In which, because I am quiveringly beaming, I report on a recent two-part bacchanal of record shopping.
Part the first, in which is enumerated a list of the albums purchased at Cheapo Discs in sunny, snowy Saint Paul, MN over the recent Thanksgiving holiday:
Burning up that open road
Wolf Parade, Expo 86
Múm, Summer Make Good
Gotan Project, La Revancha Del Tango
Current 93, Nature Unveiled
The Jesus Lizard, Liar
Morbid Angel, Abominations Of Desolation
Godflesh, In All Languages
Dan Deacon, Bromst
Múm, Go Go Smear The Poison Ivy
Kraftwerk, Autobahn
Laibach, WAT
And, part the second, in which is enumerated a list of the albums recently acquired from The End Records scandalously absurd clearance sale (still ongoing, winkwinknudgenudge):
A gorgeous shade of green
Journey To Ixtlan, Journey To Ixtlan
Adversarial, All Idols Fall Before The Hammer
Bible Of The Devil, The Diabolic Procession
Efterklang, Magic Chairs
James Blackshaw, O True Believers
Foscor, Groans To The Guilty
The Human Quena Orchestra, The Politics Of The Irredeemable
Tronus Abyss, Vuoto Spazio Trionfo
Thrall, Away From The Haunts Of Men
Pestilence, Malleus Malleficarum
Hecq, Steeltongued
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Record shopping’s only dead if we stop doing it, friends. Where do you go to scratch that itch?
Being stuck in the middle of Iowa, I buy most of my music from online distros. But I’ve had great experiences at Cheapo, Extreme Noise, Metal Haven (RIP), Reckless, Record Collector, Amoeba… basically whenever I go on a trip I try to fit in record shopping… much to my wife’s dismay.
Awesome – I’ve been to all those places except Record Collector. Where’s that at? I only went to XNoise a few times back in high school with some punk friends, but I seem to remember it being pretty rad. Did you ever hit up a place in St. Paul called Root Cellar Records? It had an all-metal basement section, and was run by the folks behind Root Of All Evil Records. Closed down a number of years ago, but that was pretty great when it was happening.
And yeah, I was pretty bummed when Metal Haven shut down here. Reckless is great, though, and I’ve spent just insane amounts of money at all three of their locations since moving to Chicago a few years back.
And I’m totally with you – I’m a complete record shopping tourist, which usually drives my wife nuts, too. We went to San Francisco earlier this year and I spent most of the time we were in Berkeley running through Amoeba and Rasputin like a madman while she tried to avoid all the crusty street-types. Really, sometimes I don’t know why they put up with us…
Unfortunately I never did get to go to Root Cellar, but I had heard of it. Record Collector is a little hole in the wall in Iowa City, IA… not the most metal record store, but I’ve found some cool stuff there. I love going to Metal Haven, kind of pricey but always a great selection and a cool experience. Reckless is great too, I’ve found so much great used metal there it’s ridiculous.
I drive my wife crazy too, but she likes metal so she is pretty patient and understanding… she even introduced me to a place in SoCal called Dark Realm records on our honeymoon. It is run by the Sadistic Intent dudes and the t-shirt selection was ridiculous I found the Cultes Des Ghoules album I’d been hunting for. We also hit up Amoeba Hollywood on Record Store Day and it was nuts!
I’m actually going to be in San Francisco in March so we will definitely hit up Amoeba and Rasputin’s as well.