Vinyl Lives

Recent months have given us some fine vinyl releases and I'll recap some that I've picked up from Side One Dimmy, No Sleep Records, Tiny Engines, Blackheart, Dischord

Jeff over at Imagine Echoes is a music fan with wide-ranging tastes who, until a year or so ago, had never owned a record.  Now, he has over 150, and in addition to building his collection, he's also the auther of the well-respected blog, Imagine Echoes.

Tiny Engines is a brand new label, but they already have a second fantastic 7" under their belts.

This isn't intended to be a comprehensive list of vinyl (or even just the cool vinyl) that's come out over the last few months, but there have been some releases that definitely deserve to be highlighted.

In my last column I discussed the difference between a seller who describes the condition of a record versus one who actually grades the record as well as what questions to ask and what to expect with the former.  This time, I'll discuss the seller who is at least sophisticated enough to attempt to grade as well as the catches involved in dealing with the less-than-concrete world of record grading.

When you go to your local used record shop, it's easy to determine if a record is in the desired condition.  A visual appraisal right there in the store will give you a really good idea of how the record will play.  Sure, it might look clean and still have some surface noise or have visible scuffs and still play clean, but by and large, when you get it home on your turntable, there shouldn't be tremendous deviation from your expectations at the time of purchase.

It seems like there's never a shortage of new holidays that pop up and, sadly, marketing is almost always the force behind them.  Well, add one more to that list:  Record Store Day.  This holiday is certainly about marketing, but it's not quite what you'd expect.  You see, this is about marketing for the underdog, the independent record store.  It's also about community, because, in many ways, that's what these stores are about.

In 1977, at age 6, Glide's Bob Lange bought his first record, Kiss Alive, and started an obsession that's lasted a lifetime.  Welcome to Bob's new column dedicated to that very obsession, "Vinyl Lives"