Record Store Day 2010

It's funny, I didn't really think that I had bought a lot for this year's Record Store Day, until I started going through my big bag of stuff. I think that the reason that I felt underwhelmed is because I had high expectations of buying a ton of vinyl this year, and that didn't really happen. I picked up a couple Record Store Day exclusives at Bull Moose Music when the store opened at 9:00, but I was really looking forward to arriving at Newbury Comics in Harvard Square and buying the bulk of my vinyl at that store. I was kind of disappointed. Newbury's didn't really have anything really exciting. I picked up a few re-issue LPs, but for the most part the selection was pretty thin. Once I started digging into the used CDs, that's when I really started spending some money.

I love The Doors. Jim Morrison has a voice that can give me goosebumps. "Music is your only friend.....until the end.". Damn, some of their stuff is so profound. I had no idea that there was a new movie coming out this Spring about the band, but this two song 7 inch serves as a promo for the When You're Strange film.


The embossed silver foil stamp on the front cover is a nice touch.

Another Record Store Day exclusive that I picked up was a live 12 inch of The Jimi Hendrix Experience from 1968.

While not nearly as cool as the foil stamp on the Doors record, the Hendrix 12 inch came with a Record Store Day sticker.

The Black Keys are amazing. Their Rubber Factory and Magic Potion albums are incredible slabs of blues/rock, drawing comparisons to The White Stripes. Their last album, Attack & Release, had a different vibe to it...maybe a little more laid back, and I'm looking forward to what the new record brings. Picked up their new 12 inch single for Tighten Up b/w Howlin' For You. Not as good as the two albums that I mentioned, maybe lacking that dirty blues guitar sound, but the songs are still good, and I'll be picking up their new album next month.

The record that I was most looking forward to was the new pressing of the first Sick Of It All 7 inch. I have never owned this record...Hell, I've never even HEARD this record! Heresy, I know. I knew the songs from the Blood, Sweat and No Tears LP, so I never even bothered to track this record down. With the Record Store Day release, I figured that it was time to right this wrong...if I could get my hands one. There were only 500 pressed on clear vinyl for this release, and I was seriously doubtful that any copies would make it to the small independent record store that I frequent in South Portland, Maine. Much to my surprise, Bull Moose Music had about 5 copies. Both Marcus and Doug had asked me to pick them up a copy if I had the opportunity. Being from the UK and Canada, didn't give them much hope in picking this up. The store limited each customer, so I was only able to buy one copy. I then had my friend, Jeff, grab an extra copy for me. Still needed one more to cover both Marcus and Doug, so at the end of the day, on our way back from Boston, we stopped in at Bull Moose again. They had one copy left and I grabbed it. Mission accomplished.

A couple of cool bonuses with this record...first is the little insert that explains that this is a press for Record Store Day.


The second cool little touch is the hand stamped "Record Store Day 2010" on the inside cover.

Apparently there are a few different cover variations on this pressing...like REV just grabbed whatever extra covers they had lying around, and stuffed the new pressing into them.

Friday Music repressed Alice Cooper's Welcome To My Nightmare album to vinyl. Even though all of the original band members had split by this album, it still stands up well next to the original classics. Vincent Price's spoken word piece on the Black Widow is spine chilling.

I downloaded the Gray Matter CD a few years ago, but I've never bought a copy. I love this band and took the opportunity of of the Dischord re-issues to finally pick up a copy on vinyl. One of the better Revolution Summer bands.

I probably didn't really get into Agent Orange until about a year ago. I had never really heard them, and so I downloaded their album to check them out. The CDR sat in my collection unnoticed for a while, and at one point I decided to finally listen to it to decide if I should keep it or not. Wow, I was impressed. Great early hardcore/punk. Apparently Drastic Plastic repressed this recently, so when I saw this at Newbury Comics, I figured that I'd grab a copy on colored vinyl.

It was nice to see that Agent Orange gave me writing credits for this classic song. Ha!

Another hardcore/punk classic re-issue...this time we have a compilation of songs from The Middle Class on Frontier Records. The record includes a couple of 7 inches from the band, plus some demo sessions. I had never really heard the band before and decided to take a chance. Pretty cool stuff, especially from a hardcore/punk history perspective.

Originally released in 1978, some say that the Out of Vogue 7 inch was the first hardcore record, and the band highlighted this fact in the liner notes for the insert.