What great record/CD finds have you made on the web?

Cafe Society
1

I like records and CDs. I spent much of the first half of my life in record stores and thrift stores where people discarded records. I worked in the two largest record stores in Canada. I like the browsing, and coming up with something I’ve been looking for, for years and years. I’ve made some pretty amazing finds of unbelievably rare records, a lot of times for cheap. The kind where you have to suppress the urge to erupt in the middle of the store, “YESSSSSS!!!” because the price will go up between the rack and the cash register. I have perfected my poker face.

Well, I don’t get to do that anymore. I don’t even know where there’s a collector’s record store within several hundred miles of where I live now. I haven’t been in one since 1999. While I miss it, I don’t miss the frustration of looking for 40 years for a record without success because nobody had a copy for sale at a store to which I was physically able to travel.

The web has done away with all the legwork, and eliminated the frustration to nil.

I found an original 1954 pressing of a 45 I’d been looking for since 1965, to replace the 78 of same that I broke. It cost $7. A couple of weeks ago, I found out about a CD from Belgium, of all The Crystals’ records they made for Phil Spector. It included “(Let’s Dance) The Screw”. There are only six known copies in the world of this record, which has been pirated but never officially released. The CD has a review on allmusicguide, even though it was all but unobtainable. I went to one site and found it in seconds, and paid $14.

Last week, I found a French imported CD of the first album by McGuinness Flint (spun off from members of Manfred Mann), which I had been searching for since 1973. $3.74. Still sealed.

Today, I was reading a site about rare James Taylor recordings. It mentioned an otherwise unreleased track on a series of Dutch CDs of FM radio broadcasts. The site said “this CD is so rare and hard to find, I dare you to try.” I had one inside of a minute. There was a listing for a 2LP bootleg of James from 1970 that they said was the rarest JT bootleg in existence, all but impossible to find. Same deal, I found it right away, paid $35 and it’ll be here on Wednesday. As the kids say, “woot!” I really like the web.

So, what have you guys found on the web that you could never find at any store in your area?

2

Nothing too fantastic. Harmony Ridge Creek Dippers and Jennifer Warnes. I did get a smokin’ deal on the recent special re-release of Jeff Buckley’s “Grace”. Got it for a song, so to speak.

Guess I’m not that much of a collector. At least of music. Found a real nice Volvo P1800. Crossing my fingers for an original Suzuki Katana.

3

Last week, I found a French imported CD of the first album by McGuinness Flint (spun off from members of Manfred Mann), which I had been searching for since 1973. $3.74. Still sealed.

I’ve been looking for another copy of Lo and Behold, by Coulson Dean McGuinness Flint for years. Heh.

I am scared to start hunting for long-wanted stuff on the web. I could spend all my money, and be exactly like I was in my teens and 20s, when I had no money, no savings, but a great, and eclectic, record collection.

4

The web is a godsend for that.

A couple of my best friends lost their daughter to cancer a few years ago, and in one of their moves they had lost the record that their daughter loved as a child, Gisele MacDonald’s songs for children. I found it in the Netherlands, and bought it for them.

Someone else I know wanted a copy of Jan Peerce’s Blue Bird of Happiness, and I managed to get it for him as a Christmas gift one year. He hadn’t heard the song since his grandmother died. She had raised him, and this was one of her favourite songs.

Recently, I managed to get copies of 3 of Storm Large’s cds online. This would have been totally impossible before the internet.

I intend to search for albums that are missing from my jazz collection, but I’m a procrastinator…

5

Here ya go! There’s quite a large price range between dealers. Pick the highest rated one with the lowest price. Happy listening!

6

About 5-6 years ago I located a pristine LP of Inside Sauter-Finegan and gave it to my Dad as a present (after playing it once to digitize it).

7

I’m at a slight disadvantage here, being in New York and all, where there are still loads of new and/or used record/CD shops specializing in jazz, classical, and every kind of pop music.

One genre that’s a little harder to locate around the City is your your bizarro old-timey fiddle-dobro-washboard-tuba music…so one of the most interesting things I found on-line was the Murfreesboro, Tennessee, string band, the Jake Leg Stompers.

“…Guaranteed Absolutely Pure renditions of both traditional and popular Pre-War Roots Music. While each arrangement is scrupulously reconstructed from the historical record, the Stompers always aim to reinvent their musical heritage, rather than merely to replicate it–not to live in the past, but to bring the past to new life.”

8

It’s always been one of my dreams to visit NYC and check out all the record stores around Bleeker Street. Is that still the record buyer’s mecca?

Problem is, my want list is so small now, I’ve moved into getting material I didn’t even know I wanted, because I didn’t know it existed! My collection just went over 5000 albums (vinyl & CD) and 12,000 singles. These days, any trip to a record store would be a lot of “got it…got it…got it…four hundred bucks??? Forget it!.. got it…got it…”

I envy guys like Michael Ochs, who owns over 100,000 albums, and an unbelievable number of photos of musicians. You may have seen credits on some reissues and in books, for The Michael Ochs Archives. But he’s on a mission to have a copy of every album and variation thereof. I don’t have it that bad - I just buy music I like, and rarities. I’m not even a proper completist.

Once upon a time, I said I was never going to replace my vinyl collection with CDs. I was wrong!

9

Well, I just discovered a neat Tuvan group [Yat-kha] and ordered their disc Re-Covers. They do covers of rock music with native instruments, and using some of the odd singing techniques [their version of Zeppelins When the Levee Breaks is way cool. It can be heard here legally. Inna-gadda-vida is different. But then again, I actually like tuvan double-note singing, and think this is the niftiest thing I have heard in a while=)

AS to old albums, I would absolutely adore a copy of Billy Mitchell’s “Might Be Hope” which some jerk stole from me and I have never found again=(

10

I’ve gotten a lot of CDs for my parents that were otherwise “out of print”. This was a simple matter of going to Ebay, or Amazon, and frankly, I dont remember all the details for all of those CDs.

Personally, the Net has supported my reasearch and then downloading of:

Bob Rivers

“Twisted Christmas”

Oddly enough, The 12 pains of Christmas and Walking in Womens Underwear (the song, not the action :eek: ) are christmas tradtions for me.

11

I’m not a collector either. I have great memories of listening to Little Orly records (78s) on my grandma’s record player, and was tickled pink to find them on CD.

They’re stories with sound effects. My favorites are Little Orly and the Haunted House and Littly Orly and the Bubble Gum. He blows a giant bubble that gets away from him and rolls down hill, collecting farm animals and people and then going boom! Good times. :slight_smile:

12

Well well, you can find a mint LP copy, still sealed, for $33, right here. Lowest price, highest rated vendor. It’s never been issued on CD. Don’t wait too long if you can avoid it, because all of the other copies in that shape are more expensive! If somebody asks what you’d like for Xmas, now you know what to tell them!

13

Have you heard the Kitchen Syncopators? They’re very cool. (Warning: Audio starts playing automatically when you open the link.)