Buys & Receipt: November Is Over… Where Are You? (Ancient Artifax & RSD Black Friday)
Record Room: Saturday, 11/30
To whom it may interest,
In terms of what we, as humans, typically understand to be constant, reliable, and understood, death and taxes are two of those things. For me, I can always count on a significant uptick in day job demand towards the end of every year. Consequently, outside passions tend to suffer as does my ability to maintain a household. Or, sleep.
Some recent updates:
Back in July, I ordered the second edition ( I was too late to grab the first one) of Ancient Artifax, a stunning volume of beautifully curated and visually arranged ephemera and memorabilia from the early days of hardcore. As a fan of the AA Instagram, the need to own a physical document of this collection was significant.
The book arrived early to mid-November. It’s so gorgeous I hesitate to even touch it.
Ancient Artifax is the effort of Brian Gorsegner, vocalist of the band Night Birds and apparent collector and preservationist of hardcore’s photocopied, drawn, collaged, painted, vandalized, torn, sold, pressed, glued, stapled, worn, sewn, and now aging material evidence of its past.
Accompanied by written testimonials from those who were there in the throes of sound & vision from the era—people like Tesco Vee (Meatmen), John Brannon (Negative Approach), Roger Miret (Agnostic Front), Brian Baker (Minor Threat)—the book does function as somewhat of an oral history, albeit with a heavy emphasis on Gorsegner’s collection.
In similar fashion, Fucked Up and Photocopied: Instant Art of the Punk Rock Movement, which was authored by Bryan Ray Turcotte and Christopher T. Miller in 1999, is another excellent showcase of punk rock’s visual history.
You can still purchase the second edition of Ancient Artifax at Deathwish, Inc.
Record Store Day: Black Friday 2024:
I wanted one album.
In the past, I’ve scoffed at the idea of a second iteration of Record Store Day falling on the often savage-inducing and cynical yearly event known as “Black Friday” simply because the following Saturday is dedicated to the patronage of small businesses. Being that Record Store Day began as a way to incentivize people to visit their local brick-and-mortar record shops (i.e. small businesses) and help ensure the survivability of these shops at a time when the convenience of online consumerism is preferred to shopping in person, adopting “Black Friday” instead of “Small Business Saturday” seemed counter to the event’s intentions.
I’m still not completely onboard with the idea, but I’m an avid believer in supporting the record stores. And, AGAIN, I was enticed by one album: the 30th anniversary edition of Helmet’s 1994 album, Betty.
My store of choice is Siren Records in Doylestown. To help manage the typically ravenous RSD crowds, especially the asshole flippers, the staff at Siren divide the morning up into designated periods of timed entry, allowing those who’ve reserved their spots to shop exclusives before opening up the store to gen pop. I didn’t reserve my spot, so Betty was sold out by the time I got to the store.
Still, I managed to grab the following:
Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson
From South Africa
To South Carolina
Culture Factory
Prices for the vinyl exclusives were really high. As I was perusing the racks, I came across a number of jazz titles, specifically the Sun Ra and Cecil Taylor LPs, that were too expensive. For From South Africa To South Carolina, an out-of-print collaborative effort by Gil Scott-Heron and Brian Jackson, there was at least a CD option.
Morphine
B-Sides And Otherwise
Rhino / Rykodisc
Morphine is a band that I’ve casually appreciated over the years, but never collected. Being a latecomer, I decided to pick up the B-Sides And Otherwise compilation. I won’t deny that a fellow vinyl collector may have influenced this decision.
Echo &
The Bunnymen
“The Killing Moon” 12” single
Korova
Echo & The Bunnymen’s generational touchstone of a single, “The Killing Moon”, turned 40 this year. While I’m not typically keen on shelling out $20 for a three-track 12”, the impulse to pick it up was strong. I think the song’s quality is beyond dispute.
Engine Kid
The Steve Albini Sessions ‘93
Southern Lord
Additional to Helmet’s Betty, Engine Kid’s Steve Albini Sessions ‘93 was the other album that I had my sights on and I was confident that the album would be obscure enough that the morning’s rush of shoppers wouldn’t buy them all up. I was thankfully correct.
The Steve Albini Sessions ‘93 is essentially a repackaged version of Engine Kid’s 1993 album, Bear Catching Fish. Despite acting as the album’s engineer, Steve Albini was uncredited for his work (not sure why) and noted instead on the back of the CD by the following:
"We drove 1400+ miles from Seattle to Chicago to record in the basement of some guy's brick house. Go figure."
This inscription appears on the spine of the Sessions ‘93 slipcover along with the sketched depiction of Albini at work, drawn by Engine Kid’s Brian Kraft.
Sincerely,
Letters From A Tapehead
