Record Store Tales

Part 115: The Rockmobile!

RECORD STORE TALES PART 115:  The Rockmobile!

In the early 2000’s, somebody thought it would be a good idea to spend money on some company cars.  Now, I’m no accountant.  I’m no expert on finances.  But I would have thought it would make more sense to pay mileage cheques on time than to buy a mini-fleet of cars!

They were Azteks.  They were painted in our store colours and had G-I-A-N-T store logos plastered all over them.  It was like driving a giant logo board.  They were hideous.  I only rode in one, once.  They tried to get me to lease one though.

“Hey Mike.  How would you like to drive one of these babies?”

Wha?  Why would I want to when I had my own car that I bought, that wasn’t a big ugly moving billboard?  Let me tell you something people.  They weren’t just ugly, they were fugly!

I guess the idea here was advertizing;  mobile advertizing.  I’m not too sure if that worked.  I don’t know how many people driving down the street would see a car like that and go, “Quick honey, write down that phone number — I need some CDs!”

SAM_0492

Coincidentally, GM slashed the price of the Aztek right around the time we got ours…

I think two or three people drove the Azteks.  I heard they weren’t that great.

One afternoon working in the head office, I overheard a phone call.  A customer was calling in to complain about somebody driving one of our Azteks.  I knew it was Meredith, one of the favourites.  She must have pissed someone off in traffic, like “Hey, that idiot in the CD Car cut me off!  I’m phoning their boss.”  I’d hate to own one of those and somebody see it in my driveway.  “Hey, that’s the guy who only gave me $1 for my Mellencamp!  Let’s go egg his house!”

So, I happily drove my own car instead of one of those ugly RockSuckmobiles.  They were phased out a couple years later.  The great experiment had presumably failed, because the Azteks were no more.  Never to be seen again.  Thank God.

 

 

Part 114: Albums That Don’t Exist

RECORD STORE TALES Part 114:  Albums That Don’t Exist

I had plenty of requests for albums that didn’t exist.  Or at least, I don’t think they exist.  Am I right or wrong?  Leave a comment.

Who.  Not The Who.  Not The Guess Who.  Just…Who.  I was told that albums by this band exist.  I can’t imagine how a band could be called just “Who”, but the customer swore up and down that’s the band, not to be confused by the other two.

Jewel’s first album, before Pieces Of You.  Maybe she released an indi album?  Regardless, the thought of any showing up in a used CD store in southern Ontario, all the way from Alaska, wasn’t too likely if they existed at all!

Blue Rodeo’s Greatest Hits…but years before they actually released one.  In the mid to late 1990’s A lot of people were baffled by a band that had 7 or 8 studio albums, but no hits collection.  Yet it was insisted to me by a customer that not only did they have a greatest hits CD, but that they’d seen it for sale elsewhere.

Five solo albums, by all five Backstreet Boys, released simultaneously.  A feat to make Kiss jealous, unfortunately such albums do not exist.  Which makes me wonder what the lady was smoking when she mocked me for not knowing about them, since “Walmart has them!”  Don’t know how they got something that doesn’t exist.  But that’s what she said.  I guess that makes me the dumbass.

Black Sabbath 1991, an album that supposedly came between Tyr and Dehumanizer.  The guy kept calling for this album that never existed.  My best guess is that he was looking for Lynyrd Skynyrd 1991?

Comment below!  Do any of these albums exist?

Part 113: Destiny (“It’s Like It Was Meant to Be”)

RECORD STORE TALES PART 113:  Destiny (“It’s Like It Was Meant To Be”)

Sometimes, like destiny, something cool arrived on my counter at random. Something I’d been hunting for.  Something special, that hit the spot at exactly the right time.  That was the beauty of used CD’s.  Even more than a box of chocolate, you truly never knew what you were going to get!

For example:

IAN GILLAN – The Best Of

I had pretty much cleaned up on Deep Purple, and I was ready to start exploring the solo projects of people like Gillan, Glover and Lord.  Like it was meant to be, suddenly The Best Of Ian Gillan showed up!  This compilation covered his two most recent solo releases, Tool Box and Naked Thunder.  Both albums are hard to get, and I still don’t have them!  This compilation hit the spot.

I remember Statham coming into the store while I was playing the opening track, “Hung Me Out to Dry”.  He chuckled at the opening screams!  “What is this?” he laughed.  But he respected my choice instead of mocking it which is more than I can say for some of the coworkers!   You never see this stuff used in these parts, but once in a blue moon.  I truly felt like I’d hit a home run!

Another example:

DEEP PURPLE – “Haunted” (CD single)

I’d been planning on ordering this one online. I found it on the German Amazon site, but only there so far.  All the single had was a bonus remix of “Haunted”, but as a Deep Purple completist, this is the kind of rarity that I seek.  CD singles tended to be a European thing and hard to get here.  I was prepared to have to pay up to $15 for this single….

When suddenly a guy brought in not one but TWO promotional copies with the bonus track!  Unmarked promotional copies, as in only the case was marked, which you can replace.  SCORE!  I saved myself some cash on that lucky happenstance, and the other copy sold off the shelf in short order.

A third great example:

JOURNEY – Trial By Fire (Japanese import)

I had been collecting Journey rarities, especially the Steve Perry years.  I saw a Japanese import of the final album they did with him, Trial By Fire, at HMV 333 Yonge in Toronto.  It was $40 or $45.  The bonus track was “I Can See It In Your Eyes”.  It just wasn’t in the budget that day.  I had several Japanese imports in my hands that day, and something had to be sacrificed.  Journey didn’t make the cut.

And then a couple weeks later, one of my regulars, Conrad, sold me a mint condition copy, bonus track intact.  Instead of paying $45, I paid $15!  Score!

REVIEW: The Black Crowes – Before The Frost…Until The Freeze (2009 CD, vinyl)
THE BLACK CROWES – Before The Frost…Until The Freeze (2009 Silver Arrow)
I didn’t know what to expect when I cracked the seal on my brand new vinyl LP of Before The Frost…Until The Freeze. The Crowes do something different every time. Reemember how different By Your Side was from Three Snakes? And how Lions was from both of those?  Not to mention Southern Harmony compared to Money Maker…
The Crowes have done it again, with an album different from their others, and they did it right.  Not that Warhorse was a bad album at all, although it’s one that remains tucked away on my shelves most of the time.  This time, the Crowes are digging way, way back to their roots.  The album is evocative of many eras of American music, from the 1920’s to the 1970’s, with an emphasis on the blues.  There’s also some bluegrass on this album, plenty of acoustics, and a little bit of funk.
And interestingly,a lot of it seems to be recorded live in front of a studio audience. Amazing atmosphere on Before The Frost…Until The Freeze!

I will say that this album should really be owned on vinyl. I own both the vinyl and CD formats, and vinyl is the most enjoyable listen.  The vinyl comes with all 20 tracks in a more logical order.  The CD comes with 10 songs, and a download code to the get the rest.  It’s nice that you can get all 20 songs via download, but I’m too old-school for that. I want to own these songs on some form of plastic.  Some form of physical product.  I want to hear these songs breathe on vinyl, because the Crowes are meant for vinyl.

Here’s your track list for both LPs.  The first record is more mellow, rootsy and acoustic.  The second, more electric and blues-driven.

Record one — Green vinyl!

“Aimless Peacock” – 6:40
“Good Morning Captain” – 3:24
“Been a Long Time (Waiting on Love)” – 7:47
“Greenhorn” – 7:12
“Appaloosa” – 3:35
“The Shady Grove” – 4:42
“The Garden Gate” – 4:21
“Shine Along” – 4:47
“Roll Old Jeremiah”- 4:40
“Houston Don’t Dream About Me” – 5:05

Record two — White vinyl!

“I Ain’t Hiding” – 5:57
“Kept My Soul” – 5:23
“Lady of Ave. A” – 5:20
“Make Glad” – 4:18
“And the Band Played On…” – 4:12
“What Is Home?” – 5:13
“So Many Times” – 4:53
“A Train Still Makes a Lonely Sound” – 4:23
“Fork in the River” – 4:11
“The Last Place That Love Lives” – 4:57

To give you an example of why you need to hear this on vinyl, the first track, “Aimless Peacock”, is a nice acoustic instrumental. It segues pretty seamlessly into “Good Morning Captain”, a beautiful song. Well, if you buy the CD, “Good Morning Captain” is track 1, and “Aimless Peacock” is track 1 of the free downloads. So you miss that transition.

The best songs for me:

“The Garden Gate” — pure bluegrass. Could have been on the O Brother soundtrack. Beautiful song, amazing song. And this one isn’t even on the CD version, just the vinyl/download.

“I Ain’t Hiding” — wow. You go from the very bluegrass first LP, to this opening track on record two, which is pure 70’s disco funk. That’s why you need to hear this on two LPs! This is track 5 on the CD, which makes its appearance more jarring.

Other standouts include “Appaloosa”, “Roll Old Jeremiah”, Rich’s “What Is Home?”, and “Good Morning Captain”, but really this is a great album, all 20 songs. It’s a great one to just chill and relax to.  I think it’s becoming my favourite Crowes album.  I’m a big fan of Amorica, but when I can find the time to devote to it, I think I prefer Before The Frost…Until The Freeze.

5/5 stars

CD tracklist for the curious:

  1. “Good Morning Captain” – 3:24
  2. “Been a Long Time (Waiting on Love)” – 7:47
  3. “Appaloosa” – 3:35
  4. “A Train Still Makes a Lonely Sound” – 4:23
  5. “I Ain’t Hiding” – 5:57
  6. “Kept My Soul” – 5:23
  7. “What Is Home?” – 5:13
  8. “Houston Don’t Dream About Me” – 5:05
  9. “Make Glad” – 4:18
  10. “And the Band Played On…” – 4:12
  11. “The Last Place That Love Lives” – 4:57

Part 112: Klassic Kwotes IX!

RECORD STORE TALES PART 112:  Klassic Kwotes IX!

1. “I just have this image of Josh shaking his ‘thing'”.  Not actually spoken in-store, this was found on the ground on a piece of pink notepaper, after a gaggle of school girls had left the store.  Odd.

2. “I’ll tell you something, somebody’s getting fat off that Gumbo thing!” said the surly old man when I showed him the price of the Forrest Gump soundtrack.  Too rich for him!

3. “So how is the new N’Sync CD, is it decent?”  Why would you even ask this question of a guy wearing a Kiss shirt?

4. “I hear good things about it.”  My response.  This was a standardized response for if you hadn’t heard the album in question, or had heard it but hated it.  For example, “How’s the new Nickelback?”  The correct answer would have been, “I hear good things about it.” 

5.  Another standardized answer for questions like that:  “If you liked their last album, you’ll like this one.”

6. “Can I try these out?” said the guy holding about dozen discs, 10 minutes before closing time.  (Luckily, we had a policy of shutting down the CD players 15 minutes before close to avoid these situations.)

7. “Sorry man.  These things are on timers.  I can’t even turn it on.”  This is what you said if a simple, “No, sorry man, we’re closing,” wasn’t good enough.  And people believed it!  There was a neat trick.  The headphones were hooked up to these little amps.  But if I shut down the amp, there was a good 20-30 second delay before the music died.  So I covertly could flip a switch to kill the amp, walk across the store, and be doing something else before the customer’s music stops.  Then when they’d say, “Hey, the music stopped, I don’t know what happened,” I would respond:  “Sorry man.  Those things are on timers. We’re closing and they automatically shut down at this time.”  This was reserved for the jerks who abused the players.

8. “Sorry man, this CD is too scratched for me to take,” said I, to the customer selling the disc.  His classic response?  “Fuck!  That’s what you said when I brought it in last time!  But this time I fuckin’ buffed it in Turtle Wax!”

9. When we first opened, we had a big huge sign that said “WE PAY CSAH FOR USED CDS“.

10. The man from the sign company came in to fix the sign.  He said to me, and I swear to God I’m not making this up — he said to me, “That’s Bill.  He spells ‘cash’ wrong on every sign.”

BONUS 11! “Hey man.  You spelled ‘cash’ wrong on your sign you know.”  No kidding?  And Bill fuckin’ spelled it wrong, not me!

Part 111: The Girl In the Sam Roberts Shirt

RECORD STORE TALES PART 111:  The Girl In the Sam Roberts Shirt

Saturday, Sept. 17, 2005.  I had a rare Saturday off, and I wasn’t wasting it.

I was single, and interested in a couple different girls.  First there was Mel.  She was a nice but just always in a hurry.  She drove like a maniac and for her it was all rush-rush-rush.  We had a “date” that Saturday morning.  We were heading to St. Jacobs to go to the market.

Well, this wasn’t the kind of market excursion I was used to.  She was rushing from vendor to vendor, getting what she needed, with no time to look around!  I had a couple things I wanted to buy and she paced and tapped her toes waiting as I looked.  It wasn’t comfortable.  I ended up buying some T-shirts (Bob Marley and Slash) and a Lego set.  The Lego set, the Ultimate Collector’s Series Y-Wing fighter, was $200.  She wanted to pay for it.  That creeped me out a bit, considering I barely knew this girl.  I said no.  And that was basically it.  She drove me home, and that was all.  No sparks, just the creeps.

Before I went on my date with Mel, I was up all night talking to Jen.  Jen was from Brampton.  She was a hockey loving Christian who also liked Johnny Cash and Nirvana.  I didn’t even sleep that night, we were on the phone until daylight.  I said to Jen, “I have this date with this Mel girl in a few hours.  But I don’t even really want to go.”  In a way I was relieved that the “date” didn’t go well.  I wasn’t into it, and even though she was a hockey-loving Christian, and I hadn’t been to church in almost 20 years, I had a much better connection with Jen.

I spent Saturday putting together my Lego set.  It actually took me all week to finish.  It was massive.

Sunday the 18th I had to work.  I grew to hate working Sundays.  I don’t remember anything about that work day at all — maybe I’ve blocked it out?  Jen recalls a little bit.  She remembers me telling her that I was having a shitty day at the store.  Sundays were usually pretty busy right from the get-go, and Sundays we were usually inundated with jerk knobs and dipsticks.  It wasn’t a great part of town to work in.  We attracted a high ratio of customers that did not carry any kind of currency, but needed to kill time listening to music at a CD store.

“Hey!” she said.  “Are you doing anything tonight?”

“Well, nothing I can’t cancel,” I said.  “Why?”

“Do you want to come down to Brampton and hang out?”

Sure!  I was down for that.  She gave me the directions, and I hopped in my green Dodge Neon and hit the highway.

I pulled into the driveway, and a blonde girl wearing a Sam Roberts T-shirt, with the bluest eyes I’d ever seen was waiting for me.  She smiled a smile that lit up the whole day.  I was wearing the Marley shirt that I bought the day before.  The night flew by.  We went to a park and played on the swings.  We went to Sonny’s, and had some of their legendary poutine, and probably the best cheeseburger I’ve ever had in my life.  The night flew by.

I had to work Monday morning, as usual.  I left Brampton around 9 so I could get home and get to bed at a decent hour.  As I drove down Dixie Road towards Highway 401, I said to myself, “That girl is special.  Whatever you do, you have to make sure she doesn’t get hurt.  She’s different than the others you’ve met.”

And she was.  And 3 years later, Jen became Mrs. LeBrain.

Part 110: FAQ

For those of you just joining us, I felt now was as good a time as any to answer some FAQ’s about working in a record store in general, and my experience specifically!

RECORD STORE TALES PART 110: FAQ

FAQ 1:  So, it’s just like Empire Records, right?

NO!  Not even close.  We never had a couch.  I hate that movie.

FAQ 2:  I thought working in a record store was supposed to be fun?  Why is your blog so bitchy?

This is something I am trying to be especially conscious of – a good balance.  Yes, working in a record store is fun.  The treasures that float your way, the characters you run into, and the situations can be quite funny/cool/exciting.  But my experience was both sides of the coin.  Being a manager, reporting to a corporate structure, during the beginning of the downloading era had plenty of sucky moments too.  It is easy to look back with the benefit of hindsight and say, “We did this wrong, we missed the boat here, and we messed this up.”   My bottom line has always been to make you laugh and hopefully that happens from time to time!

FAQ 3:  So you got a discount, right?

Yes!  New employees didn’t get one until they were done probation, due to past abuses.  Once it kicked in, it was pretty sweet.  The only thing that we couldn’t get discounts on were rarities.  Anything rare, like let’s say the first Tea Party CD, we were not allowed discounts on.  But that discount allowed my collection to grow 20-fold!

         

FAQ 4:  How do I get a job in a music store?

In my experience, there are two ways.  One is to know somebody that works there to get you in. Keep shopping there and chatting up the staff until they know you.  Another way is to apply like any other job, and have a wealth of musical knowledge to back you up.  I don’t know how important musical knowledge is anymore, with Google able to answer most questions, but that’s how it was for us.

FAQ 5:  What’s the rarest thing you ever saw come in?  

Well, that depends.  Rarity is relative.  What was rare then can be common now.  But one thing for sure was that rare Tea Party album.  I also saw a Japanese import Deep Purple box set.

FAQ 6:  So, it’s just like Empire Records, right?

GAHHHH!

Part 109: The Summer From Hell!

RECORD STORE TALES Part 109:  The Summer From Hell

Summer, 2004.

I had one really, really awful summer at the store.  My full-time backup had quit, and head office made the decision not to hire a replacement until the Christmas gear-up season.  Instead, they decided to spread out the part-timers to cover the hours.  They were always eager for hours, but not necessarily weekend hours!

I was required to work two Saturdays a month anyway.  That summer, I had to pull a lot more than that.  Saturdays, Sundays, the odd 12 hour shifts…I didn’t get to the cottage very much that summer.  Allegedly, one head office staffer was overheard saying to another, “It’s going to be funny watching Mike try to work all summer without a full-timer.”  Good to know they had my back.

I was furious.  But I was also defeated.

I had one weekend booked off in July.  I couldn’t miss that weekend.  My grandma’s 80th birthday party was that weekend.  There was no way in hell that I was going to miss my grandma’s 80th birthday party.  It was a 2 hour drive away, in Kincardine Ontario.  I only have one grandma (88 this year!), but wouldn’t you know it?  Nothing ever went smooth for me….

I had a date the previous night (Friday), with this girl who was originally from Thunder Bay.  We went out and we had a nice meal followed by a night of drinks.  I woke up slightly hungover, but eager to hit the lake, and say hi to grandma.  Then, my phone rang.  Not a good sign.

My least reliable employee, Wiseman, was calling in sick.  The truth was more likely that he was calling in wasted.  Somebody had to get the hell over there and cover him.  And that someone was me.

I pulled in, unshowered, unshaven, and pissed off.  I had never been so mad at Wiseman in my life.  It was becoming a far, far too regular occurrence that he was always “sick”, and someone had to cover for him.  You can’t expect every part time employee to give up their Saturday plans and work on no notice, but a manager had to.

To her credit, there was one head office person on duty that weekend, and she came in to take over.  I will always be grateful to that person for covering me on my grandma’s 80th birthday weekend.  If memory serves, my great aunt Marie, her sister, made it that weekend too.  I think that was the last time I ever saw her, she passed away not too long after.

My relationship with head office people was rocky to say the least, especially after that “It’s going to be funny watching Mike try to work all summer…” crack.  But she did cover me when I needed it.  I won’t forget that, and I’ll always be grateful.

The rest of the summer was what it was, weekend after weekend of working, the same grind and drudgery.  The musical light in the tunnel that summer was the release of Marillion’s double Marbles CD.  It is my favourite Hogarth-era Marillion to this day, and when I received it that summer, it got me through.  We didn’t carry it in stock in our store, but it was in my car, and on my home player, all summer.  It brightened the mood, it kept me going, waking me up in the morning and getting me out the door.  The Summer of Hell’s bright spot was Marillion, and my grandma.

I would like to dedicate this installment of the Record Store Tales to that one head office person who stepped up and covered for me that day.  We had many knock-down-drag-out arguments over the years, and I’m sure that her side of many events differ from mine.  Regardless, if it wasn’t for her, I wouldn’t have been present for my grandma’s 80th, and for that I owe her a debt of gratitude.

Thank you.  It meant a lot to me.

Below:  the soundtrack to that summer

Part 108: Building the Store, Part 2

RECORD STORE TALES PART 108: Building the Store, Part 2

Last time, Statham posted something about a dream he had, of us putting together our own record store. I wish I could have had the experience of opening a store without doing work!  The reality of it varied.  On the couple of times I helped set up a store, it was hardly glamorous.

The first time was when we opened up the first store that I managed.  It was the biggest one so far, lots of stock, all crap. Junk. Shite.  Basically what we did was, maybe starting six months in advance,  just buy lots and lots and lots of stock.  Before long we had, I dunno, maybe 5000 discs, all garbage.  Dozens of Jann Arden, Spin Doctors, Michael Bolton…I had so much Michael Bolton that he took up three fucking rows!  I even had rare Michael Bolton.  Nobody had rare Michael Bolton!  Nobody wanted rare Michael Bolton!  Then you’d go to the Metallica section, nothing.  Kiss, a couple copies of Kiss My Ass.  And we had soooo much country.  We had buckets of country.  And rap artists that you nor I have ever heard of. 

Waltz back over to the rock section and browse the classics.  Did we have any Floyd?  Nothing.  Led Zeppelin?  Just the tribute album, Encomium.  Meat Loaf?  Bat 2, but not Bat.  We had a couple of Rush discs, like Counterparts, but nothing from the 70’s.  No Maiden.  No Miles.  No Dylan.  No Hendrix.

We had no standardized pricing scheme back then.  So, if I was pricing Eric Clapton’s Unplugged at $9.99, the guy next to me might have priced it at $11.99 because maybe he liked it more.  It was very subjective.  Sometimes you knew what a CD was worth brand new and based it on that, sometimes it was so common that it didn’t matter, and sometimes nobody had a fucking clue.  We’d try to fix the pricing it as we went, but it was slow.  After we opened, a customer would come up with three copies of the same album.  “This one is $8.99, this one $9.99, and this one $11.99.  Is that because one is more scratched?”  Logical question!  But no, we just cocked up.

It took weeks to manually input and price all those discs.  Shelving them took a couple more days. Making the header cards, setting things up, all told we were at it for maybe a month.  Then the big day came and we did our opening.  We were only half-equipped:  there was no second computer yet, and only half of our CD players for listening station had been bought.  Signs were still arriving to be put up.

I’ll never forget our sign that showed up that said, “WE PAY CSAH FOR YOUR USED CDS!” 

Regardless of how crappy the stock was, it sold!  I couldn’t believe it!  There were only a few decent albums and I figured once they were gone, that was it.  That wasn’t the case at all.  People kept buying the old rap and country discs.  Tanya Tucker?  Check!  We had lots!  And people were buying it!

Then, used stuff started coming in at a rapid pace.  Crazy stuff too.  I remember this one huge Tangerine Dream box set coming in, on the Thursday of the first week.

After we opened and good stuff started coming in by the box full, all the hard work seemed like it was paying off.  But the setting up was long and tedious, and I couldn’t stand Todd, who was also on setup duty.  But who gives a crap?  I spent weeks doing nothing but data entry while listening to music (our own music, which we brought in – of course).  I rocked a lot of Deep Purple those weeks.  It was awesome.

I remember that I had just found two Purple albums that I wanted:  Concerto For Group and Orchestra, and King Biscuit Flower Hour.  I also rocked Purpendicular, which had just come out, as much as I could.   Todd didn’t understand the music at all.  All he was interested in listening to was Floyd, nothing else.  He played Bush once or twice, but otherwise it was all Floyd.  He really, really liked P.U.L.S.E.  And he just murdered Floyd for me, for a long time.

When I listen to albums like Concerto and Purpendicular, it brings me right back to doing data entry in that store.  Not a bad soundtrack to work to.

Part 107: GUEST SHOT! – Statham: “Building the Store”

RECORD STORE TALES PART 107: Building the Store

Hey folks, Statham here. You’re looking good. Now, sit down and let me tell you a story, it’s a good one.

Last night, I had a dream. One I think you need to hear about, in the context of Mike’s blog. You see, I dreamt that Mike and I opened a record store together. It seems, for the convenience of making things happen, that I had won the lottery again. (I say again because, c’mon, it’s like having won the lottery just being fortunate enough to be me every day of the week). Anyway. The oodles of money secured the financial end of things, thus freeing us up to be creative in the endeavour.

There were a lot of naysayers. Oh boohoo, physical media is dying (if not dead), this would have been great 15 years ago, blah blah blah. Yeah well, alot people would shoot down anything anyone else wanted to do because they are lazy, needy, selfish and generally dumb. If it had been them in our shoes, they’d want us to be gushing with praise for their initiative, and they’d want us to be giving them doggie treats for being so good and clever. Anyway, we didn’t listen to any of these peoples’ negativity and they soon went away. Relief!

To his credit, Mike was onboard right away. Somehow he was still working his current job too, but also able to be at the shop all the time. Now, we all know Mike is amazing, but he really was breaking the laws of physics, here. Ah, dream-time. It makes no sense, but is the more awesome for it.

So. Being of means, we found that the organization, construction and founding of the shop was just a matter of planning and patience, but it went together very quickly. I have no idea what town we were in when all this was happening, but it hardly matters. Somehow, when the contractors were done, not only was the shop beautiful, bright and spacious, but all the shelves were jammed full of well-organized and thoughtfully chosen CDs, DVDs and games, too. I tell you, I’d really recommend those contractors to you. They were very thorough.

It wasn’t long before our doors were open, and business really started to take off. With Mike’s knowledge and my enthusiasm, it turned out to be a really worthwhile venture. People responded well to our humour, easy-going sales patter that wasn’t like sales-talk at all and, of course, our dashing good looks. It was a winner.

I don’t have a whole lot of specifics for you, just this sense I had that it was a good thing.  And that’s all I remember of that dream, in a nutshell.

ANALYSIS:

Well, clearly, all of Mike’s Record Store Tales have entered into my subconscious and activated the part of my brain that has always believed I’d like to work in a record store. Not the one Mike used to work for, from the sounds of it (even though at one point I did apply there), but still. I’ve spent enough time in record shops, so it seemed a natural enough thing to do.

And Freud would probably say this was somehow about my penis. Because everyone dreams about that, surely.

To be continued…


If you haven’t figured it out from past Statham stories, he’s Snake Eyes. I’m the Crimson Guard.