1970 Cactus

I've been tossing around the idea of reorganizing my record collection for a long time now. Because my listening habits tend to revolve around specific years or time periods, I was curious as to how my record shelves would look if they were organized by year. I wasn't sure if it was a good idea, or one that would frustrate me down the road, but the idea sat there in the back of my mind for a couple of years. When I started obsessing over punk from 1977, it seemed to be the catalyst to put my plan into motion. I was really concentrating on specific years, and was curious to see how my shelves would look visually from this organizational perspective.

It obviously made sense to start at the beginning of my collection timeline, and I was soon digging through albums from the year of my birth...1970.

I obsess...it is what I do...and records from that year quickly dominated my daily playlist, and a number of them started seeing daily action on my iPod. Once I'd broken out my vinyl collection by year, and was looking at only those seven records that I owned from 1970, the albums that I was missing stood out like a sore thumb. The more I immersed myself in my soundtrack from 1970, the more I needed to fill those holes.

When I set out on my mission to try and nail down the remaining 1970 releases that I needed, the debut Cactus album shot to the top of my list.

Around 10 years ago, I first started to appreciate 70's Rock, and some where along the way I downloaded a copy of that first Cactus record. There was something about it that really struck a chord with me. It was raw and unpolished, bluesy and yet borderline chaotic at times. Hell, their entire purpose of covering Parchman Farm was to play it faster than anybody before them. I can get behind that kind of thinking.

I was actually chasing this record quite a few years ago, but every time I'd find one, I wasn't happy with the condition. Seemed as though every copy out there was beat up and suffering from terrible ring wear. When I came across this one on eBay, looking mint with the shrink wrap still on it, I jumped on it regardless of the higher price.