pull the scratched vinyl out from time to time. It’s a bit the same as journaling in my Moleskine as well as journaling here on the web. You don’t have to have one or the other. It’s OK to be analog AND digital.

… and the scratches on the records? … they’re the duelling scars of my life.

Drop your silver in my tambourine ….

Comments

[Greg]

An interest group for record collectors and dealers alike to get together and discuss anything related to this very popular hobby.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/musiccollectables

All are welcome !!!!

[Paul]

mmm... interesting scenario Mike. Now in this hypothetical situation, could the vinyl albums left on the back seat of the pink Vauxhall possibly be rare Steeleye Span albums? I hear they melt best of all. Now that would be a strange piece of art - almost poetic.

[Mike]

Here is an additional senario for the story:

The vynls are left in the back seat of a mate's car in summer ... the car a pink vauxhall...

Sounds far fetched and bit Monthy P but life is strange than art.

[Paul]

Thanks Jean. I'm glad we both were so hip and groovy at that age. BTW I remember seeing Rick Springfield play with the Zoot (his first big band) in about 1969 or 70. Zoot was one of the big Austraian bands at the time and also contained Beeb Birtles on bass (later with the Little River Band). From memory they all wore pink satin jumpsuits. Roger Hicks who was Zoot's guitarist jumped ship to join Brisbane's Avengers (my favourite local band). Rick Springfield was playing in Brisbane in Wickety Wak and both the Avengers and the Valentines (which included Bon Scott also in satin) wanted him but eventually when Hicks came to Brisbane , Springfield joined the Zoot Ahh.. the Brisbane music scene in the late sixties .. read it and weep ... http://www.milesago.com/Artists/zoot.htm

[Jean]

oooh, no it wasn't, i must have been subconsciously trying to make myself cool. It was Keep on Dancin' 84 - remember those trashy repackaged Top 40 compilations? That Rick Springfield, what a spunk...

[Jean]

I love that story - I recognize myself in your terror of the Shop Lady; for the record, the first record I ever bought all by myself was a Violent Femmes album that i saved up for months to by at $8 or so (the one with the guy wearing a fish on his arm on the cover - gross)