I spent an hour and a half in Vinyl Freaks record emporium in Cowcaddens in Glasgow at the weekend. There are other good shops in Glasgow, namely Avalanche, Missing and 23rd Precinct with a healthy stock of the old black plastic. There used to be a little record store run by Stephen Pastel of The Pastels (nice chap) in John Smith's bookshop on the Byres Road, but the premises was taken over by the devil, sorry I meant Starbucks.
Cowcaddens must be a seriously low-rent area, sandwiched between the Centre and the West End at the mouth of the motorway which carves Glasgow in two. Vinyl Freaks is a great store overflowing with 2nd hand records. I only get to go there every few months so have the pleasure of almost always finding a new batch of stuff. Immediately what caught my eye was a 2 foot block of entryist pop, BEF Human League, Depeche Mode, Classix Nouveaux and a whole host of strange pop/dance 12"s by the likes of The Mood and Datura. It seems quite clear, in retrospect, that it was this current of long-fringery which fed into Balearic-era Acid-House. The records had to be from one collection (sure enough the owner said they belonged to a guy who "does really well" and now only DJs disco) and it was interesting to note the Acieed section was stocked with numerous Day-Glo comps.
Sadly the World music bin had been stripped bare (by me probably-snort) but there was plenty else to look at. They've got heaps of old dance stuff- I took special care going through the boogie and disco sections because usually if anything has found it's way up here it's quality stuff worth transporting to the frozen wastes, added to which the geeks (while no less obsessive, trust me) are thinner on the ground- it's an equation which can produce rich pickings. In fact in London I probably wouldn't bother with the Disco bin, another feature of being "abroad" being that you change your habits ever so slightly. As it happened I didn't find much- a good C-Bank 12" (not "Another Shot" which I've had in the past) a HiTension 12" piqued my curiosity (more on that later) and alot of minor label Disco (always worth listening to just in case).
Just as I settled down with a stack of tracks to inspect, my mobile phone went off. "Oh shit!" my 18 month old daughter had locked herself in the bathroom. I ran out of the shop and burnt rubber down the length of the Great Western Road flashing my lights, caning the horn, down the wrong side of the road. Just as I pulled up I got a call saying her resourceful grandfather had gently prized the door off its hinges with a spade.
A little rattled I thought it best to return to the store, after all you've got to get your priorities right. I mopped up 20 quids worth of stuff (a healthy pile) a little hastily. Highlights being a couple of early Strictly Rhythm 12"s, Project "86"s awesome "Legends" on Nu Groove and Toxic Two's "Chemical Reaction" an improbable tranche of early New York Breakbeat Rave.
There were, however, a larger handful of records I left. Including the HiTension 12" and Material's "American Songs" EP. Now I don't know what kind of saddo you are, but what whizzes any died-in-the-wool record collecting geek up, is an elegantly composed chart. It just so happens that on the train into London I saw both those records in Peter Shapiro's recent Death Disco primer in that curate's egg that is The Wire. I've really struggled over this one. If my memory serves me well, the HiTension 12" I heard (an Island Promo) was not produced by Chris Blackwell, like Shapiro's. Also I didn't think it was very good. But I'm not afforded the luxury of a second peak, drat and blast. Secondly, I've tried to comfort myself with the idea that I really am better without the Material EP. I'm not a real fan of Laswell's, I even sold on my copy of "Memory Serves", supposedly their swansong. Furthermore I think I have "Ciguri" tucked away on some compilation. But you know it still hurts, more than you can possibly imagine.
Posted by Woebot at January 29, 2003 12:39 PM