Record Store Tales

#1007: Kissathon Tomahawk

RECORD STORE TALES #1007: Kissathon Tomahawk

According to my Facebook memories, on this day in 2009 I was listening to a massive all-encompassing Kissathon.  This was done so I could review all the albums before the release of Sonic Boom.  The first run of Kiss reviews here on this site came from that 2009 Kissathon.  By coincidence only, this past weekend was a mini-Kissathon, started on Thursday night with some music we don’t play as often in the car.

1. Crazy Nights (1987).  Even the underdogs deserve some love.  Listening to this album inspired me to write a new Record Store Tale about the experience of hearing it for the first time.  You see, for me this album was unique.  I got into Kiss in 1985 just as Asylum was released.  In two years, I collected, listened to, and absorbed all the Kiss albums to a degree only a kid that age can.  Crazy Nights, therefore, was the first “new” Kiss album to come after completing my journey through their discography.  And unlike Asylum, it was different.  I spent a morning writing up the impressions I had in 1987.  As for the car trip, we laughed at some of the terrible lyrics and obvious musical attempts to copy Bon Jovi, but it was an enjoyable listen.

2. Dynasty (1979).  After the Paul-dominated Crazy Nights, I wanted to hear something with all four guys singing lead.  There are very few albums like that, and only three with the original lineup:  Love Gun, Dynasty, and Psycho-Circus.  I went with Dynasty this time.  A short but very energetic listen as we passed through Palmerston, Wingham, and Whitechurch on the way to the cottage.

3. Gene Simmons (selections from) (1978).  Once we hit Lucknow it was time to put on an album for the last 20 minutes or so of our drive.  Gene Simmons was under-represented in our first two choices.  Only two Gene songs on Dynasty, and only four on Crazy Nights.  The Demon needed some love, and I wanted to expose Jen to some of his more…ahem…questionable material.  We played a lot, some good some bad.  The good:  “Radioactive”, “Mr. Make Believe”, “See You Tonight” “Always Near You/Nowhere To Hide”.  The bad:  “Burnin’ Up With Fever”, “Tunnel of Love”, “Living In Sin” and…yes…”When You Wish Upon A Star”.  I remember back in the old days going to the lake with my parents.  Sometimes they’d let us listen to an album on the car deck instead of our headphones.  My dad praised “When You Wish Upon a Star”.  “Finally, a good song!” he said.  Good song perhaps, but not a good vocal performance!  I explained to Jen how Kiss fans were shocked and flabbergasted when Gene’s album was finally released.

As the gentle strains of Pinocchio completed their final crescendos, we pulled into the driveway at our humble place in paradise.

Our little furry friends the chipmunks began visiting, as did a pair of blue jays that I named Domaso Garcia and Lloyd Moseby.  These blue jays were brave little birds and I managed to get a little bit of footage up close.  However by Friday morning the calm turned to distraction!  I worked on completing an upcoming list, my second collaboration with Jonathan Lee.  If you recall, Jonathan and I ranked all the Kiss albums from worst to first a short while ago.  Now we are finishing up another comprehensive pair of lists, on another band we both love (and you do too).  When they are ready, the lists will be revealed…but not until they are ripe!  I had to work on my list while the chipmunks and blue jays made annoyances of themselves, distracting me from my rock and roll duty.  Therefore the peanut supply was cut off for the rest of the weekend, especially when the chipmunk ate his way through the bag.

Unlike the last several weekends, this one was fairly uneventful.  We did get in a good swim, and some footage of crystal clear waters.  Listening to Kiss (and then Judas Priest) on the porch, working on writing, playing video games and cooking meals.  In fact the only “new” thing that really happened this weekend was the cooking of the Saturday steak.

For the first time we tackled a 2″ thick tomahawk steak.  It was actually 2 1/2″ at the thickest point.  It was fun to cook but the fat content caused lots of flame-ups so it was a matter of taking care.  Jen thought it was the steak of the summer.

Traveling home was uneventful, until we passed Listowel (home of the original Helix).  At this point, traffic was heavy.  An impatient pair of blondes in a red jeep decided that passing cars the conventional way going to take too long, and so they went onto the gravel shoulder, and passed three cars including myself on the right.  I gave ’em the horn as they endangered my life, and they didn’t even look over.  I imagine the inside of their jeep smelled like Patty and Selma from the Simpsons.  They had that kind of look.

A few miles down the road, I had an opening so I went for it and passed them, flipping them the bird as I did.  They didn’t seem to notice, but they remained stuck in the line of traffic for the rest of the ride home.  I never saw that red jeep again.  This all happened to the tunes of Raise Your First and Yell by Alice Cooper.  The exact song they passed me on was “Chop, Chop, Chop”.

We came home tired and had some naps.  Funny that even though the weekend was less active than others this summer, we were just exhausted.  I was too wiped out to work on a video, but hopefully that will come.  In the meantime I’ll just sleep and wish upon a star.

 

#1006: Too Many Cooks

RECORD STORE TAILS #1006: Too Many Cooks

Every so often, a thought or a memory has casting my mind back onto the old Record Store Days.

You probably don’t often think about a job that you quit almost 20 years ago now.  Then again, you probably didn’t work in a Record Store.

It was the Dream Job.  I always wanted to work in some way with music, and selling CDs was pretty high on my list.  It truly was everything I had hoped for.  I acquired hundreds of rare treasures, out of print CDs and things I never knew existed.  I got them with a discount, and I got to listen to music every day.  Lifelong friends were made.  That’s something I never thought would happen from a workplace.

The Record Store also put me back in touch with friends I had seen in years.  The Store was located at the local mall, the epicenter of the neighbourhood.  Banking, groceries, and everything you needed could be found at the Mall, and so a lot of the people I went to school with drifted in through my doors.  Some managed to stay in touch since then, thanks to social media.  I would not trade those connections for the world.

I know a young fella who now works at one of the many stores that I did time in.  It was one of my least favourite stores, in fact.  I hated working at that location.  The customers were not, shall we say, the upper crust of society in that neighbourhood.  But the kid loves his job!  Have things changed, or did I get it wrong? That’s what I ask myself sometimes.  Did I misrepresent those years in Record Store Tales?  Was I unfair?

The first two years were really awesome.  I looked forward to going to work every day.  I got there early and stayed late.  There is no question that the fun atmosphere changed when we started to expand.  10 years later I was having panic attacks.  Too many years of a retail job that was treated with as much urgency as a doctor’s or a lawyer’s.  Family came second.  Performance was everything.  Weakness was inapplicable.

Too many cooks spoil the brew.

At the end I had three bosses, and it was kind of shady how some of that went down.

I never looked forward to work anymore.  I still got there early, but that was more to take my own time opening.  Get ahead on some things.  Listen to music.  Fill orders.  I still do that today in my current job.  I arrive early, and slowly and casually start getting stuff done before we’re officially open for business.  Make a coffee.  Read some news.  Answer emails, before the phone starts ringing.  I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, but the boss told me, “If you worked at IBM, coming in early to do extra is considered bad work habits.”  I distinctly remember him saying that.  I simply could not win with them.  It was a record store, not IBM!  Who cares what IBM do?  They don’t buy and sell used CDs from the public.

I’ve said before that there were cliques at the Record Store, and I stand by that claim.  I never felt like I belonged.  I was the only hard rocking sci-fi nerd with severe social anxiety.  I wasn’t hanging out with the right people at the right bars, because that’s not my thing.  Being invited out to the bar doesn’t count.   I.  Did.  Not.  Fit.  In.  I stand by that.  And I maintain that people in power did let their personal lives leak into their work life.

No.  Upon reflection I feel like I was fair in my previous assessments.  I will say that I am guilty of one thing in my writing.  Once I knew that people at the Record Store were reading, I let that influence my writing too much.  Too often, I wrote with that knowledge in the back of my head, whether consciously or unconsciously.  Perhaps that was unavoidable.

Too many cooks spoil the brew,
Wanna be the king of the world,
Yeah, and too many jailers makin’ the news,
Wanna be the king of the world.

#1005: Bully Graffiti

“Oh, she wasn’t that bad.” – Them

“Oh yes she was!” – Me

 

RECORD STORE TALES #1005: Bully Graffiti

The office Bully and I had to work together frequently. I’ve worked for a lot of managers over the years, but she was the worst, even worse than the guy who stressed me into a nervous breakdown. He didn’t mean to do it; he was just a shitty manager. Office Bully on the other hand was malicious, as I have described in the past.  She was not capable of separating her personal life from her job, and because I was friends with her ex-fiance, I got the shitty end of the stick every time.  I felt like there was a constant tug of war over me.  I had a target on my back, as others noticed.  “She doesn’t treat anyone else like she treats you,” said one colleague.

I will never forget one morning working together in the store in the late 1990s. She decided to test me. Test my knowledge. Of her. Of her taste in music.

Usually the staff picked the tunes for the day. I asked her what she wanted to listen to while I went to collect music for the day’s store play.

“Pick something I like,” she said.  Jesus Christ.  Pick something she would like?  What the hell did she like?  I knew she was testing me.  Testing me on how much I knew about what she liked to listen to.  How much I’d been paying attention.  She liked to play these games.  We weren’t supposed to be friends; I just wanted to do whatever I had to do to be treated like a human being in the workplace.

I knew she liked Bjork, the Band, soul music, and…I drew a blank.  Frankly it was none of my business what the hell she liked.  Not part of my job.

I decided to hedge my bet.  We had a five CD changer, and instead of picking two CDs for me and three for her, I picked five for her and hoped I got some right.  Based on the fact that she liked old soul music, I thought I’d try more oldies.  American Graffiti soundtrack?  Maybe there was something on there that she liked?  It looked pretty good.  I put the five discs that I picked into the changer and hit “play”, crossing my fingers and toes that I got it right.

A few songs went by without comment.  So far so good.  Then came an American Graffiti track into the shuffle.  That’s when she spoke up.

“You picked this, for ME?” she interrogated.

“No, I picked it for me,” I lied.  Dodged a bullet.  Barely.  I lived to work another day.

The Bully’s friends will say something predictable, like “That doesn’t sound like she was testing you, that sounds like she just wanted you to pick the music for the day.”  I would respond, “You weren’t there.”  I heard the tone of voice.  I knew the game being played.  It would have been obvious had anyone else been there.  “You picked this, for ME?”  That was the tell.

But I got away with it and to this day I really could not give a shit what kind of music she liked.  She certainly didn’t respect my tastes — once she told me only one person at my store (the one she was friends with) had good taste in music.

Why would you ask someone with poor taste in music to pick your CDs for you?  She was playing games as usual, as always.

 

#1004: It’s Not You

RECORD STORE TALES #1004: It’s Not You

2018 was, shall we put it mildly, an interesting year. It was the summer that wasn’t. The year I spent the best months of the year driving to and from Toronto, at first waiting for a miracle, and then waiting for the inevitable. When my beloved mother in law finally passed away in September of that year, at least she left the pain behind.

Her decline at the end of the summer was rapid. Before she got too sick, she insisted that I still go record shopping with Aaron as we used to do annually. “You go and have a good time.” She had no way to know how important that was. That one record shopping excursion changed everything for Jen and I that summer. A discovery I made on that trip impacted the whole rest of the summer. That discovery was Blotto.

I’ve talked numerous times about how the skillfully comedic sounds of Blotto made the summer driving tolerable. I’ve trumpeted the merits of Blotto ad nauseum, but it cannot be overstated how important that music was to us at that time. And I had no real idea what I was buying. I just knew Blotto had one song in the 80s – “Metal Head” – that I saw on MuchMusic as a kid. But I didn’t think they were a metal band. They had a bald guy and a guy who looked like Revenge of the Nerds.  They sported funny names like “Bowtie” and “Cheese”. For the sake of personal musical history, I wanted “Metal Head” in my collection. So there in the basement of BMV, with Aaron at my side, for a mere $8.99, I acquired their important album Combo Akimbo. It was the best decision I made all summer.

What I got was a nine-track comedy-rock album that kept us in positive spirits as we drove up and down Highway 401 all summer. And what is amazing is that I can play the album today and still feel the same things.

The bad memories are still there. They bubble to the surface. I can see myself behind the wheel, stopping and starting again all the way to Toronto. I hear Jen singing along next to me. But the pain is manageable, and the positive feelings outweigh the bad.

Of the nine songs, there was always one that made us laugh the most. That song was “It’s Not You”. Not only is it a catchy song with a cool guitar lick, but the lyrics are hilarious. I’m glad that Blotto was not tainted by the summer of 2018 and I can still enjoy their music with a huge grin on my face.  That’s the gift.  All too often, because acquires the feelings of the times you hear it, and if those times weren’t good, it’s hard to get around.  Fortunately that didn’t happen with Blotto.  I feel only good feelings, especially when I play “It’s Not You”.  I can’t help but smile, every time.

This is something that’s not easy to do,
It will hit you like a bolt from the blue,
After last night, I have to tell you we are through.

When we’re alone, everything is OK,
But it’s never gonna stay that way,
When I take you home, your family has so much to say.

I try and I try, to be cool when they start,
But girl, they’re the ones who are tearing us apart.

It’s not you!
Don’t blame yourself
It’s not you!
No-one can help.
It’s not you!
I can’t be your man.
It’s not you!
It’s your family that I can’t stand.
And it’s driving me crazy!

Your mother wants to know if I am on drugs,
Your brother shows me his collection of bugs,
Your aunts don’t like me and your uncles are a bunch of thugs.

Your father coughs and blows smoke in my face,
He still believes in the superior race,
He says if he were president, the world would be a better place.

I try and I try, to ignore them for our sake,
But girl, I’m afraid it’s too much for me to take.

It’s not you!
Don’t blame yourself
It’s not you!
No-one can help.
It’s not you!
I can’t be your man.
It’s not you!
It’s your family that I can’t stand.

There is no future baby can’t you see,
Picture in your mind how it would be,
All of us living in relative misery.

I try and I try, to be cool when they start,
But girl, they’re the ones who are tearing us apart.

It’s not you!
Don’t blame yourself
It’s not you!
No-one can help.
It’s not you!
I can’t be your man.
It’s not you!
It’s your family that I can’t stand.

It isn’t you,
It’s only your family,
Don’t take it personally,
It’s just all those little things,
Like when I come over to your house and your father tells me “Don’t park in the driveway, ‘cause your car gets oil on the new white pebbles,” and then when I go inside the house, the cat jumps on my lap, and gets hair all over my shirt and pants, and your grandmother sits the newspaper and gets it so wrinkled and bunched up that I can’t even read it, and your sister brings out her scrapbooks and wants me to look at all of her prom pictures, I mean, who cares! And your brother wants me to help him with his science project, dissecting frogs, ick, what a mess, and I go into the bathroom to wash my hands, and all they have is soft soap, and my hands smell like coconuts, and I can’t dry them on those little guest towels, so I gotta wipe them on my shirt, which is already covered with cat hair, and then when I come outside, your father corners me, and wants to tell me all the jokes he read in Playboy magazine….

 

#1003: Animalize Live Uncensored

RECORDS STORE TALES #1003:  Animalize Live Uncensored

36 summers ago, I taped Kiss Animalize Live Uncensored off next door neighbor George.  I recorded the video (which he recorded from a rental) onto a VHS, and the audio onto a 90 minute blank cassette.  For that summer, Animalize Live was my Kiss live experience.  I only had Alive on vinyl, which wasn’t portable.  I didn’t have Alive II yet.  My cassette copy of Animalize Live was constantly in my ears all summer.

I knew every word of every Paul rap.

“Detroit let me tell ya something just between you and me.  That baby had the longest fuckin’ tongue I ever seen in my life!”

“Paul, what are you doing with a pistol down your pants?”

“Eric may look like a baby, but he’s built like a man.”

Paul did a striptease, and the guys hung the panties that they were thrown by girls in the crowd from their microphone stands.  The concert dripped of raw sex and I was like a kid in shock.  I had never seen anything like this before.  I didn’t even know if I wanted to!  But there it was in full glory, Paul Stanley telling stories about his “Love Gun” and me sitting there watching it multiple times a week.  The summer I had mono.  I couldn’t do much else.  I watched a lot of videos and a lot of them were Kiss.

Listening today, I remember every note of every solo.  Paul went first with a guitar solo.  Bruce Kulick, the new kid, was standing in for Mark St. John and didn’t even get an introduction or solo.  Eric’s drum solo was second, and Gene’s bass solo last.  I liked the bass solo.  It actually seemed more musical than the other two.  Its simplicity is one thing…but I was humming the bass solo hours later.

I still know every vocal divergence each song takes in this live incarnation.  Like old muscle memory.  And you know what?  There’s something to be said about 80s Kiss.  They were playing things faster and Eric Carr added his own unique elements to Kiss, as did Bruce.  On some songs the speed works.  I was just thinking that if they came out playing “Creatures of the Night” this fast today in 2022, people would lose their minds.

On my Walkman, I went for cottage adventures with this concert in my ears.  It was the worst recording possible; a cassette copy of a VHS copy of a VHS copy, in mono.  Bootleggy as hell.  But there I sat in the grass, as Paul Stanley told us of the women who wanted to “mother” Eric Carr.  And I had no idea what, specifically, “mothering” Eric Carr meant.  I knew it meant sexy times of some kind, but…nope, right over my head.

Animalize Live Uncensored was my Alive III from a time when we didn’t think we’d get an Alive III.  Or at least, I didn’t.  It was several albums and several years before we did get one, and Eric was gone by then.  I liked it.  I still do.

#1002: The Best of the Best of the Best

RECORD STORE TALES #1002: The Best of the Best of the Best

It has been unknown numbers of years since the last time I had a four-day summer vacation.  Long overdue! Full of great music, great visuals, and so hard to come back from. My heart aches, but I have been diligent and made a video of the memories, as I always do. The theme of this week’s video:  wildlife!  Lots and lots of animals. 18 minutes of video paradise: the best of the best weekend I ever had.

As usual, we departed the hot city on Thursday night, to the sounds of great rock and roll.  Heavy metal, in this case.  This time I chose Iron Maiden’s Seventh Son of a Seventh Son for the trip.  The entire album plus the B-sides bonus disc.  Musically genius, lyrically dicey.  I used to think the words were so deep.  “Seven deadly sins, seven ways to win, seven holy paths to hell and your trip begins…”  I used to imagine Bruce’s lyrics were so deep.  Now I think he was just making up cool sounding phrases.  We all know what the seven deadly sins are, but there are no “seven ways to win”, nor “seven holy paths to hell.”  I used to give him credit for knowing the exact meaning of everything he sang.  What are the seven ways to win?  Don’t ask Bruce, I don’t think he knows!  But it all sounded cool, and I must have spent childhood memorizing this whole album, because I sang the whole way to the lake.  I conclude the concept is fun, but without depth.  If there is any depth to the album, it comes on the last song, Steve’s “Only the Good Die Young”.

So I think I’ll leave you,
With your bishops and your guilt,
So until the next time,
Have a good sin.

That resonates, but the overall album is just a tale.  Just a comic book.  On the other hand, I could be like Liam Gallagher with Oasis lyrics.  “Just because I don’t know what they mean, doesn’t mean there’s no fookin’ meaning in them fookin’ words!”

80s Maiden continued on the porch all Thursday night. All 80s, all Bruce. Nothing but. Then we watched Thursday Night Record Club with Brent Jensen and Alex Huard, talking about Judas Priest’s British Steel.  Switched over to Priest on the front deck the following morning.  And then to Journey, for an upcoming episode of Tim’s Vinyl Confessions, on the excellent new Journey album Freedom.  I used my show notes to complete my upcoming review.  It will be ready shortly after the show debuts.  And you’re going to love the show we taped.  Trust me!

As the days meandered on, we encountered all sorts of wildlife. There was a cheeky chipmunk that was climbing all over us each day, looking for treats. There was a raccoon hanging around the back door, smelling the blueberry pancakes I just made. Birds, birds, and more birds. And Schnauzers! We saw the return of our UFO!  We kept our eyes on the skies, and there may have even been a flying squid!  (What?)

Indoors and outdoors, there was plenty to do.  No wonder four days flew past.  We did retro gaming, watched Ant Man, had a belated birthday party, and cooled off in Lake Huron. We observed the sun set, and then the moon a few hours later.  We have photos and video of it all.

By the time Monday rolled around, nobody wanted to go home.  I spent my final four hours on the front deck editing away.  It took that long to edit down 95 minutes of footage into the awesome 18 seen below.

Please enjoy the lengthy but entertaining video, and the awesome memories that go with it. I wish we could stay forever. At least with the videos, the memories remain and will not fade.  The accompanying music comes from Tee Bone Erickson, Dr. Kathryn Ladano, Max the Axe and the Seagram Synth Ensemble.  And it’s all good.  I worked damn hard on this, because making videos like this does a lot of good for me when my seasonal affective disorder eventually kicks in.  I worked hard on it for me, but also for you, because beauty is universal.

The best sun (and moon) sets in the world.  Magical music.  Awesome animals.  The best, of the best, of the best weekend ever!

#1001.5: 50 (Or, Thank You!!)

RECORD STORE TALES #1001.5: 50 (part two)

Thanks to everyone for your kind comments about my 50th birthday gone awry.  Jen is feeling better, though besides a fat lip, she now sports a nice black eye.  Could have been worse.

I’m still Covid negative so I’ll take that as a win.  The cold that I do have is not so bad, and though I am back at work, I have not been able to do a full day yet.  But that will improve.

After Jen felt better from her fall, we opened some gifts.  She got me some cool Marvel and Star Wars figures, but the music is the best part.

First up was the new Black Crowes EP, 1972.  This six-song covers EP is getting rave reviews and I cannot wait to hear the Rod Stewart cover “You Wear It Well”.  This EP is in anticipation of new material from the reformed band.  There’s even a photo of the new lineup (including returning bassist Sven Pipien) which is a packaging touch I always appreciate.  I have been skeptical of the Crowes’ current reunion, but putting out new music with this lineup alleviates most of that.  Dig it!

And then we have the massive Black Sabbath Technical Ecstasy box set!  This is one of my favourite Oz Sabbath albums.  Actually one of my first, after Paranoid.  The box includes the full album, the album remixed, some outtakes and a live show from 1977.   The live show looks especially cool, with “Gypsy”, “Dirty Women” and “All Moving Parts” in the setlist.  “Electric Funeral” is even included.  The bizarre cover art has always struck me as Asimovian.  Think The Gods Themselves.

Thank you Jen.  What a day for you.  You sure know how to buy gifts though.

Then I unboxed the massive parcel sent to me by Thor in Denmark.  It was heavy.  I didn’t know what to expect.  It was obviously packed full.  Even so, nothing broke in transit!  Everything arrived in great condition, but there was so much stuff inside, we need to do a complete inventory.

First, there’s Anthem:  Ultimate Best Of Nexus Years Japanese import with obi strip intact.  Thor actually wrote an excellent review of this album with all the details.  Bassist Naoto Shibata played on one of my favourite Loudness albums, so this is a total enhancement for my collection.  It’s a double disc with a different singer on each disc, from two eras of the band.  He rated it 4.95/5!

Then we have Red, Hot and Heavy by Pretty Maids, a band he considers the most underrated in metal.  I don’t know this one, but it’s from 1984 so I think I’m going to like it.

Finally we have a self-titled album by Dizzy Mizz Lizzy, who I had to look up.  This is a 1994 debut album by a critically acclaimed Danish band.  Says a review on the Wikipedia page, “It all heavily oozes Led Zeppelin and Seattle.”  Sounds good to me.

It may take a while for me to get to Dizzy Mizz Lizzy, considering Thor also sent me the motherlode of a band I first heard in the 80s, D-A-D, originally known as Disneyland After Dark.  They too hail from Denmark, and I have praised their 1989 American debut, No Fuel Left for the Pilgrims, with a 4.5/5 star review.

Well, Thor went overboard.  And by that, I mean Overmuch!  Look at all this D-A-D glory!  Thanks to him, I must now be the proud owner of the best D-A-D collection in Canada.  Let’s go through everything one by one.

No Fuel Left For the Pilgrims (1989).  This is the super rare original version of the CD, with the original name, before the change to D-A-D.  Not only is the cover different, but so is the mix on four tracks:  “Sleeping My Day Away”, “Point of View”, “Rim of Hell” and “Girl Nation”.  On the international CD that I have, these four tracks were remixed by Chris Lord-Alge.  You can hear the slight difference, mostly in terms of levels in the mix.

Good Clean Family Entertainment You Can Trust (1995).  A single disc compilation with live and studio cuts, and loads of single artwork inside.

Psychopatico (1998).  Double live.  Their first live release besides a 1990 live Japanese EP.  17 tracks total.

The Early Years (2000).  Double compilation!  Includes their first two studio albums, plus their debut EP called Standin’ On the Never Ever, and 17 rare or previously unreleased bonus tracks.

Scare Yourself Alive (2006).  Another double live!  Two gigs from 2005 included.  Minimal overlap between the two discs.

DIC·NII·LAN·DAFT·ERD·ARK (2011).  Studio album.  Check out that Super Audio CD case!  Looks like I have all their studio albums now, as you shall see.

A Prayer For the Loud (2019).  Their most recent studio album.

And, best of all…

The Overmuch Box:  Twenty Five Years of D-A-D (2009)!  This includes all their studio albums up to 2008, completing my collection!  The albums are:

  • Standin’ On the Never Ever (1985 EP)
  • Call Of the Wild (1986)
  • D-A-D Draws a Circle (1987)
  • No Fuel Left for the Pilgrims (1989 US version)
  • Riskin’ It All (1991)
  • Helpyourselfish (1995)
  • Simpatico (1997)
  • Everything Glows (2000)
  • Soft Dogs (2002)
  • Scare Yourself (2005)
  • Monster Philosophy (2008)
  • Bonus album:  Behind the Seen (Rare, unreleased & B-sides 1984-2009)

There’s still a bit of D-A-D out there to acquire, such as that Japanese EP, but surely not much.  To be honest I never expected to get any more D-A-D beyond the Riskin’ It All album (which is supposedly lethal).  But…holy shit people!  That’s enough D-A-D to take years to digest.

Thor’s generosity cannot be understated! This is awesome stuff.  You never see their music around in Canada, and I simply assumed I’d never have them.  I love the price tags from a store called Moby Disc – great name!  To have this much D-A-D, including the early stuff I only read about, and both versions of No Fuel, I’m just blown away.  Truly overmuch! This is a band that has been special to me for a long time, because I can remember sitting in Bob Schipper’s basement when that music video came on.  He went nuts for it.  Just loved it.  Just like I loved that big guy!  Nothing but great times.

Thank you Jen, thank you Thor, and everyone who wished me a happy birthday.

#1001: 50 (Or, Reading a Post in Real Time)

RECORD STORE TALES #1001: 50

Well, it happened.  After two and a half years of no illnesses whatsoever, this boy finally got sick a couple days before his 50th birthday.  Not Covid, thank fuck.  Just the cold that seems to be going around “like wildfire” according to our pharmacist.  Sunday night it hit like a ton of bricks and I was in bed by 5:30.  Monday I was coughing with a sore throat and spent the entire day in bed, a couple hours here and there aside.  Tuesday I was well enough to go back to work.  Dead tired though.

And so, this 50th birthday that was supposed to be a simple movie night with the parents is now a night at home by ourselves.  Can’t bring this cold into their house.  Additionally, because I didn’t go into work on Monday, I cancelled my planned day off on Friday.  Just not enough time left in the week to get everything done.  We were supposed to do a 50th birthday celebration at the lake but that won’t be happening.

As miserable as I felt, it’s nice to get the birthday messages.  Because I can, I’ll boast a bit about the celebrity birthday wishes.  I’m always a little shellshocked when guys like this wish me a happy birthday:

  • Brent Jensen, the author and podcaster who always makes my skin vibrate
  • Mike Fraser, world-class producer and mixer extraordinaire
  • Brent Doerner, Helix guitarist
  • Greg Fraser, Brighton Rock and Storm Force axe-slinger
  • Michael Willerding, former drummer for Russian Blue and Feel
  • Rik Fox, original W.A.S.P. bassist who messaged all the way from Facebook jail

Even though I feel like I need an extended

[cut]

That is the exact moment while writing this post on a snack break that my cell phone rang.

Same old, same old, same old.  The mall called.  My beautiful wife had a seizure.  This time, she fell flat on her face and cut her lip.  She looks absolutely brutal right now.  It hurts my heart.

Had to leave work early.  I’m exhausted.  She’s pretty sore.

Let’s focus on the good.  Trying to focus on the good.

OK, the good:

  • Happy birthday wishes from all my friends and relatives
  • Surprise birthday pizza and pasta from our pharmacist, Vu
  • Surprise birthday parcel from Thor, aka Thunder Blackmore (it’s just cool getting a text message that says “You have a parcel from Thor”)
  • Jen is safe

I was going to do a big unboxing of Thor’s parcel but I am dead tired now.  I need rest.  And what says “you’re 50 years old now” better than a nap?

It can only get better from here.  Happy 50th, to me.

Record Store Tales #1000: A Tribute

Introduction

1991 was the beginning!  While I was busy furthering my education, the future owner of the Record Store prepared for his grand opening.  The store was in a mall location and had a minimal staff.  It filled a niche in that mall, and managed to survive where other stores did not.  It wasn’t hugely successful, but that was about to change.

In 1994, everything shifted.  The owner brought in a tray of his own CDs to sell used, and they flew off the counter.  “Why not?” he asked himself, and switched to a 50/50 used/new format.  I bought my first used CD from him that July.  It was Kiss My Ass, which was a brand new release.  I paid $12 instead of $19.  Perfect, especially for a CD you didn’t want for every song!  I vowed to shop there loyally.

Later that month, July of 1994, I had the opportunity to keep shopping, but with a discount!  I was hired part-time.  The first used CD I bought as an employee was Rush’s Chronicles.  The sticker price was $20 instead of $34.

In 1995, the owner opened his second location with a novel 90/10 used/new format.  This format took off, and in 1996 he opened the third location.  He asked me to manage it.  I had been waiting for just such an opportunity.  It was the start of a decade long run for me, managing record stores.  I missed saying goodbye to the original location, but relished having my own full-time management position.  What a ride that was, as you have seen and read!

At the end of ’96, the original location finally closed but moved to Cambridge, utilizing the 90/10 format.  It was the end of an era – the era of the original location, which is still fondly remembered by all who worked there.  For Record Store Tales #1000, let’s pay tribute to the original mall location of the Record Store.  Some of the best years and memories of my life.  Very little of this will be new information, for there are only so many stories to tell.  However I hope you find this 1000th chapter interesting and entertaining:  a tribute to the original!

Record Store Tales #1000:  A Tribute

Back when it opened in 1991, it was just nice to have a Record Store at the mall again.  We used to have an A&A Records & Tapes, but they closed in 1990.  There was a period of time where there were no record stores within walking distance, except the Zellers store‘s meagre music section.  Unfortunately the Record Store prices were comparatively high:  $14.99 for a regular priced cassette.  I didn’t know then about things like cost and overhead, but Columbia House was a better option for me.  Still, he managed to keep that store alive.  Some of tapes I purchased there before being hired included Europe’s Prisoners in Paradise, Fight’s War of Worlds, and Mr. Bungle’s self-titled.  That may have been it.  Tapes weren’t cheap.

Then the used CDs came along.  A used disc like Kiss My Ass was cheaper than its cassette counterpart; a no-brainer purchase.  I was very fortunate to get on board the train just as they were taking off with a great idea.  The owner hired me in July of ’94, and T-Rev shortly after in August or September.  The things I saw come in used during my first weeks and months were incredible.  Rare import singles, bootlegs, and lots of out-of-print metal stuff, long before reissues were a “thing”.  I’d frequently have to choose what to buy for myself from paycheque to paycheque.  I’d look up items in our supplier’s catalogue, and buy anything used that was currently deleted.  Stuff like You Can’t Stop Rock ‘N’ Roll by Twisted Sister, or the Brighton Rock albums.

There were a number of CDs we had set aside as store play copies, but only a stack or two.  We could play anything that was in stock used, but if someone bought it, that was that.  Two of the store play albums we played most often in the summer of ’94 were Alice In Chain’s Jar of Flies EP and Stone Temple Pilots’ Purple.  Whenever I hear that Alice In Chains today, I can really feel that whole period again.  Dark, but with a nostalgic glow due to the years.  Once T-Rev and I started working alone, we picked our own music.  If you heard Max Webster blasting from the store, then T-Rev was working.  If you heard Sabbath, it was me.

We had a TV to play MuchMusic, but most often it was on mute while we played CDs in the store.  The boss hated that TV.  I think one of things that bugged him was when a customer asked him, “When did you get that TV?”  It had been there for three years!  I think I may have used it to watch Star Trek once.

I loved closing the store.  You could listen to whatever you wanted.  There was a lot to do though.  Balance the register, do the deposit, take out the trash, vacuum, and file any inventory bags and tags from sold items, so they could be re-ordered.  Each CD we stocked had a copy with a tag or bag on it, with the artist, title, and record company.  These were then filed in a book at the end of the day, and anything put in the book would usually be re-ordered.  That was the nightly routine.  Sometimes I forgot to take out the trash and boy did I get told for it.

T-Rev and I alternated nights.  There were two sets of shifts:  Monday night, Wednesday night, and Friday night.  Or, Tuesday night, Thursday night, and the weekend.  We alternated weeks and it was great.  But we worked alone, and Saturdays could be a grind.

The thing that really slammed us on Saturdays was buying the used CDs.  It was such an important process, because by buying CDs we were controlling our cost of goods.  So it took time and it was all done manually.  Searching physically to see if we had the CD already.  Flip through a book to see if we could find out what it was worth.  Inspect the condition.  Decide on a value.  Keep ’em organized.  It took time, and we had no space.  I remember we had this small counter, with a big cash register, and off to the side were two damaged CD towers that we basically used as an end table to pile more stuff on.

Every Wednesday night was tag check!  We had security tags like most stores, and every Wednesday, we re-taped ones that were coming off.  Speaking of security, let’s not forget Trevor the Security Guard, who got me in shit for killing time talking to me too much.  And the other weirdo security guard who got me into Type O Negative.  Kind of looked like Farva from Super Troopers.

I remember the “regulars”, and lemme tell ya, malls have characters.  There was a licensed restaurant in the same hallway as us, so we had the odd drunk.  It was just something you had to deal with.  If the smell didn’t give it away, the slurred questions did.  There was one lady that was in all the time, buying stuff for her sons.  Or at least, asking “if we had it”.

There was a pizza place and a convenience store, so food was taken care of.  We didn’t have a restroom, which was a good thing, because we didn’t have to worry about customers wanting to use it.  (There was one time a washroom would have come in handy, but only one time.)  Unfortunately there also wasn’t a back room to store things or to eat lunch.  I remember one afternoon, I was eating my slice of pizza on the bench outside the store.  A dad-type guy walked up to me, and said “I can see you’re eating your lunch, and that’s fine, but I’d like to speak with you later about returning a tape.”  I just nodded my head and said “OK”.  Jesus Christ!

T-Rev and I were given a lot of say in what we carried.  We special ordered new stock that we knew the store needed.  Meanwhile, the boss was bringing in bootlegs and Japanese imports.  T-Rev made the signage as mine were deemed too messy.  I often wonder if the owner feels that way about my website as well.  I was not allowed to make any signs!

The best memories of the Record Store were people, like T-Rev, who remains a friend to this day.  It wasn’t long before we were influencing each others’ purchases.  He recommended The Four Horsemen’s second album, Gettin’ Pretty Good…At Barely Gettin’ By.  I got him into buying singles for the rare B-sides.  It was great working with him.  Then one day I walked in and a big bearded guy was behind the counter.  Tom had entered the picture, and a new era was about to begin.  The founder of Sausagefest had arrived and things were about to get heavy!  Shortly thereafter, Tom threatened to sleep in the store one night when his car doors were frozen shut.  I kind of wish that had happened.

Or how about reconnecting with old school friends at the front counter.  Things like that were rewarding, not to mention the sheer cool factor in working at a Record Store in 1994.  It truly was the dream job!  My collection boomed and I had to start looking at new storage options!  And who was there to design my custom CD tower?  T-Rev!

So here is a tribute to the original record store, all the great memories, and the best years of my working life!  Thank you!

 

 

 

 

#999: Slo-Mo Schnauzers, Stop Motion Autobots, and UFOs? Oh My! (Video)

RECORD STORE TALES #999:
Slo-Mo Schnauzers, Stop Motion Autobots, and UFOs? Oh My!

Nothing really went as planned when the internet went out.  So, we did what we could.  We pretended it was 1989 and had fun in old fashioned ways.  Good thing no LeBrain Train show was planned!  And boy, did we take advantage of the break.  Fortunately music was not an issue, so I warmed up the laptop and dug into the hard drive for some albums that reminded me of the old days.

To a soundtrack of Kiss, Kim Mitchell, Max Webster, Aerosmith, Alice Cooper, Bon Jovi, Def Leppard, Iron Maiden, and many more, I grabbed the comic books and the Yahtzee.  It was too cold to swim (weird for July) so we had to do other things.  Jen worked on her adult colouring books.  I made food.  I also took plenty of video.

The wildlife this weekend was captured for your viewing pleasure.  Plenty of gulls, eating multitudes of beach insects (which were so plentiful you can clearly see them on camera).  We had a brave little chipmunk who seemed to enjoy the sounds of Aerosmith.  I think I’ll name him Joe Perry.  There were two cute doggos (one Schnauzer and one Miscellaneous), which I filmed in slow motion.  The visuals this weekend were unrivalled!  A pretty epic night fire, and sunsets that kill any you have seen yourself.  All captured and carefully edited to a soundtrack of unreleased Max the Axe music, and classic Tee Bone Erickson tunes.  Although the finished video is on the long-ish side, your reward is unreleased Max tuneage (one live, and a preview of a coming remix of “Randy”) and plenty of stunning visuals in HD slow motion.

We talked last time of being bored at the lake as a teenager.  If I had this kind of technology as a kid, I’d never had been bored.  That’s the truth.  There’s always something worth documenting.  The fact that I can have it finished and edited at the end of the weekend is actually pretty mind blowing.

The weirdest thing that happened (besides hearing a coyote calling at 11:30 at night, and then screaming at 5:00 AM), was the UFO.

Now, I’m not saying “aliens” when I say “UFO”.  Let’s be clear on that.  However the object was flying and none of us could identify it.  There were minimum three witnesses each time.  On the first night, the UFO appeared at sunset as a quickly brightening star, which eventually faded or was hidden by clouds.  It didn’t move.  My camera didn’t reveal much, although it looked like a blocky shape.  Our working theory was the International Space Station.

The second time, the object appeared in the same place at the same time, still motionless.  It looked like a flame in the sky, a frozen flame.  That’s the best way I can describe it.  It stayed in the sky until we eventually left the beach about half an hour later.  When I returned later at night, it was too cloudy to be seen.  Two examples below, and you can see more in the full video.

Internet outage aside, the only crappy thing about the weekend was that I did not get to visit Sausagefest as I’d hoped.  The internet outage disrupted Jen’s routines a bit and I elected to stay home and make sure she was OK.  As it stands I’m glad I made that decision, as she needed a little help doing a few things.

Otherwise, it was a delightful weekend of music and doing things differently.  I wish I had written down all the albums we listened to, but with no movies and no TV, music was the obvious dominant force.  A lot of Kiss this weekend, folks.  A lot of Kiss.

The video may be long but it’s worth it.  Slo-mo Schnauzer is your payoff!