Essays
Words from our favorite people
Light My Fire - My Night With Rock Royalty
When I was twelve, my dad inadvertently introduced me to my first musical obsession. His intention was to send me upriver with Captain Willard on a mission to take out the deranged Colonel Kurtz. Instead, what I found was the haunting psychedelic sounds of the Doors. The film was, of course, Francis Ford Coppola’s masterpiece “Apocalypse Now,” and the song in the intro was “The End.” A band whose singer had passed some twenty years before I had even heard a single note from them; yet a band that would play a role in arguably one of the greatest experiences in my career as a personal chef.Sebadoh and My First Vinyl Purchase
One specific band that I had fallen in love with was Sebadoh, Lou Barlow’s post-Dinosaur Jr (at the time) band. I had a lot of feelings as a teen and so did Lou, and Sebadoh’s sound on 1994’s Bakesale was just the right amount of familiar and different for a kid who was exploring their own taste in music after the death of Kurt Cobain.Captain Beyond and the Hunt for Obscure 70s Vinyl
Though I have no proof of this, I would bet dollars to doughnuts that the need to find things is hardwired into our DNA. Seriously, just think about the archetypal quests that proliferate from the minds of writers across the globe and across time. From the Arthurian quest for the Holy Grail, to Indiana Jones and the…well, again Holy Grail, you get what I mean. There just seems to be a need to find what has been lost. My son Enzo and I are hunters of rare vinyl.Hunting For Space Invaders
One of the tracks on the CD was a song called “Spacing Out” by a band called The Invaders. Upon my first listen, I was instantly hooked. There were elements of spaced-out psych-rock, latin jazz, funk, and other worldly sounds that totally rocked my world. A gale force blast of mighty horns and tight snares gave it a sharp, nasty groove like it was coming straight from the underground of a ‘70s gangster flick. There were bits of R&B, soul, lounge, and the playful experimentations of Stereolab all rolled up into one song. Like the swing of Esquivel with the driving force Parliament Funkadelic. It opened my ears to something I had never heard before and sparked my curiosity.How Are Sheryl Crow’s Albums Not On Vinyl?
It’s a question that should boggle the mind of any music fan: how are Sheryl Crow’s pivotal albums of the 1990s and early 2000s not yet available on vinyl? In an era when the format has been resurrected as a celebration of artistry, the absence of Sheryl’s catalog — albums that belong alongside the best of their time — stands out as baffling and unjust.The Intimate Relationship of a Demo Track
“Demo releases give an extra sense of intimacy between the artist and the listener. Similarly to waking up next to someone, a demo track provides a rawness that technical preparedness could not emulate and a new level to the relationship established.”The Debate of the Century: That Weird French 45 in my Record Collection
“The 45 in question was called “Le Debat Du Siecle” (The Debate of the Century), an eleven-minute recording by two French comedians, Thierry Le Luron and Pierre Douglas, who were known for doing political comedy and developed an act where they impersonated two famous current politicians in a debate scenario.Samurai Champloo’s Departure and its Arrival
“My father had originally set the sound system up for me in my mother’s old apartment, as I sat at the piano and played a few tunes for him, that day one of the few times I learned about his taste in classical music, his strong preference for the Satie and the Chopin over the Schumann and Pachelbel, each reveal its own surprise. As much as I enjoy a prelude, Departure’s instrumental hip-hop is what I find myself reaching for when there are silences to fill, or when we have company over.”The Go-Go Days Are Gone-Gone
When The Go-Go’s first album was released, I spent untold hours listening to it spin, singing along to every lyric from the bubble-gum pink inner sleeve, staring at the back of the speckled cover transfixed, where all five members appear in individual black-and-white photos taking bubble baths, looking both sexy and innocent—the epitome of a young girl’s fantasy self. I not only loved their music; I wanted to be The Go-Go’s, specifically Charlotte Caffey, the seemingly quiet background character who, on the cover, reads a book called Harlot and eats chocolate in her overflowing bubble bath.Four Days: Searching For This Desert Life
“I’d spent most of my life to that point wondering if any band will ever really speak to me. I’ve heard rumors before of music changing people’s lives, of finding commiserate truths and profundities in song lyrics, but I always figured that was hyperbole at its finest. But in the dark hours in my living room, lost and alone, I see a shy, introspective man giving voice to the sad longings within my heart, lost, broken, confused, and alone. And yet, round here, we always stand up straight.”The Cozy Domesticity of Carly Simon
““Coming Around Again” is truly as domestic as it gets. A perfectly blissful portrait is initially painted of a life that is “So good on paper/So romantic” but the tone gradually shifts to “Then you break a window/Burn the soufflé/Scream the lullaby.” There’s a realness to it, showing that as wonderful and unified as family life can be, it can also be difficult and unbearable.”The Stereo-Versus-Mono Conundrum Circa 1964
“The record bin at Thrifty Drug Store in La Mirada, California, where I stood, was admittedly full of my parents’ soul-crushing music: the Ray Conniff Singers, Vic Damone, the Mills Brothers. But on this bright sunny day in late January 1964, it held something more, the Holy Grail, fresh off the delivery truck: Meet the Beatles!, the group’s first album from Capitol.”Punk Rock May Not Have Saved My Life, But Jeff Rosenstock Helped Me To Improve It
“And the first song on there, the very first line is “will you still love me after I’ve fucked up?” It had been a long two years since I lost my friend and almost lost my partner. I’d done a lot of 12 hour drives for work, thinking about that last talk with her, thinking about all of the other things I’d lost throughout my life– bands, opportunities, moments in time, dead friends, dead family– mourning it all, crying and punching my steering wheel while Jeff tells me that “growing and changing doesn’t change the stuff”“It is not just music for most of us”: Notes on Raein and Records From Departed Friends
“Elsewhere in the world, the raw anarchist spirit of the underground still thrives. Turn your ear toward Europe and you can hear young screamo bands collaborating on split 7” singles, hammering out philosophical rhapsodies. For them, it’s more like revolutions per second.Musings On Herbie Hancock & The Headhunters - Head Hunters (Columbia Records, 1973)
“I guess quite simply put, Head Hunters always has and always will be the epitome of “cool” to me: the meandering, yet extremely well thought-out instrumental sounds heard within, the sheer idea of being bold/brazen enough to call the band The Headhunters and the album Head Hunters, the ascending and ultimately descending whistle sound “Watermelon Man” is effortlessly built, layered, and torn apart around, and the album cover showcasing Hancock wearing a yellow gold-colored African kple kple mask of the Baoulé tribe from the Ivory Coast.”The Lost Record Collection of NY Punk Legend Robert Quine
“Robert Wolfe Quine was a brilliant guitar player who had been an integral part of the New York/CBGB punk scene during its heyday. He went on to work with Tom Waits, Lou Reed, They Might Be Giants, Brian Eno, Matthew Sweet, and Richard Hell and the Voidoids to name a few. But, despite being such a genius of the instrument, he passed away and remains unknown to most.Pure Phase by Spiritualized 30th Anniversary
" This year marks the 30th anniversary of the release of Pure Phase, the overlooked second album by beloved neo-psych space rockers Spiritualized. The album occupies an interesting spot in their discography as it’s sandwiched between their widely acclaimed and influential debut album Lazer Guided Melodies, and their canonized masterpiece, Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space."How a High School Radio Station Became Chicagoland’s First FM Rock Revolution
“Tucked in a barely ventilated room in the corner of the drama department’s rehearsal room, in 1966, WRHS, 88.1 FM with its group of high school music rebels became the first Chicagoland FM station to play rock-and-roll music. Wikipedia credits WLS-FM as Chicago’s first commercial FM station to play rock-and-roll in 1968.”On Grimes and Art Angels
“I was barely holding it together mentally and financially, with little room for solace. But that solace, like always, showed itself in the form of music. It was around this time that I first heard the lead single off of Art Angels, Grimes’ follow-up to her breakthrough opus Visions. “Flesh Without Blood” is a richly layered song, mixed perfectly so as to be structured like a rock song but as deeply engrossing as a dream-pop one.The Brian Jonestown Massacre - Their Satanic Majesties' Second Request
“A spiritual sequel to the forbidden British record, the Eastern-influenced neo-psychedelia made a statement for the ages, a piece that fills the record stores and shelves of music nerds of a plethora of generations of music lovers. For this album, the trip it will send a first-timer on lasts a lifetime.”Post by Bjork; Aquemini by Outkast and Connecting the Two
“Both of these collections are of their time and outside of time. Post is the sonified, personified “irrational exuberance” from 1995 that would go unnamed until Alan Greenspan’s speech a year later. Post what? Post everything. Aquemini was born in 1998, when AOL had hastened the digital transformation of our commons to something cutthroat, getting communal bulletin boards onto the internet—the iterative, rapid-fire dialectical response to culture and creation were just beginning, and people were ready to remix. They chart out the first steps of a world going through a major adaptive process, one which people would now”You're My Favorite Thing
“A conversation about what it means to be a fan of a band; what your favorite band says about you; how your favorite band stands the test of good, bad, and indifferent times; and how the same goes for your oldest, dearest friends.”Fairuz in America
“Fairouz is a known name to anyone who speaks Arabic, as a legendary singer from Lebanon who had been active since 1950, she graced many generations with her voice and her music, and as an Arab Christian family, we held a special appreciation for her as all of our Arabic Christmas jingles were sung by her, and she was almost a part of our family every Christmas gathering.”At the Drive-In: The Relationship of Command
At the Drive-In released “Relationship of Command” on September 12, 2000. I had just turned 19 the month before, standing at a crossroads of hearing this and The Refused’ “The Shape of Punk to Come” – both fundamentally changing me, daring me to re-examine what music was, what I thought songs could sound like."Urban Hymns
“So, I had a little red record player with my strange amplifier glowing in the dim light of my living room. One of the first albums I purchased was The Verve. Listening to Urban Hymns one night I found myself so caught up in the lyrics that I forgot it was an album”Fish Heads and Dead Puppies: In Search of Demented Vinyl
“From there, I plunged deeper into the world of novelty vinyl. One of my next quests led me to Ogden Edsl’s “Dead Puppies.” The song, a darkly comedic ode to neglected pets, became one of Dr. Demento’s most requested tunes. Released in 1977, the original pressing was even harder to track down than “Fish Heads.” When I finally unearthed a copy at a flea market in Garden City, the vendor gave me a knowing smirk. “Dr. Demento fan, huh?” he said. I nodded. He threw in a battered copy of “Shaving Cream” by Benny Bell for free.”My Vinyl Collection Journey
“The “hunt” of shopping is a huge part of the hobby’s appeal for myself. I occasionally buy records I have not heard before, usually within the two to five dollar range. Through chance encounters, I have the opportunity to explore new music or come across old favorites”Closer I Am to Fine: A Lifetime with The Indigo Girls
““I’m trying to tell you something ‘bout my life.” The words feel like a hand extended across time, reaching to my eighth-grade self in 1989. That was the year the Indigo Girls released their first record, and though I can’t recall exactly when or where I first heard them, I know I fell in love instantly.”Collecting Cal Tjader Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Jazz
“Cal Tjader opened my eyes to jazz as a genre and as I started collecting more and more records, an increasing percentage of my purchases were jazz. As of the time of writing this, my record collection stands at 1344 records, 350 of which are jazz.The Trials and Tribulations of Finding A Perfect Turntable
" Assuming a more advanced hi-fi setup was too expensive and complicated, I gave up playing records for a while. Things would change though on Christmas of 2022 when my wonderful girlfriend (now wife) Sarah, bought me a new record: Florence and the Machine’s Lungs."Born to Run at 50
“So, where did my love for Bruce come from? It started after I left New Jersey to go to college and grew more intense when I moved to Texas to be with my wife, Ali. I wanted a piece of home, and his music fed my need for nostalgia.Kansas City Jazz and Searching for Records
“Current radio hits aside, you could only enjoy the music if you had it in your hands. Collecting was, like the format itself, hands-on and all analog. So finding a coveted rarity took legwork, sleuthing, and patience. And my dad loved nothing more than being a vinyl Sherlock. "Once Upon a Time: Captain Fantastic Turns 50
“There is also a poster of the album’s cover art, emblazoned with the words “from the end of the world to your town.” The poster quickly goes up on the wall of my bedroom, where it will hang for several years, even after I leave home, until one of my brothers moves into the room.Nowhere, Man: Searching for Rubber Soul
“Let’s get this out of the way. I don’t like the Beatles. I don’t take pride in this, and I swear I’m not being contrarian. I just was never able to connect with any of their music. I think a big factor in whether a person born in the 80s would love the Beatles is if their parents were Beatles fans and raised them the “right” way. My parents didn’t provide such an upbringing”Q&A With Ankur Razdan (with bonus essay)
“So now I have 4 (started with 5) trashbags full of 45s sitting in my cellar. One at a time I keep a bag up in my home office and every morning I carry out a ritual: I grab a few 45s, discard their dirty sleeves, clean them with vinyl cleaning solution, repackage them in fresh sleeves which I order in bulk, and pile them up (and listen, of course.)No Band Does Vinyl Packaging Like mewithoutYou
“We all have our reasons for loving vinyl. It’s a format you can hold close. There’s that special substance about it that demands attention and makes you feel like you’re getting something real, something tangible”There Was a Time - on Uncle Tupelo
Their best songs, spread across four albums in just a few years, gave voice to a uniquely Midwestern blend of hope, desperation, determination, and alcoholism.Remembering Steely Dan 2.0: Two Against Nature at 25
The leap day release was one last joke on everyone, a deliberate tweak of an anxious fan base after a two-decade wait for a new album.Low's "Great Destroyer"
All of Low’s discography shines on vinyl, but The Great Destroyer has always been the record I spin the most. It’s a record that consumes youThe Brief But Memorable Adventures of Bob and Me
I’d like to think I’ve made up for lost time, but it almost doesn’t matter that I came to London Calling late. Whenever you first experience a brilliant work of art, it’s always the right time.Mike Rastiello on Building His Record Set Up
It was a dark, damp room; oh man, there was the receiver. They still had speakers set up to it to show me that it worked. I plugged in my iPod into the AUX in port, a hilarious meeting of technology decades apart.Scarred for Life
Your vibe is more that of a hair metal connoisseur, a devotee of the Aquanet set, a genre that’s subject to even more ridicule than the Heavy Metal Parking Lot wannabes who smoke rollies and give out stick and poke tats at the fringe of the ragged school lawns.I Had That on Vinyl: Black Pear Tree by the Mountain Goats and Kaki King
That piece of vinyl, mottled black and yellow, was on my turntable a lot, in good times and especially in hard. The anger of “Mosquito Repellent” felt real and earned when I too hoped that the bad guys would win, that the good guys would get their heads bashed in.Beach Beat Classics
You can dice vegetables to Carolina Beach Music. Whatever is in an oily frying pan just smells better when “Give Me Just a Little More Time” by the Chairmen of the Board bops on in the background.Pilgrimage Has Gained Momentum
While there, we learned about the reputation of Berry, Buck, Mills and Stipe locally. My suspicions were correct: They are solid dudes that everyone pretty much likes.A Valentine to John Grant's "GMF"
…we were sat in the front row of the Brighton Dome, when John Grant walked on stage, sat down at the piano, and let forth his stunning voice. It may not have been love at first sight, but it was something close.Transcontinental Platters
…among my first buys were R.E.M., Graham Parker, Pretenders and The Replacement’s Tim. I still have most of them; some are worth a bit of money, but worth even more to me sentimentally.The Everest Archive of Folk and Jazz and Label Design
I realized my beloved series was more of an afterthought - something issued in the waning days of the company, long after its founder had been ousted.Judge a Record by It's Cover: What Makes Good Album Art
Hello and welcome to a hopefully recurring column called ‘Judge a Record by Its Cover,’ where we explore the art and science of record packaging and presentation. The importance of album art is often overlooked when thinking about a record you are putting out. You might be thinking you’ll just slap some random band photo on there and call it a day. After all, it’s the music that really matters right? Well, while technically correct, the music is ultimately what matters most, just like when everyone scrolls through Tinder, people usually only pick up the records that they find aesthetically pleasing. So while a good album cover won’t make up for terrible music, it can get people to listen in the first place.
Reach With Richard Simmons
Look, I’m not gonna beat around the bush here. This is not a very good album. It currently has a 1.81 rating on RYM and I think it earns it. But give the man some credit! Workout records were fairly common in the 80’s (even Arnold Schwarzenegger had one, and believe me when I say you need to hear it), but they mostly used songs that were already popular. Richard Simmons insisted on writing original tunes.The Progressive Path: From Long Island Record Stores to Canterbury Dreams
Each trip meant taking the train into Penn Station with an empty backpack and returning with it full of vinyl treasures, carefully wrapped in brown paper bags to protect against the elements.Mystique and Deceit in R.E.M. Album Art
Back home in Pennsylvania, the next trip to the record store sent me straight to the “R” bin: did they have any other records? “Murmur” was already acquired, but the bin also held a blue-covered EP titled “chronic town.” Yes, I’ll have that one too.How "Brat" Helped Me FInd Autistic Joy
As a recently diagnosed autistic adult, who’s been labeled loud, messy, selfish and honest to a fault, I had been unwittingly living a brat summer for my entire life.Laughing in Analog: How Cheech & Chong Led Me Down a Comedy Vinyl Rabbit Hole
That night, I placed the needle on “Sister Mary Elephant” and experienced comedy in a way my YouTube algorithm had never suggested. The crackle before the first “SHUT UP!” The perfectly timed pause between “Dave’s not here” and “No, man, I’m Dave!”23 North: A Travelogue of Record Shopping in Ohio
I approached the check-out counter, staffed by a man who I assumed to be the owner, an older man with long gray-white hair and a thick beard. An archetype I would begin to know as, The Record Store GuyDiamonds and Rust
Some rare things are simply so significant, so powerful, that you are not meant to forget them, not in this lifetime at least. You carry them with you, what does it matter if they gradually become lighter or weigh you down with time? They will stay regardless.
I currently own a print of Diamonds and Rust that I purchased from some Italian guy for a little less than ten bucks a few months back. Naturally I was ecstatic about this find, and when I finally held it in my hands for the first time, I asked myself where I wanted to place it – we all know the crucial importance of the Record Collection Order. To me it’s a very intuitive process, I don’t really sort by year, genre, or even artist. In this case, my eyes immediately fell on Dylan’s Blonde on Blonde. Putting these two next to each other felt exactly like the right and the wrong thing to do, but more on that later.
The Ghost of the Appleseed Cast's Sagarmatha
The Appleseed Cast reinvent themselves with each album, and I’m always interested to see where they’re going. I originally bought Sagarmatha on CD when it first came out, but during the pandemic I found a copy of the repress by Graveface Records at my favorite record store, The Love Garden in Lawrence, Kansas. I wasn’t expecting Sagarmatha to be the soundtrack to the haunted house I was raised in, but life is strange. The album is ambitious. It’s intoxicating, almost otherworldly. It’s been stuck in my brain since I first heard it many years ago.
In Defense of The Police (the band)
The first record I ever bought myself was a copy of The Police’s Reggatta de Blanc. I purchased it on a trip to my home state of New Jersey in 2015; I was 15 years old. I can authoritatively date this purchase because I felt compelled to post the purchase on my Instagram. At the time, if you asked me to pick any tour to see, I would have considered saying a show on the Outlandos D’Amour tour.
Learning to Let Go of Things
Confession: Even though I am writing this piece for a site for vinyl collecting, I don’t really have a vinyl collection! There is a reason for that: I was born in 1981 and have never owned a record player. While I have owned 60-70 LPs in my lifetime, I haven’t actually played the majority of them.
So, why do I own them? It started in college during the peak of the CD era when nobody listened to vinyl. It was the last year of the 90s, the tail end of “the End of History.” CDs were how we all listened to music and, as far as we were concerned, that was how it would be for the foreseeable future. By the end of the year, of course, Napster was officially a Thing and that was bad news for compact discs.
The Special Love I Have for You: Discovering Badfinger’s Straight Up
Would you lend a highly sought-after album to someone whose last name you didn’t know, had no clue where they lived, and might possibly never see again? That is how I was introduced to my all-time favorite album.
From before I started kindergarten, all I wanted to do was hang out in record stores or the next best thing: a department or discount store record section. My biggest summertime thrills were stumbling upon garage sales with stacks of 45s for a dime apiece. Three of my biggest childhood disappointments came from the closure of record stores at Village Square, a 1960s-era outdoor mall half a mile from my home in 1976, 1980, and 1983.
I Just Want to Sell Out My Funeral: How The Wonder Years Changed Pop Punk Forever
There are only so many hours in the day, and so little of it is spent listening to music. So, if you’re a music fan like me, when you find a band or album that speaks to you, you want to hold on to that for as long as you can. It acts as a testament to a time or period in your life, yelling at you through speakers as it softly spins on a turntable. A constant reminder that things aren’t as bad as you think, and music can help you explore facets of yourself while reaching out a hand of understanding.
Three Services at the Church of In-store Play
Last summer I went record-store hopping with a musician I’d admired for more than a decade. In the car we chatted like we were instant old friends, but as soon as we got into a shop we’d split up, eventually drifting back toward the register, and comparing our hauls outside.
Maybe it’s because we’re both terminal introverts, but I think record shopping is solitary by nature, even when you’re with friends. Partly it’s physics; you can’t both look through the same bin at the same time unless you’re looking over someone’s shoulder. But I also think the rhythm of record browsing is deeply personal, maybe as individual as a fingerprint. How fast you flip through the bins, how long you pause for an artist or album you’ve never heard of before you flick past or pick it up to investigate further. With how much care do you slip a record from the sleeve, at what angle do you hold it to check for scratches? It’s intimate.
Minor Threat, Nostalgia, and Teenage Rage
I touch the record and I am sixteen again, straight-edge more or less by default, sitting in my room listening to “Seeing Red” and thinking, yeah, these guys get it.
I don’t remember where I got my copy of Minor Threat’s Complete Discography CD, but it was in heavy rotation when I was in high school. I didn’t care that they had broken up two years before I was born, the raw youthful anger was enough to make a connection regardless of time and distance. As someone who also spent my teenage years not smoking (both of my grandfathers died of smoking-related illnesses)*, drinking (I had snuck a few sips of my dad’s Stag beers and didn’t really care for it) fucking (if anyone was interested in doing that with me when I was in high school, I was utterly oblivious) or doing drugs (I wouldn’t have had the first clue where or how to get drugs, even if I had any particular interest in using them), I identified with the ideas put forth in songs like “Straight Edge”, “In My Eyes”, and “Out of Step”, even if I didn’t really feel like I had the intent necessary to consider myself straight-edge; my sober state was more one borne out of inaction than of any militancy of belief.
The Mystical Dice of Random Musical Destiny
I recently bought a new turntable. It is the first serious piece of audio equipment that I have purchased for myself in 22 years.
It is not as if I didn’t own a record player. The piece of equipment that I bought 22 years ago is, in fact, a working phonograph. But change is good and it was time for a change.
To celebrate this fun new record player, I’m going to return to enjoying regular audio adventures with my Mystical Dice of Random Musical Destiny.
Everything in its Right Place
I was thirteen when I watched Neil Young and Pearl Jam perform ‘Rockin’ in the Free World’ at the 1993 MTV Video Music Awards. I didn’t know it at the time, but the collaboration would eventually inform how I organized my record collection and how I thought about my favorite artists.
It was a big night. It may be shameful to admit now, but in 1993 the VMAs were the center of my calendar year. The annual awards show marked the end of summer, the start of the school year, and brought with it the promise of unpredictability and spectacle.
Their Band Saved My Life: Double Nickles on the Dime, Mental Health, and My Punk Rock Salvation
I once let a kid who had been kicked out of his house live with me and my family, and he tried to steal my underwear. Okay, that’s a lot up front, let me backup for just a second. It will be quick, and then I’ll tell you how it all led me to The Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime and how D. Boon, Mike Watt, and George Hurley saved my life. Here we go: I started high school in the fall of 1993 and went through all the usual anxiety for all the same reasons everyone does at that age, like a new building, feeling like I had to prove myself again, knowing I would once again be “Jen’s little brother” (my older sister was a high school legend), and oh yeah, girls; especially girls. Girls who could drive and wouldn’t have time for me and my awkwardness, gawkiness, bad skinness, and net-negative charm…ness. I only had one thing going for me, and that’s being funny. It was my only currency, the beginning and end of assets, and it led me to hanging out with a group of older guys (meaning they were juniors and seniors) because they too were funny. I felt cooler and accepted hanging out with them. In that group was the guy who ended up needing a place to live because he got kicked out of his house. Me being the big-hearted person I was, I talked to my mom, and we took him in. What followed was six months and a lot of stuff that can be best summarized as I went from feeling like I was a part of the group and to being more like I was the annoying little brother they only hung out with out of obligation. The kid who moved in with my family clearly didn’t like me but did like having a place to live. In time it was obvious I wasn’t wanted around.
The Story of Hoodwax: A Monthly Vinyl Meetup
They say because we’re humans, we crave human connection. From social gatherings around the holidays to taking in a movie or concert with friends, our shared sense of joy is nourishment for the soul. As a capital “E” extrovert, I live this sentiment every day.
When my wife became pregnant with our son 10 years ago, we decided to sell our loft condo in Lowell, Mass., a former mill town located 30 minutes north of Boston, and move a little closer to my job. Sadly, I made the decision without thinking through the social implications of leaving a city where we had laid strong cultural roots over the course of our 8 years there.
In Defense of Sad Records: My Trip Down the Narrow Stairs
I first say “life sucks” and mean it when I’m twelve years old, in the late aughts. I’m too awkward for friends, social media is starting to expose me to the world’s biggest problems, all the adults are sad from the recession, and my own parents are fighting a long and bloody divorce. When I say it, I’m alone in my bedroom, and the silence thereafter feels like the universe agreeing with me.
Cloud Nothings - Turning On
By Trevor Zaple
Shopping for vinyl is a habit that, primarily, has you working like an old-timey prospector panning for gold in California in the middle of the 19th Century. Picture it: I’m deep in the musty innards of a vintage and antique mall in London, Ontario. Tucked away in the corner, near the washrooms, is a little nook that mostly sells old Coke signs, teacups, and commemorative plates. Hidden behind a shelf of dusty old tumblers in the corner – the very back corner of the mall – are records.