Q&A Remix With Jeff Ash

The Q&A Remix is a frequent column on IHTOV in which people from all walks of life answer a set of pre-written questions about their vinyl collection. Today we welcome Jeff Ash

Have you ever bought a record just for the artwork?

Oh, sure. The all-timer is Hawaii Calls: Fire Goddess by Webley Edwards with Al Kealoha Perry from 1958. A vaguely cheesecake cover on which an exotic-looking topless woman holds flaming bowls in front of her, well, you get the idea. Another is Mambo, a 10-inch Xavier Cugat record from 1953. Another is Live at Someplace Else, a 1968 LP with a cool cover that was by a Minneapolis group called South 40, which turned out to be Crow before they were Crow and thus a fairly interesting record.

What is your most memorable vinyl buying experience?

For 10 years, my grail record was Two for the Price of One by Larry Williams and Johnny Watson, released on Okeh Records in 1967. Never saw it in the wild. Bought a CD copy at Amoeba Records in Berkeley, California, in 2010, but couldn’t find the vinyl. Just before Christmas in 2019, I was record digging at Mill City Sound, an excellent record store in the Minneapolis suburb of Hopkins. I was idly going through letters A and B in the soul records when I glanced up at the collectible records on the wall, the ones that are fun to look at but usually way too pricey. There, right in front of me at eye level, was Two for the Price of One. I immediately took it off the wall and bought it. Never mind that it completely blew my budget, costing four times what I’d planned to spend on records on that trip.

What’s the first area you head for in a record store?

If it’s one of my regular stops, I’ll start with the new arrivals among the used records. If it’s a store that’s new to me, I’ll start with the used soul and R&B records.

What one record in your collection would you be most eager to share with new friends?

Probably one of my soundtracks from Black or blaxploitation films of the ‘70s. Cool music they likely haven’t heard from films they likely haven’t seen. Probably the “Shaft” soundtrack by Isaac Hayes from 1971. I bought it when I was 14. Hugely influential on my musical tastes. I had that record for years before I ever saw the film.

Are you a completionist when it comes to artists? Which artist do you have the most records from?

Not a completionist but close to it for some artists with a small number of releases. I just have to remind myself that some records are obscure for good reason. Then there’s Bob Seger, who practically disavows all the music he recorded before 1975, when the Silver Bullet Band era began. I love those early Bob Seger records, and I have all but two of them. I have (and want) none from the Silver Bullet Band era. I have 16 Ike and Tina Turner LPs, plus two more by Ike.

What is/are your white whale records, something you have your eye on but haven’t been able to find? 

 Four of the five Music from National Football League Films soundtrack records. I have the first. I’ve seen the second but never the others. Getting to the point now, though, that I’m OK if I don’t find them. Another is An Album of WIFC Solid Gold, a promo double LP pressed for an FM radio station in Wausau, Wisconsin, my hometown. I once had it, but I gave it to a guy who used to be a DJ at that station. I figured I could find another copy but no luck yet. I have the same LP pressed for WOKY radio out of Milwaukee.

Do you have a favorite live record? 

Not a huge fan of live records, but it’s probably The Mothers – Fillmore East, June 1971. It’s more of a comedy record than anything, but it’s also a record that takes me back to a rather specific and good time in my life. Some other good ones are the live Aretha Franklin and King Curtis records from the Fillmore West, plus Live/Blow Your Face Out by the J. Geils Band, plus Alive! by KISS – the greatest 8-track tape ever.

Who/what got you hooked on records? 

 Listening to the old Top 40 AM radio in the late ‘60s and earliest ‘70s – WOKY out of Milwaukee and WLS out of Chicago – then going out and buying 45s before moving on to buying LPs.

What are your first memories of listening to records? 

My dad always had LPs when we were growing up in the ‘60s. I have a few of those albums. But he stopped buying records in about 1965, when money got tight with a family of three growing boys.

What’s your favorite record to listen to on headphones? 

 Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd, especially when the sound goes from side to side, from channel to channel. Somewhat related, whenever I’d upgrade some part of my old stereo, Head East’s Flat as a Pancake would be the first LP to test it out, seeing whether the double-tracked Minimoog solos on “Never Been Any Reason” sounded good. Boston’s debut LP would be the second record to test it out.

Tell us a little about your favorite record store 

 My favorite record store of all time was Inner Sleeve Records in my hometown of Wausau, Wisconsin, as it existed in the late ‘70s. It shared a small building with a bike shop. New releases on the wall, other new records in the bins (no used records back then), all curated by a friendly hippie who gave you a free sleeve for each record you bought. The Inner Sleeve is still with us, still run by the same friendly hippie, but it has moved twice over the years and neither of the new locations has had the same charm and vibe as the place I came to love. My favorite record store now is Mill City Sound in the Minneapolis suburb of Hopkins. Tremendous selection of records. I always find something there. One more note on that: I love record store tourism. That is, stopping at indie record stores while traveling. It’s usually an interesting experience, a chance to meet cool people (who also know good places to eat) and gets me into neighborhoods not typically visited.

What’s the weirdest record you own? 

I love to look at records classified as “weird” or “strange” by record stores or by record sellers at record shows. I just had to buy Where There Walks a Logger There Walks a Man by Buzz Martin on the Ripcord label from 1968. Folk music for Pacific Northwest loggers. Who knew?

How has your record collection and appreciation for vinyl evolved over the years, and what has influenced your tastes? 

 I loved the soul and R&B music I heard on Milwaukee and Chicago radio in the late ‘60s and earliest ‘70s. However, my knowledge of that music was wide but shallow. I knew the hits but nothing else. In the late ‘00s, I discovered music blogs, which introduced me to a ton of soul and R&B music I’d never heard, much of it deep cuts or obscure regional stuff not widely played or distributed – certainly not in small-town Wisconsin. That’s what I’ve collected over the past 15 or so years, seeking out what I’d seen and heard on those blogs. I also started writing my own music blog – AM, Then FM. It’ll be 18 years come February 2025, but I’m kind of an outlier now, still doing a blog instead of a Substack. I’m also old enough to have seen vinyl’s evolution as the dominant music format you thought would be around forever, then being overtaken by CDs and falling out of style for a long time, then roaring back into style. I bought vinyl for about 20 years, roughly 1970 to 1990, then bought only CDs like everyone else for about 15 years, then got back into vinyl in a big way in the mid- to late ‘00s. By then, there was a ton of used vinyl to dig through at stores and shows.

What’s the last record you played?

 I must confess that new records are so expensive these days that I try to listen to them on YouTube first if possible to determine whether I really want to pop for them. Thus, the last record I played was Slang Spirituals by Lady Blackbird. It’s excellent.

Jeff Ash is a writer, editor, researcher and record digger from Green Bay, Wisconsin. (He’d just come in from shoveling in his photo.) Jeff spent 38 years in the news business and has written AM, Then FM – a music and pop culture blog – since 2007.  He’s also on Bluesky, Twitter and Facebook.