Vegas Vinyl in Las Vegas

I was just in Las Vegas for a conference.  I went a few days early with the family.  We saw The Who at Caesar's Palace.  I had a few hours to kill between family and conference.  Of course I visited record stores.

Vegas Vinyl

Located in an unassuming strip mall across the street from the Airport.  Literally - behind me in this shot is parking lot, then the street, then the airport fence, then the runway.

Unlike the store that shall not be named across town, the proprieter is an extremely nice guy.  I got the feeling he's living his dream in operating a record store.  I got there right as they opened on a Saturday morning.  I was immediately offered a free cold bottled water to enjoy as I dug through the crates.

Some comments about the music currently playing led to lively conversation.  A pleasant experience.  will definitely return when I'm back in Las Vegas.

I very much like their logo.  If it was offered on a T-shirt I would have purchased one.

After shopping I stopped off at my hotel to put records in a safe place as it was about 150 degrees outside.   Then a quick trip to old friend Record City - previously blogged about here.

http://vinylstatistics.blogspot.com/2014/10/record-city-las-vegas-nv-paul-revere.html

And the store who shall not be named was avoided.  When you have a well earned reputation for being a jerk, you don't get my business.

Yellow Magic Shoes

When someone like me sees something like this in a record dump in Hong Kong - it immediately gets added to the collection......

Jerry Lewis - RIP 1926-2017

So yes, there is a record out there.

Just might be revisiting my favorite Jerry Lewis films this weekend.

The Ladies Man
The Errand Boy
The Bellboy.

You don't have to be French.

Charlottesville, VA

As with most of the thinking folk in the U.S., I'm shocked by what went down in Charlottesville, VA.  I was just there about two weeks before the unrest.  I found it to be a very charming city with a college town vibe.  Those who caused trouble were from outside the area.  Many were from out of state.

This site is not about news or politics.  I could fill pages and pages with my rants about our current regime and other regimes around the world.  Not the place.

This site is about records.  Make America crate (dig) again.

I visited two record stores while in Charlottesville.

First up  Sidetracks Records.

Located beside the railroad tracks.   Nice little store that had a policy on the wall - '$15 holds three records (Or Europe '72)'

Next I pulled into Plan 9 Music

located in a non descript mini mall away from the center of town.  Friendly vibe.  Good prices.



I left Charlottesville with good feelings about the city and Virginia.  So visit.  It's a cool little college town with friendly and nice people.   Don't let past events deter you.

Gabriel in Deutsch

Peter Gabriel left Genesis in early 1975.   He took with him the vision, wit, experimentation, personality,  lyrical proficiency,  etc.  In other words, everything that made the band great in the early days.  Genesis went on to massive success after Gabriel left by gradually watering down their sound to the point they sounded like The Wiggles.  

Gabriel went on to release impressive work.  His first four albums had no title.   The next few had two word titles (So, Us and Up).

Some artists will release the occasional single in a different language.  Gabriel went took it a step further.  He recorded vocals in German for entire albums.

I have two of them....


Peter Gabriel (The Famous Charisma Label  1980)

Gabriel's third album is commonly referred to as 'Melt' in reference to the cover, an altered Poloroid.  The mix is the same as the 'normal' version.  Only the vocals are redone.

If you read German, you can read the liner notes on the insert.  The inner sleeve contains the lyrics in English.  The insert has a German translation.

The same treatment was also used for the fourth album

Peter Gabriel (The Famous Charisma Label 1982)

The fourth record was entitled 'Security' in the USA.    The was only on the label.  The album title did not appear on the cover or the spine.

This time out, the album was completely remixed and re sequenced.   Some tracks are longer.

The inner sleeve is completely in German.

HHH Liner Notes

Liner notes are a funny thing.  It's not often you get them written by politicians when the artist is striving for hipness.  Sure, rock stars support candidates.   Witness the Obama inaugural galas.   Witness the Trump galas - the best he could get was a runner up from America's Got Talent.

So here we have Tommy James & The Shondells.  I stress Shondells.  I once proved a trivia master wrong when my team got dinged for not mentioning Shondells when identifying the artist that performed Draggin' the Line.    That track was after Tommy went solo.   No Shondell was harmed during the making of that record.  My smartphone with a link to 45cat.com helped me out. 

I digress.

Tommy James & The Shondells  - Crimson & Clover (Roulette 1969) 

Coincidently I'm listening to King Crimson while composing this post.

Fresh off his defeat by Richard Nixon in 1968, Hubert Horatio Humphrey took time out of his busy schedule to write a thank you note to Tommy James.  Noted in the text is that Tommy 'cooperated enthusiastically' during the campaign.  Sounds like somethig a Bond villain would say.  Tommy was so tickled he put on on the back of his most psychedelic album

How to CB

Another entry in the 'there's a record for everything' thread.   I found this at The Last Bookstore in Downtown Los Angeles.   

My only concern is how they got the record to play without skipping in a big rig.

I didn't get the pamphlet.

Living Guitars Get Stoned

Living Strings. Living Voices. Living Brass. Living Marimbas.    Such are the released on RCA Camden, RCA's budget line named after the factory town in New Jersey.

Their MO was to take low rent orchestras, record them for cheap, rename them Living [something] and sell them for a bargain price.

I suppose they said the strings and other instruments we living so they didn't have to credit (or pay) the musicians who played them.

Here's a fairly odd one.....

Living Guitars Play Songs Made Famous by The Rolling Stones (RCA Camden 1971)

I gather the cover to be a representation of the slave trade so glorified in Brown Sugar.

On the back we get a picture of the palm tree Keith Richards would fall out of 40 years after this release.

Gary US Bonds Twist Up Calypso

The Twist was all the rage.  Calypso was a hit with the cocktail set.  What's an artist to do when his hit singles were drying up?  Combine the two crazes and see if it stick of course.

Gary "U.S." Bonds - Twist up Calypso  (Legend 1962)

Bonds was responsible for some great pre British Invasion party songs.  School Is Out, A Quarter To Three and New Orleans are still classics IMHO.