Record Store Tales

#953: The Moment I Dumped Conspiracy Theories

RECORD STORE TALES #953: The Moment I Dumped Conspiracy Theories

With a lot more free reading time on hand after quitting the Record Store, I dove back into one of my favourite childhood topics:  UFOs.

It was Canadian nuclear physicist Stanton T. Friedman who re-convinced me there was something legitimate about the subject.   Described as a “genius” by those who knew him, Friedman spent 50 years as a ufologist.  He often said, “Most sightings can be easily explained.  We’re not interested in those.”  His point being there is a small but baffling number of contenders, that have yet to be fully debunked.  I began buying up his books, and found his stance as a “facts and figures” man quite convincing.  He was quite convinced that the United States and other governments had engaged in a “cosmic watergate” to cover up certain unexplained events.  He went to great lengths to find and verify documents in US archives, going so far as to find out if certain typewriters were used in certain offices.  If they were not, then the document was a forgery and he discarded it.  He put a tremendous amount of time into his research.  After seeing him speak in a documentary called Out of the Blue, I was intrigued.

I bought every book by Friedman that I could get my hands on.  To balance it out, I also read The Demon Haunted World by Carl Sagan.  It is important to read the view of the sceptic, but even so I thought Carl overlooked some things.  Then I bought Jesse Ventura’s book called American Conspiracies, which expanded the field into JFK, 9/11 and more.  Only one chapter on UFOs, but Ventura’s experiences were interesting at least.  Finally, I misguidedly bought a highly reviewed book by Richard Hoagland and Mike Bara in which they presented for evidence a number of photos of “glass domes” on the moon.  Suddenly and unwittingly, I had crossed the Conspiracy Threshold.

The Conspiracy Theshold is the line between the conceivable and the asinine.  It’s subjective, but exists for all who delve into the world of conspiracies, just as certain and invisible as the air in their lungs.  Much like the line between clever and stupid, it is a fine line that differs from person to person.  Glass domes on the moon was way, way past my threshold.

What happens if you go further?  In my experience, all conspiracies eventually flow to a weird, apocalyptic religious end.  How far you go is up to you, but that’s where all roads lead.  For example, when I followed UFO conspiracies too far on the way to the top…Barack Obama ended up a being satanist lizard alien.

Q Anon are now the latest who believe in lizard aliens.  Cool story.  Hey, you know what, I saw “V” as a kid too.

There are variations of the lizard alien theory, with the Queen, the Pope, the Clintons and the wealthiest families in the world all secretly running things in their lizardly ways.  You’ve heard of the Bilderbergers?  They’re the head honchos, when it’s not the military-industrial complex or the Pentaverate.  They’re all aliens, demons or both.  It’s a fine line — some who believe that the concept of aliens violates the Bible say that aliens and demons are the same thing.  Whatever the finer nuances of a given conspiracy theory, this is where they all lead, if you follow the breadcrumbs all the way.

By that time you’ve either realized you’ve gone too far and need to take a step back, or you’re too far gone to be reasoned with.  Not surprisingly, today’s “Pandemic Conspiracies” ultimately take you back to…lizard people and the End of Days.  Go far enough down the rabbit hole and eventually you become the rabbit.

These people have sucked the fun out of conspiracy theories.  With just a hint of sadness, I for one will never travel that aisle of the bookstore again.

 

#952: Hackers

RECORD STORE TALES #952: Hackers

The internet (otherwise known as the “information superhighway” or “the weeb”) was just beginning to enter public consciousness in 1995.  Hollywood struck while the iron was hot with Hackers, a pretty shitty movie starring Johnny Lee Miller, Matthew Lillard, and Angelina Jolie.

I saw Hackers in the fall of ’95 at a drive-in.  It was so bad that when the film broke partway through the movie, I didn’t even care.  “I want to see the rest of the movie!” complained my girlfriend in the other seat.  She was mad; she didn’t want a refund, she wanted to see Hackers.  They eventually got the movie back up and running, for what it was worth.  We mocked the corny dialogue about “14400 BPS modems” and terrible visuals.  “That isn’t what the internet looks like!”  She was right.

The only lasting impact the movie had was its CD soundtrack, which was still in demand six months later.  Featuring the Prodigy, Orbital, and Underworld among others, Hackers was popular with the growing electronica crowd.  It was also hard to find used, and expensive new.

As discussed in Record Store Tales #795: A Case for Security, CD theft was a major issue for local stores in the mid-90s.  There was a roving gang of thieves called the “Pizza Guys”* who ripped off CDs from major chains and then sold them all over town.  The cops were aware of the situation, and instructed us to keep buying from them so they could collect evidence.  We followed their instructions and they had pages and pages and pages of information on these guys.  What they sold, where, and when — and what ID they were using.

Nobody liked dealing with those guys.  They were rude, and drew attention to themselves with the massive amounts of new releases they were selling — multiple copies.  They were cocky and got bolder week by week.  But not as bold as the rookie employee dubbed “The Boy that Killed Pink Floyd”.

He wanted the Hackers soundtrack.  He wasn’t willing to pay new prices and he had his name in the computer for a used one.  Then he got a bright idea.  He didn’t “ask” the Pizza Guys for a copy.  He just made it really obvious that he wanted one.

One day when we were buying CDs off the Pizza gang, the kid asked, “No Hackers in here, eh?”

A few visits later, the gang was back.  Entering the store, one of the leaders smiled, nodded and simply said “Hackers!”   He had somehow acquired a copy, and even acknowledged the request.  I don’t know how our kid didn’t get fired for that one.  The boss was not impressed!  He finally got his walking papers after special ordering an expensive Pink Floyd CD single, deciding he didn’t want it, and putting it on the shelves to sell as a used item.  That was the end of the Boy Who Killed Pink Floyd!

 

*Because they served up hot slices.

 

#951: Set Your VCR, It’s 1986 and KISS Meets The Phantom Is On Tonight!

Special thanks to Jennifer Ladano for telling me to write this story down!

RECORD STORE TALES #951: Set Your VCR!
It’s 1986 and KISS Meets The Phantom Is On Tonight!

When thinking back about my earliest rock and roll discoveries, it’s important to recall the order in which I got the albums, or first heard the tunes.  It seems like I had always known “Rock N’ Roll all Nite”, but since my first Kiss albums were Alive! and Hotter Than Hell, those were the songs I knew best.  And I barely knew them!  I got my first Kiss in September of ’85.  But I was learning slowly.  Eventually I’d get Asylum, and gradually tape Kiss albums from my neighbour George.

Something else happened that exposed me to Kiss in a new way, that I sometimes forget about.  It was the first time I saw Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park.

Everybody knew about Kiss Meets the Phantom, but few of us were old enough to have seen it.  When it showed up in the TV guide one week, on some Buffalo station, it seemed like every kid with access to a VCR set it to record.  It was being shown at something like 1:00 in the morning on a Sunday.

Upon waking, I got my sister up early and we raced downstairs to watch.  We did not have time to watch the whole thing that morning.  It was winter, possibly the tail end of Christmas holidays, and we were off to the lake for one day.  We watched some, went to the lake, had lunch at the Embassy, and came home to finish the movie.

I noticed there were far more ads to fast forward through on late night TV than during the day!


Actual ads from the actual tape of the actual night.

My sister recalls liking Kiss Meets the Phantom; my memories are quite different.  I was bored to tears any time Kiss wasn’t on screen, and you had to wait through, like, an hour (with ads) for Kiss to arrive at the bloody park!  I didn’t know who this Anthony Zerbe fellow was, but at age 13 I considered him possibly the worst actor I had ever seen.

It was my first time seeing Peter Criss on video and not just still photos, and I was surprised at his voice.  I told everyone, “Peter Criss sounds like Aquaman.”  I had the show right, but the character wrong.  Michael Bell did the voice of Peter Criss in Kiss Meets the Phantom, and Wonder Twin Zan in the cartoon Superfriends.  Legend has it that this was because Peter didn’t show up to loop his lines in post-production.  Whatever the case, it led to a different urban legends:  that Peter Criss had given up rock and roll, and taken up a lucrative career as a cartoon voice actor!

I thought Gene’s distorted voice was tiresome after a while, and Paul seemed the coolest.  My sister liked that Kiss were like superheroes with powers.  On the other hand, I didn’t like that.  If Paul Stanley couldn’t shoot a laser beam out of his eye in real life, I didn’t understand why he would in this movie.  They were still Kiss, still playing the same Kiss songs, but also super-powered.  My rigid brain couldn’t reconcile the two.

As for the music, the movie contains several songs that I heard for the very first time that day.  “Beth” (acoustic, no less), “Shout It Out Loud”, “God of Thunder” and “I Stole Your Love”.  (“Rip and Destroy” doesn’t count.)  Now, because I didn’t know these songs, and there were no captions, I had to guess at the titles.  “Shout It Out Loud” was the easy one.  But these were the live versions taken from Alive II, fast and reckless.  Not to mention we were hearing it on a TV with mono speaker; state of the art for the time, but not for proper music listening.  So that’s why, for that day at least, I thought “God of Thunder” was “Not a Doctor”, and “I Stole Your Love” was something that sounded like “I Ho-Jo-Ho”.

The process of discovering Kiss was so memorable because it’s so fun.  The superhero character aspect appealed to my sister and there’s no denying that it had something to do with why I loved Kiss too.  But hearing the songs and albums for the first time can only happen once.  And I can clearly remember a tinge of sadness when I finally acquired Rock and Roll Over, the last original Kiss album I needed to finish my collection.  I was starkly aware that I was having this experience for the last time:  hearing a classic Kiss album, guessing who was singing the songs by the title alone, and discovering hidden favourites.  As I learned when Crazy Nights came out, hearing a new Kiss album was simply not the same as discovering the classics!

Kiss Meets the Phantom was a struggle to sit through then, but fortunately I saw it at an age when Kiss still seemed larger than life.  Objectively, it is a pretty terrible film, best enjoyed as a trainwreck.  The best parts are the concert scenes, which was the closest I got to seeing Kiss live at age 13.  It was my first exposure to some really important songs even if I wondered why Gene was singing about being “Not a Doctor”!

[Re-Post] Part 241: Halloween, KISS style!

Always nice to repost a seasonal classic.  Enjoy this Halloween tale.

RECORD STORE TALES Part 241:  Halloween, KISS style!

Our annual inventory count fell on October 31.  For five years straight, I never got to dress up, hand out candy, or do anything fun on Halloween because I was too busy counting discs and CD towers!  However in the early days, this wasn’t the case.  Halloween 1996 was actually a pretty good one.

Like most malls, ours had a few Halloween contests.  T-Rev entered the store in the Pumpkin Carving category.  He and I came up with the plan to do a Kiss pumpkin.  T-Rev, the store owner’s brother, and myself gathered in my mom’s workshop in the basement. My mom had plenty of paint, and I was good at drawing the Kiss makeup designs.  T-Rev had the idea to make the pumpkin Gene Simmons, and figured out how to make a pumpkin tongue stick out.  I must say he did an amazing job.

The first step was to spray paint the pumpkin white.  One of the guys did the cutting.  Then, I drew the Demon design with a black magic marker.  We thought the nose needed to be more three-dimensional, so I cut it out a bit.  Together, we began colouring in Gene’s makeup.  We needed something to define the eyes of Gene, and T-Rev thought of using pumpkin seeds.  We added a wig, and voila!

T-Rev propped Gene up on the magazine stand outside the store.  Immediately we started getting compliments, and the response was pretty unanimous:  We had done the best job in the entire mall.

Unfortunately, the judges didn’t base their ratings on who had done the best job.  They were only marking the results, whether the store employees did the pumpkins themselves or not!  A store that hired a professional carver won first place.  We came in second.  There was no prize for second.  T-Rev and I considered that to be cheating.  Cheatie-cheatertons.

The contest was over, and not too soon:  the pumpkin had begun to rot, as pumpkins do.  That didn’t stop a customer from coming in on November 1st and offering him $10 for it.  T-Rev accepted his gracious offer, even though the thing would be turning horrific in a day or two.  A fool and his money, right T-Rev?

By 1997, the store had moved out of the mall.  This was our last pumpkin carving contest, but at least we had the satisfaction of winning the popular vote.  As far as I’m concerned, we went out on top.  My personal consolation prize was later on, Halloween 2006.  By this time I had moved on to United Rentals.  They took Halloween very, very seriously at United Rentals!  I dressed up as Paul Stanley, and this time, I finally won first prize!

#950: A Letter To S

Hey S,

I felt like writing again, I hope you don’t mind.  My emails are not the esteemed A Life in Letters by Isaac Asimov, but it’s more about the process of the writing for me.

I’ve been listening to Van Halen in the car a lot.  Long story short:  I’ve been having issues with my music hard drive in the car, with it repeating tracks.  I discovered I could fix it by formatting the drive and starting over.  Certain Van Halen albums used to give me issues in the car, with the repeating songs.  It’s been a pleasure to rock to King Edward this week.  It’s hard to believe but he died over a year ago now.

I remember coming home from work the day he died and I was just in a foul mood.  Not only was I grieving Edward Van Halen, but I felt stupid for grieving someone I never met and never hoped to meet.  It was a torrent of shitty feelings, plus I hadn’t eaten properly.  It was a Tuesday and I had to do laundry or something, and I snapped at Jen.  I felt like an asshole afterwards.  I also remember telling you this story, and you were the one who said it was OK to be grieving.  Until that moment I didn’t really consider that maybe you don’t have to be a psycho to be upset about Van Halen’s death.

Music aside — which was usually warm, fun with instrumental and occasional lyrical depth — Van Halen meant a lot to me.  I must have been 13 years old when I was sitting on the porch with my best friend Bob, hearing 1984 on the tape deck for the first time.  My dad came home from work, heard the noise and asked what we were listening to, as dads often did.  “Van Halen!?” he said.  “Sounds like some kind of tropical disease!”

My dad was always good with one liners!  When we watched music videos on Much, he would mock the singers shrieking their best operatic screams.  “What’s wrong with that man?  Should he go to the hospital?  He sounds like he’s in pain!”

Good memories, all.  I’m very attached to those childhood memories.  I’m trying to commit them all to writing before they’re gone.  Often, lost memories can be triggered by an old photograph.  But there are many things I wish I had video of!  If only there was a tape or photograph of that first time I heard Van Halen.  But film was a precious commodity until the last 15 years or so.  You didn’t just take pictures of you and your friends listening to music on the front porch.

I remember some of the tapes, and conversations.  Iron Maiden’s Maiden Japan was popular in our porch listening sessions.  George would come over from next door, and Bob would come over with his tapes.  My house was right in the middle!  I wonder how much of my happiest childhood memories are due to geographic concerns.  If my house wasn’t right there in the middle of everybody, maybe I never would have been there that day to hear Van Halen or Iron Maiden.

Sometimes I worry that I spend too much time living in the past and trying to recapture those moments.  But then I think about what you would say to that.  “Why are you worried about something that brings you happiness?” I think you might ask.  And you’d be right.  So bring on the Van Halen.  Bring on the Iron Maiden.  Let’s party like it’s 1985.  Might as well go for a soda — nobody hurts, nobody dies.

Mike

 

#949: My Music at Work (2006-2007)

RECORD STORE TALES #949: My Music at Work (2006-2007)

 

None of my jobs since quitting the Record Store have been musical in nature.  Dealing in steel pipe and accounts payable were boring by comparison, but everywhere I go, I bring music with me.

For a brief while I was working at Novocol Pharmaceuticals.  They make the stuff that freezes your teeth so the dentist can do his work.  It was pretty wild; I had a lab coat and a cubicle.  One day I heard music drifting in.  I got out of my chair and wandered around.  I realized that the music was coming from the phone.

Many offices have phones that can play a radio station piped in.  A little mono speaker, but better than nothing.  It was the first music I had in the workplace since quitting the store.  CHYM FM became my nemesis as time went on, but for the moment, I was glad to have music again.  James Blunt, Rod Stewart, and a lot of “Bad Day” by Daniel Powter.  Remember Daniel Powter?

I was at Novocol for a few weeks, and then I had an opportunity at United Rentals where I spent over a year of some of the best work days I ever had.  United was a very special place and I’m glad I got to experience it.  I made many friends there, and once again, they had the phone radios set to CHYM.

At United, we had a big back room with 8-10 computers for us to enter invoices.  When we started the room was full.  And I made myself known as the music guy when Rod Stewart came on the radio, as I spoke up to sing his praises.  It was the first good song all day.  Probably “Downtown Train”.  That station only played one or two songs per artist, unless that artist was Beyonce.

“Right on, Rod Stewart!” I announced to the room. “Great song!”

The immediate response from one of the younger girls in the room was “Who’s Rod Stewart?”

I feigned shock.  “Who’s Rod Stewart!?  The guy with the spikey hair!  You know ‘Reason to Believe’, ‘Have I Told You Lately’, ‘Rhythm of my Heart’, ‘Tonight’s the Night’…no?”

No.  They did not.

I put up with CHYM for a long time, but one day somebody changed the radio station to Dave FM, the local rock station.  All of a sudden, Bon Jovi and Quiet Riot at work were a mainstay.  Even Judas Priest.  “You’ve Got Another Thing Comin'”.  Hearing that at work, a band that I was not allowed to play back in the Record Store days, it was awesome.  Just awesome.  Here I was in an Accounts Payable office, listening to music I liked better than what I was allowed to play at the store.

The boss poked his nose in the door.  “Hey, is that Quiet Riot?  I used to love Quiet Riot!”  I was the only one in the room who knew what he was talking about.  He was a good boss; he helped me get my current job.

“Lick It Up” would thump from that little mono speaker.  It was still better than whatever I was allowed to listen to when I worked in an actual music store.  The only times I played Kiss there were the occasions no bosses were around, and I was confident I wouldn’t get caught.  If I was working at an out-of-town store like Oakville, I would play forbidden bands like Kiss and Iron Maiden.  I knew nobody would be popping in for a surprise visit.

Not everybody was happy with the music at United.  One lady, a couple years older than me, liked CHYM.

United closed their Kitchener office in 2007 and moved operations to the US.  Employees were being shed slowly, and in the latter days there were only three of us left in the back room.  There was an older lady, a younger one, and me.  Two of us loved the music that Dave FM played, one of us claimed it caused headaches.  No matter how low the volume was.

“How can you listen to this?  It’s just noise,” she would complain.

She wasn’t even that much older than me.  Four years tops.  But after having Rhianna and Kelly Clarkson forced upon us for a year, my sympathy was not high.  I offered to bring in some CDs from home that I thought everyone would like.  I chose The Cars.  Turns out I was the only Cars fan.  We stuck to the radio and Dave FM.

Because the office was closing, we were all looking for new jobs.  We were trying to be supportive of each other, but I noticed that the one older lady that didn’t like rock music was starting to become a little difficult to bear.  She’d always been like a motherly figure, helping others.  This seemed to change as we got closer and closer to the end.  She was getting this attitude of superiority and it wasn’t helping my self esteem.  I had 10 years of retail management, which she told me wasn’t enough for the kind of jobs I was looking for.  I’d have to set my sights lower and work my way up, according to her.  A little encouragement would have been better medicine, but talking to her made me feel like I was going to be stuck forever.  In a few weeks she’d be gone, thankfully, to a new job as a receptionist.  Good riddance.  The vacuum enabled me to step up into a leadership role at the end of United.  And then the call came through – I was needed.  Urgently.  And now I’m here!

To my chagrin, my new work had CHYM FM on the speaker phones too.  But as in the past, CHYM didn’t last and before too long, Dave was back.  History repeats!

#948: Post-script

RECORD STORE TALES #948:  Post-script

In this life, at least since 2018, we have learned to take nothing for granted.  We treat every trip to the cottage like it’s the last, but I really didn’t expect to get back this late in the season.

With some Judas Priest on the stereo (Sad Wings of Destiny), we made one more uneventful trip up north.  The weather forecast was not good, but the Friday was still lovely.  We arrived early afternoon and I set up my laptop and speakers on the front porch for what really might be the last time in 2021.  I did not waste a note of music.  It was raining but the overhang kept me dry.  Listening to song after song, I chose my Top 5 best album closing tracks for that night’s show.  Finalized!

The best office you could want, rain or shine

I can’t remember the last time we made it to the lake this late in October.  Friday I wore shorts.  Saturday was another story….

I woke up early Saturday morning and went for a walk in the pitch black.  It was wet from the rain but otherwise warm and dead quiet.  A few hours later, the wind and rain picked up and Saturday became an “indoor day”.

I went down to the beach for a few moments to capture some video but I couldn’t make it further than the treeline.  The wind was blasting the rain right through my clothes.  It’s been many years since I’ve experienced that kind of weather.  We battened down the hatches and prepared for a cold one.  It was a good day for movies, music and toys.  The heat went on and so did the long pants!

You can feel this picture

Sunday was the really interesting day.  The reality was hitting me that it could possibly be months before we saw this place again.  I was trying to really absorb the sounds, sights and feelings.  I had two flashbacks, and they were intense.

The first happened in the early morning.  I was cleaning the kitchen and put on some tunes to work to.  I chose Rock and Roll Over by Kiss, as it had the classic Kiss vibe I wanted and strong cottage memories associated with it.  The first time I heard Rock and Roll Over was there at the cottage – it was the last Kiss studio album I needed.  I would have been about 15.  As I was washing the dishes, singing and dancing to “Mr. Speed” I suddenly had the first flashback.  I was in that very kitchen with my best friend Bob and I was a teenager again.  We were doing the dishes and rocking out to Kiss.  It was entirely in my imagination.  We never washed the dishes to Kiss that I can think of.  Yes the parents would usually ask us to help with the dishes, and any time we had company over, I conceded because I didn’t want to look like a spoiled brat.  But we never did it with music playing, that I can remember.  But we would have if we could.

It was such an intense feeling that I needed to stop what I was doing and take a breath.  I could literally see us both, washing the dishes and rocking to Kiss.  It probably never happened that way but my flashback didn’t care.

Once that intense experience had passed and the kitchen was clean, I went outside to wander and take some last pictures.  My 49th season in this place.  An awesome season and truly one of the very best.   It was then that I had the second intense flashback.

49 years

I was walking around the side of the cottage, thinking about how awesome it was to be walking around shirtless in this paradise all summer.  And then suddenly – I was.  For a brief moment the sun was blasting my shirtless skin.  And then it was over.  It was like when Will Byers suddenly flashes into the Update Down on Stranger Things.  In a blink it ended and was gone.  I just enjoyed the experience.  I’d like more flashbacks like this to happen.  It’s all about the setting and the mindset.

Once Jen and I had finished packing, I was locking up and I noticed her at the end of the driveway staring at the lake.  It is her favourite place in the world; she calls it her “safe place”.  I joined her and asked if she wanted to take one more look around.  We walked down to the windy beach one more time and just drank it all in.  The sight of the churning lake, the sound of the crashing waves, and the feeling of the wind on our skin.

And that was it.  With heavy heart we started the car and hit the road.  If that was the end of the season, by God we had a good one!  Some of the best tunes, meals, swimming, live shows and videos were had this year.  An unforgettable summer, interviewing rock stars from the comfort of the front porch with Lake Huron before me.  Top that, 2022.

 

#946: Novel 30 Year-Old CD Packaging

RECORD STORE TALES #946: 30 Year-Old Novel CD Packaging

It’s not every day that I run into a CD packaging design that is new to me.  From all sorts of digipacks, to variations on the classic jewel case, to the SACD and DVD Audio, I thought I had seen it all.  Today I found one that is new to me.  It belongs to a CD single by the Scottish band Gun, from their first album Taking on the World.  That dates the single to over 30 years ago, so it’s surprising I haven’t seen anything like it before.

This is how it happened.  I was looking for a specific Metallica single (“The Unnamed Feeling”) to begin completing my St. Anger collection.  (I still need the Australian version with unique Australian live tracks, and an annoying version with a remix on it.)  Because I don’t like to buy just one thing, I checked other discs that the seller was offering.  I chose a 1994 Jackyl single for “Push Comes to Shove”, and the Gun single.  It was the title track from Taking on the World, a brilliant song itself, backed by a 12″ mix of their other big single “Better Days” and a non-album cover of Thin Lizzy’s “Don’t Believe a Word”.  The singles arrived in the mail last week and now I’m getting around to listening.

The Gun single comes in a regular thin cardboard sleeve, like many typical CD singles.  Here’s where it gets interesting.  I popped out the disc, and what should I find inside?  Not the usual 5″ single, no.  This is a 3″ single, much less common.

I have seen 3″ singles come in four different kinds of cases before.

1. Simple 3″ cardboard sleeve, like this copy of Queen’s First E.P.

2. 3″ Jewel case, like Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” 2021 release.  (Click here to see a version of the same jewel case, but sold with a blank 3″ CDr.)

3. This unusual white plastic stickered case, from Poison’s “Every Rose Has Its Thorn”.

4. Finally and least interestingly…just a regular 5″ CD single jewel case.

The Gun CD, released on A&M Records in 1990, is now the fifth storage system I’m found for the 3″ disc.  From inside the regular 5″ cardboard sleeve came a 3″ CD attached to a white plastic tray.  I have never seen one like it before.  It is specifically designed to hold 3″ discs, and has a three-pronged center to grasp the CD securely.

Isn’t it fascinating that after almost four decades of collecting music over different formats, that I just found a packaging design that I’ve never encountered in my travels?  I spent 12 years in a used CD store and this is the first 3″ white plastic tray I’ve ever seen.  Thank you Discogs!

#945: Spinning Vinyl ’75

RECORD STORE TALES #945: Spinning Vinyl ’75

If there was ever a photo that prophesized the future, I have found it.  Taken in late 1975, there I am listening to a record with a big pair of headphones on.  I was merely three, but look at the smile on my face.  And the clothes…am I wearing shoes in the house?

Behind me, the original family stereo.  Every family in the neighbourhood had one.  Ours had an 8-track player and a turntable.  You can tell I’m playing a record, and not a tape, because the cover is off the turntable.  The big clunky headphones didn’t fit my head, but they would later.  Because this system had an 8-track deck, it also came with two microphones.

Oh my God I just realized my mom put a plant on top of the stereo!

Since this is before Star Wars, I probably wasn’t listening to music.  I only remember owning two records.  One was a Lone Ranger story record, and the other was The Flintstones.  But they came out after this picture was taken.  If this photo had been taken in the Instagram era, the cover would be prominently displayed behind me.  Sadly we’ll never know what I was listening to.

VIDEO: Misty Weekend (with Max the Axe )

A visual supplement to Record Store Tales #944:  Mosquito Song

Playing around with faster editing to suit the musical track:  “Thirsty and Miserable”, the new Black Flag cover by Max the Axe, from the Oktoberfest Cheer EP.  Enjoy a good look at some wild (and probably poisonous) mushrooms!  Cameo by Classic Loki.