Here’s a grab bag of ads from MuchMusic from 1988 and 1992. They are:
A fun little collection of ads that bring back the memories.
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!
Today is the last day for Oktoberfest…but “Oktoberfest Cheer” goes on and on!
From the new EP Oktoberbest Cheer, written by Mike Koutis, here is the video for “Oktoberfest Cheer”. Have a schnitzel on a bun and a frosty cold one, and get your copy at Encore Records in Kitchener, or by dropping us a line here.
Notes: Since Eric deleted the only rehearsal footage of “Oktoberfest Cheer”, I was forced to use the video for “Randy” live at the Boathouse somewhat ham-fistedly. However this works perfect with the punky off-the-rails nature of the song. Speeding things up and slowing things down hides a multitude of sins in the edit, and the Keystone Cops flavour of the high-speed footage lends a comedic profile to the video. Which is necessary for any song that contains lyrics like “don’t crush my smokes, don’t spill my beer.”
This average looking boom box has a notable feature that you’ve never seen before on a machine of this class. It can play up to five cassettes (both A and B sides) continuously in a clever drawer design. If you were using 120 minute tapes, you could hit “play” and have 10 hours of continuous music. I’ll let Techmoan show you the clever feature; enjoy.
Have you ever had a conversation when you just knew what the other person was about to say? Not like a déjà vu, just a…synchronicity. A crossroads in time and space, intersecting with a very specific subsection of music fandom. I experienced that tonight with Tim Durling, but you will have to watch this episode yourself to hear the stories. Keywords: “Soundtrack to the Video Historia“.
Tim has just written what could be the very first book dedicated to the subject of 8-track tapes. You can support Tim’s project by clicking here! As a collector, he has sought to determine what exactly has been released on the format and what has not. There are a lot of unknowns in this little-documented realm, but what you will find in his book is only information that is 100% verified. If he wasn’t satisfied that something was released, it didn’t go in the book.
I can’t wait to get my copy of Unspooled, and you have until October 23 to kickstart it. The colour photographs of these tapes are sure to melt your eyeballs. But before that happens…watch the show below! Thanks again to Tim for stopping by. And thanks to Aaron for co-hosting!
The LeBrain Train: 2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano
Episode 83 – Unspooled with Tim’s Vinyl Confessions
8-track tapes: While many of us know what they are, very few of us have ever played one. I still remember the clicky-clacky of the tape changing tracks! So does Tim Durling, from Tim’s Vinyl Confessions. But he’s not here to talk about vinyl tonight. Tonight we talk 8-track tapes!
Unspooled: An Adventure in 8-Tracks is the title of Tim’s forthcoming book, which you can help fund right now on Kickstarter. Tim’s knowledge of the format, and his mighty collection, have enabled him to write a must-have book loaded with pictures of ultra-rare releases. If you have ever been curious about this most intriguing of formats, then this is an episode that you do not want to miss!
Joining us for co-hosting duties will be Aaron from the KMA. Tune in, won’t you?
Friday October 8, 7:00 PM E.S.T. on Facebook: MikeLeBrain and YouTube: Mike LeBrain.
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.
‘Twas only a year ago I wrote these words:
There will never be another Van Halen. No player before or since will have the ingenuity and influence he did. From modifying his own guitars and amps to achieve the perfect “brown sound”, to brutalizing the strings with a drill, he was an innovator. He was the most important of all the guitar innovators. And he sheepishly grinned through the whole thing as if to say, “Who, me? I did that?”
A year later, it’s only more certain that there will never been another Eddie. You can read my full memorial here: Rest in Peace to the greatest guitar player of all time.
The week Eddie passed, we did a tribute to him on the LeBrain Train. You can watch that tribute below, starting at the 20 minute mark.
As if that wasn’t enough, we followed that with another Van Halen show: VH deep cuts! One thing for sure, Eddie certainly inspired a lot of conversation on the LeBrain Train over the past year. You can watch the deep cuts below, starting again at 20 minutes.
Let’s all take a moment to reflect, and play some Van Halen tonight. Tonight, I’m going to go with “Dirty Movies” from Fair Warning to spotlight the greatest gee-tar picker of all time. What song or album will you play for Eddie tonight?
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.
RECORD STORE TALES #944: Mosquito Song
With all apologies, if the climate change crisis means that I can wear shorts in October, then I cannot help but think that all clouds do have silver linings.
Levity, folks! Just a little levity.
Jen and I ditched our fall coats, and hit the road Friday afternoon. On the car deck: the last live discs of the massive Metallica 2021 box set. This was the 1993 Mannheim Germany show. As we headed into a series of electrifying encores, Jen asked where the crowd was. 17 minutes of “Seek & Destroy” went by awkwardly as the band asked for the audience to follow along, but no audible responses came through the speakers. They must not have mic’ed the audience for that show.
Aside from the music, the drive up was awful. Stuck behind farm machinery and long lines of cars, we took several detours to drive on clear roads. Running out of Metallica*, I switched over to The Darkness’ Last of Our Kind for the final hour of our agonizingly long drive.
When we got there though…
It was a beautiful day that felt like late August, in early October! I did the only thing I could: I put on my shorts and proceeded to rock out. I thought the days of setting up my speakers on the front porch at the lake were over for the year. How elated I was to be wrong! And the place was utterly deserted. People don’t often come in October, thinking the weather would be cold and rainy. It was anything but.
Speakers and laptop ready, I began the weekend with some Ghost. Here’s the fascinating part. I hit “play” on their most recent album Prequelle, and I found it unexpectedly fit in perfectly with the setting. At the lake, I often like to play old music that takes me back in time like a Tardis. It’s the perfect environment, because so much of my musical discovery happened in that place. Three tracks in particular fit the mood like a glove: “Rats”, “Danse Macabre” and “Miasma”. Suddenly I was transported back to an alternate 1986 where these were my favourite songs. It was trippy and very cool.
My mind went to that place again. Grade 8 graduation and the final farewell to the Catholic school system and all the bullies it built. I could see myself onstage singing to them.
“In times of turmoil, in times like these,
Beliefs contagious, spreading disease.”
I wondered if, in my alternate reality 1986, the teachers pulled the plug on me singing “Rats”. I would probably do better singing “Danse Macabre”.
“You’ll soon be hearing the chime, close to midnight,
If I could turn back the time, I’d make all right.”
Little does Papa Emeritus know, I’m getting quite good at turning back the time. All it takes is a song. Those three Ghost songs are easy for anyone to pretend it’s still the late 80s. They would have fit right in. All it takes is the right song in the right setting and I’m there.
There’s one Ghost song that I wish I could take back in time and play on graduation night back in the Catholic days. That would be the evil “Ritual”. Certain lines, at least.
“Tonight, we’re summoned for a divine cause,
Remembrance, no, but for their future loss.”
Ahh, to fantasize. I really resented that place. Music was my release from Catholic hell.
Before too much time in 1986 had elapsed, I found my body back in 2021 being eaten alive by mosquitoes. Little ones with voracious appetites. Enjoying their unexpected fall snack, they were relentless. At one point I raised my electric “bug zapper” over my head. I only wish I had been recording, because in a couple swipes I could hear dozens of bugs fying. 20 or 30 in just one swoop. Little explosions like a machine gun popping, but never running out of ammo. The war against mosquitoes could not be won outside, so I reluctantly took it indoors.
Very strangely unseasonal, but as we get warmer year after year, this is the kind of surprise we’ll have to get used to. Being outside was less hazardous if you kept moving, so I spent plenty of time exploring. I discovered an old, heavily decayed vertebra of some kind. It looked larger than human. A deer, most likely?
The ground was layered with mushrooms of many different types, and they were everywhere. 40 years ago when contractors were building out cottage, a group of Italians scavenged for mushrooms. They knew which ones were good to eat. I didn’t even consider taking that risk and instead just took pictures of some. As I wandered around, there were many more, far denser, but I did not bring my camera. It was like living in Mario Town.
Outnumbering the mushrooms were the mosquitoes, and eventually I could take them no longer. I sought refuge inside. But they had gotten through the screen, and made mists of mosquitoes beneath the lamps. It was mosquito hell!
As are all weekends, this one was too brief. Instead of being sad for the waning of the season, we were just glad to have had an amazing weekend in October. And maybe we’ll even make it back one more time. We’ll see what the weeks left hold.
* We still have two interview discs to go, but I didn’t want to listen to 45 minutes of Lars chewing his gum in the car.
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