A morning mix of news for the vinyl inclined

In rotation: 4/22/25

Twin Ports, MN | Local Record Stores Talk Vinyl: From the sound quality to the artistry vinyl records have made their comeback. Large department stores often carry some of the most popular records. But more unique selections are best found at your local record store. …“A lot of younger folks I see are kind of getting into it, asking a lot of questions about players, what they need for accessories. What’s the difference between a 45 and a 33 so it’s really cool to watch the market kind of blow up and expand, especially to a younger audience, because it ensures longevity in what we’re doing here.” said Jon Fritsche, Owner of Globe News in Superior. “You don’t need to have a super elaborate, expensive setup, you can start simple, whether it’s one of the little travel turntables, or, I don’t know, an older turntable with some headphones. You don’t have to throw 1000s of dollars at a system right away. You don’t have to buy 800 records right off the bat.

Atlanta, GA | New record store Crates ATL soft launches in Downtown Atlanta: A new record store from Moods Music owner Darryl Harris is set to open in Downtown Atlanta on Easter weekend. Crates ATL hosted a soft opening on April 11, introducing Harris’ new venture to Historic Hotel Row on Mitchell Street. Community members gathered for music, snacks and drinks, and a chance to get a first look at Crates’ inventory of new and vintage records, speakers, turntables, plants, and more. Moods Music has been an Atlanta staple for 25 years, bringing vinyl and CDs spanning genres like Neo Soul, Afro-Cuban, and Acid Jazz to Little Five Points. Crates displays Harris’ established music knowledge and effortless cool with a selection of records primarily highlighting Black artists and genres like jazz, hip-hop, funk, soul, and R&B — making it the “dopest vinyl shop in the ATL.”

Littleton, CO | Records on Main in Littleton will have its soft opening on April 26: After a delayed opening due to a motorcycle accident, the vinyl shop is preparing for its first customers. In the heart of Denver’s metro area, iconic shops like Wax Trax Records and Mutiny Information Cafe have long defined the region’s vinyl culture. Soon, vinyl enthusiasts can find records in downtown Littleton at Records on Main, a family-run record store set to open at 2430 W. Main St. The story behind Records on Main is as compelling as its collection. Cassie Cherin recently found herself organizing the soft launch of her dad’s record store. Her dad, Marshall Cherin suffered a near-fatal motorcycle accident that left him hospitalized. “It’s been difficult. I moved here from Los Angeles in the last 20 days,” she said. “But it’s also exciting and (my dad) is progressing really well right now. Hopefully he will be out of the hospital and into rehab within the next week.”

New York, NY | Rough Trade Debuts a New 4,000-Square-Foot Underground Location at Rink Level: …Indie record shop Rough Trade debuted a secondary location on the Rink Level of 30 Rockefeller Plaza this week, adding a new 4,000-square-foot space dubbed Rough Trade Below to its existing 2,000-square-foot street-level shop of the same building, now rebranded as Rough Trade Above. “Rather than open another store somewhere else in the city, we felt that we shouldn’t follow convention and just go bigger where we are,” director and co-owner Stephen Godfroy tells The Center Magazine. “Even though the second store is very close in proximity, it’s a different world.” Now, the upstairs location focuses on new vinyl, arranged by genre and then alphabetically. The lower-level store also has some new releases, but they’re displayed by theme, like classic New York albums. But a major part of the new space is a used vinyl section, where shoppers can listen to tracks before purchasing, as well as sell their own records.

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TVD Radar: Harley Flanagan: Wired for Chaos in theaters 6/20

VIA PRESS RELEASE | Founder of the pioneering band Cro-Mags, Harley Flanagan is a punk rock/hardcore legend who’s defied the odds—along with neglect, sexual abuse, drugs, violence and PTSD—and lived to tell the tale. The feature-length documentary, Harley Flanagan: Wired for Chaos, dives headfirst into the wild life and times of this larger-than-life icon and is a no-holds-barred ride, that isn’t just about the music; it’s about a man forged in fire who’s lived to tell the tale.

Raised by a Warhol Factory “it” girl, Harley was thrown into the Lower East Side’s underground scene in the ’70s. Left to fend for himself, by his teens, he was squatting in Alphabet City, stealing food, dodging gangs, and living in a world that he describes as “some serious Lord of the Flies shit.” But, as his life descended into a hellish day-to-day, he was simultaneously becoming a punk rock legend: at the age of 11, he was drumming at CBGBs and Max’s Kansas City with his aunt’s band, the Stimulators.

Sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll weren’t a choice—they were survival. But Harley was a fighter. Whether on stage, in the streets, or in the Jiu-Jitsu gym with Renzo Gracie, he never backed down. As the ferocious frontman of the Cro-Mags, he pushed NYC Hardcore into uncharted territory. But violence, addiction, and a traumatic past left deep scars. The streets made him, but they also nearly destroyed him.

Directed and Produced by Emmy and Peabody Award-winner Rex Miller (Citizen Ashe) for Rexpix Media, and produced by Laura Flanagan, Harley Flanagan: Wired for Chaos dives deep into Harley’s past, but it’s not just war stories. It’s about what happens after.

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TVD Radar: Anarchy
on Abbey Road – A Punk Tribute to The Beatles
red marble vinyl in stores 5/9

VIA PRESS RELEASE | “No Elvis, Beatles or the Rolling Stones,” sang The Clash in 1977—but that was a long, long time ago. Today, at least two of those names are even bigger than they were back then, and the punks have thoroughly changed their tune.

Last year brought Punk Me Up, a star-studded punk tribute to the Rolling Stones (and the successor to perhaps an even more audacious offering, a punk tribute to Pink Floyd that utterly brutalized the sentiments behind Johnny Rotten’s most famous T-shirt).

Now comes Anarchy on Abbey Road, a 15 track collection that sees another spiky-haired army of punkoid heroes and veterans fold their fists around the Fab Four’s favorite ditties, and breathe a whole new wave of energy into songs we’ve spent our entire lives hearing.

“Why Don’t We Do It In The Road?” demand Peter & The Test Tube Babies, one of the most entertaining of all the bands that flourished in the fury of punk rock’s Oi! diversion. “I’m Down,” lament Eddie and the Hot Rods—a band that is celebrating its 50th anniversary around now, but still blazes as brilliantly as they did in ’75, when a lot of their set was made up of ’60s classics, from The Who and Them, to the Stones and Bob Seger.

The legendary 999 tell what happened when “I Saw Her Standing There”; The Members recall their favorite “Daytripper”; and stepping back into the realms of what history refers to as the proto punk years, the Flamin’ Groovies (“Revolution”) and the Pink Fairies (“Get Back”) reflect back upon their own infancy—these aren’t their first Beatles covers, after all. But they’re as good as those they did way back when.

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Graded on a Curve:
Iggy Pop,
The Idiot

Celebrating Iggy Pop on his 78th birthday.Ed.

David Bowie was a great artist, but he was also an appropriator and opportunist, and was not above exploiting his friends to achieve his own goals. Take Iggy Pop. Pop had been floundering since the Stooges dissolved, and found himself in Berlin with Bowie who, like Pop, was trying to fight both his drug demons and find his way to a new sound, which would emerge in 1977’s Low. But before Low he produced Pop, as much out of self-interest as friendship. As he would say later, “Poor Jim, in a way, became a guinea pig for what I wanted to do with sound.”

Fortunately for Pop, their creative collaboration—for their sessions were much, much more than Bowie’s simply using Pop as a laboratory animal for musical experimentation—resulted in 1977’s The Idiot, a work of genius and a radical departure from Pop’s frankly self-destructive proto-punk with the Stooges. Indeed, it was so radical it skipped punk entirely, and disappointed plenty of people who thought Pop should have been taking advantage of a sound and attitude he had helped to foment.

The Idiot would have been unthinkable to anyone familiar with Pop’s previous personae as rock’s wildebeest, who flung himself about to the frenetic roar produced by the Stooges, seemingly oblivious to the physical and psychic damage he was inflicting upon himself. On The Idiot, the roar of guitars was replaced by a funky and robotic foray into more Apollonian territory, with Pop singing over Kraftwerk-flavored art rock, quieter tunes some with Gothic overtones, and even proto-industrial electronica.

Most of its songs would be celebrated by proponents of the various genres of post-punk, demonstrating conclusively just how far ahead of its time it was. On a bummer of a note, it was even the soundtrack to Joy Division singer Ian Curtis’ suicide, as it was found spinning in the room where Curtis hanged himself.

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TVD Radar: Alison Krauss, Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection 30th anniversary reissue in stores 7/11

VIA PRESS RELEASE | Craft Recordings is excited to announce the first-ever vinyl reissue of Alison Krauss’ double-Platinum compilation, Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection.

Originally released in 1995, the album offers a survey of early career highlights from the legendary bluegrass-country singer, fiddler and producer. A testament to Krauss’ virtuosic and versatile talents, the collection—released when she was just 23 years old—includes the best-selling country hit “When You Say Nothing at All,” the GRAMMY® Award-winning “Baby, Now That I’ve Found You,” plus timeless favorites from her solo releases, as well as those with Alison Krauss & Union Station and Alison Krauss & The Cox Family.

Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection returns to vinyl July 11th and is available to pre-order now, while fans can also find limited-edition pressings on Translucent Teal vinyl (exclusively at Books-A-Million) and Vintage Red vinyl (at CraftRecordings.com). In the meantime, listeners can also rediscover the timeless collection across digital platforms today.

While this reissue commemorates the 30th anniversary of Krauss’ career-changing collection, fans are also celebrating the long-awaited eighth studio album from Alison Krauss & Union Station, Arcadia, which dropped March 28th via Down the Road Records. To celebrate their first release in 14 years, the band is embarking on a 75-date North American tour, beginning tomorrow with a two-night stint at Louisville, KY’s Louisville Palace.

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Graded on a Curve:
Arab Strap,
Monday at the Hug
& Pint

It’s Monday afternoon here at the Hug & Pint in lovely Falkirk, Scotland, not that you’d know it because management 86’d the sun a long time ago because it was annoying the customers, and that blootered bampot at the end of the bar is Arab Strap’s Adrian Moffat, and aren’t you curious what he’s havering on about?

Well I can tell you, because along with bandmate Malcolm Middleton he’s laid it all out for you in lovingly lugubrious detail on 2003’s Monday at the Hug & Pint. And as it turns out Moffat is one articulate, if very down in the mouth, fellow, one whose life is shite because, well, he has problems. Women problems, a rat-arsed-every-night-of-the-week problem, self-esteem problems.

And if that kind of bleak doesn’t sound like your idea of listening pleasure there’s this: Arab Strap’s music—often gloomy, yet just as often achingly lovely—makes for the perfect backdrop for Moffat’s often self-lacerating lyrics, and together they can be downright revelatory.

The only real question you’re left with after listening to Monday at the Hug & Pint—Arab Strap’s fifth studio outing and their next to last before going on a very long hiatus—is why you’ll want to play it again rather than go drown yourself in the nearest bog. Like Arab Strap’s other albums, this one is an epic bummer.

But here’s the explanation—depression can be surprisingly cathartic. It doesn’t hurt that Moffat is a lyricist of uncommon talent, and that Arab Strap seem incapable of writing of a bad song. Enter the Hug & Pint on a Monday night and you’ll wind up with more than just a bad case of sexual frustration and a wicked jackhammer of a hangover—you will partake of the divinely morose.

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A morning mix of news for the vinyl inclined

In rotation: 4/21/25

Midland, MI | Business Matters: Radio Wasteland Records in Midland offers new and vintage vinyl records. Jim Gleason, 59, owns Radio Wasteland Records at 716 George St., across from the Midland Public Schools administration office. The business stands as Midland’s only independent record store. A variety of new and vintage records are for sale as well as some vinyl accessories and equipment including new turntables. The store is also able to order vinyl records that are not in stock. “Probably 90% of our stock is vintage vinyl,” Gleason said. “We’ve got bins full of several thousand dollar records though the average price of our used vinyls are about $3-$10 with a small amount of high-dollar, collectable records that go into the hundreds of dollars.”

Glenside, PA | Vinyl Chickie, Glenside’s first specialty record shop, launches in May: Vinyl Chickie, Glenside’s first specialty record shop, is looking to open its doors at 2256 Mt Carmel Avenue in one month. The store’s grand opening will be held alongside The Dovetail, Align Barre & Fitness, and Bernie’s Herbals on May 17. Owner Lisa Schaffer, a seasoned vinyl DJ and 2024 Best of Glenside-winning local photographer, says the last of her wish-list—custom-made record shelves—are on their way. “I worked at a record store for years. Vinyl Chickie is where I want the next chapter of my life to be. I love music,” she said. “I want to be in a place where people come to talk about music. That’s my happy place.” The store will feature new and used records, new equipment (as opposed to used), 45s, CDs, and cassettes, as well as a listening lounge area and a gift shop.

Headingley, UK | The Premier League referee who opened up a vinyl record store: Explore the revival of vinyl records, the challenges the music industry faces and the Premier League referee who opened his own store. In an exclusive Shots! TV documentary, we explore the resurgence of vinyl records and challenges the music industry faces. In the episode, we talk to a DJ about the future of music, find out how a Premier League referee ended up opening a record store, and learn how a Taylor Swift album inspired a work of art. Watch The vinyl revival to find out more and tune into Freeview channel 262 and Freely channel 565 this Sunday 20th April for more documentaries. The Vinyl Whistle shop in Headingley was named as a play on ‘the final whistle’ by it’s former owner Jon Moss, who was a Premier League referee. Jon had always had a passion for music and was in a band during his time at university.

Indio, CA | 3 Questions with Alex Rodriguez, A.K.A. Record Safari: With heat above 100 degrees on opening day of the Coachella Music and Arts Festival this past weekend in Indio, California, it was inevitable that Alex Rodriguez would see a lot of extra customers in the Record Safari store he curates annually at the festival. The shop’s powerful air conditioning keeps everything nice and cool, and all those precious new and vintage vinyl platters warp-free. While some other festivals sell records and CDs, Coachella’s is the largest-known festival record store—and was fully stocked for Record Store Day this past weekend. Among the releases was a limited edition of festival act the Marias’ new single, “Back to Me.” In 2020, Rodriguez was the subject of a documentary—fittingly called Record Safari—that followed him in his search across the U.S. for vinyl for the store at Coachella.

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TVD Los Angeles

The Best of The Idelic Hour with Jon Sidel

Greetings from Laurel Canyon!

Beautiful people are queuing to drown / They wait for the lifeguard to put on his crown / But he’s up at the other end of town / Trying to talk to the mirror / The scientist talks and he knows what he means / He sits on the floor and has beautiful dreams / Then he gets brought down by a woman who screams / But he knows it’s only a record¡ oh yes it is

A song for insane times? Huh? I guess whatever you say.

My grind towards spring continues. Kid Jonah made it back safely from Coachella to pitch well on Tuesday. So life is as good as it can be. Oh, and I made it out to see Bar Italia at Fonda Theatre last night.

These days I’m not used to standing with a thousand people to watch a band. From the NY Dolls to Fugazi to Led Zeppelin I’ve seen ’em all. What made me want to add Bar Italia to that list? Italia’s debut album was one of the sparks of 2023.

Happy to report that so did many cool kids made the scene. There was even a nice touch of rock ‘n’ roll fashion in the crowd. The band has room to grow live, but they finished off last night’s gig strong.

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TVD Washington, DC

TVD Live: Mercury Rev at the Atlantis, 4/13

Since it first formed 35 years ago at the University of Buffalo, Mercury Rev has gone through a lot of phases before settling into the kind of poetic grandeur it gave its high water mark, 1998’s Deserter’s Songs and that continues to inform their latest work, last year’s Born Horses.

It’s the kind of big, synth-washed saturation with guitar embellishment and booming drums that would satisfy an arena crowd. It was strange and wonderful, then, to see Mercury Rev in the first week of their tour playing a club as small as the Atlantis in DC. Bringing the same kind of theatricality to their performance that they’ve brought to their sound, the touring quintet assembled on stage to the strains of Ravi Shankar and an Antoine de Saint-Exupéry audiobook.

Frontman Jonathan Donahue, in a double-breasted coat, cap, and ascot, looked like a Pied Piper, using elaborate arm motions to swim through the sound or suddenly crouch to conduct or simply present the forces on either side of the stage, conjuring up their sounds like a wizard.

One was the only other original member of the band, Sean “Grasshopper” Mackowiak, in shades, playing an electric guitar that wasn’t so much individual notes or even chords, but more a cascade of glistening effects. Opposite him was the booming drums of Joe Magistro. Behind them, also in shades, were a pair of multi-instrumentalists, mostly working a pair of synthesizers, though Jesse Chandler also picked up an occasional sax or flute to bring something different to the mix.

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TVD Radar: Elliott Smith, Figure 8 (Deluxe Edition) 3LP in stores 6/6

VIA PRESS RELEASE | Twenty-five years ago today, the late musical mastermind Elliott Smith released Figure 8, his immaculate, ornate, Technicolor second album for DreamWorks Records.

In honor of the album’s 25th anniversary, its enduring appeal and continued influence, Interscope/UMe will release Figure 8 (Deluxe Edition), the previously digital-only edition that expands the classic album with all the B-sides, solo acoustic and alternate version tracks that were released on the various singles, promos, and international editions of the beloved 2000 record, on vinyl for the first time. The Deluxe Edition was released as a digital exclusive in 2019 to commemorate what would have been Smith’s 50th birthday.

The first-ever vinyl pressing of Figure 8 (Deluxe Edition) features the album presented on 45 rpm tri-color opaque white, black and red “Figure 8 Mural Vinyl” as a nod to the famous Los Angeles mural that a black and white Smith stands in front of on the iconic album cover. The original 16 tracks are spread across two LPs while a third LP boasts seven bonus tracks, six of which have never been on vinyl.

The audio has been mastered for vinyl by Justin Perkins at Mystery Room Mastering with lacquers cut by Ryan Smith at Sterling Sound. This special 25th anniversary Deluxe Edition will be housed in a tri-fold sleeve and this exclusive vinyl colorway is limited to 3,000 globally. Figure 8 (Deluxe Edition) is available to purchase exclusively via Interscope.com. The record will ship on or around June 6.

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Graded on a Curve:
The Dictators,
Go Girl Crazy!

Celebrating Andy Shernoff in advance of his 70th birthday tomorrow.Ed.

You can’t judge a book by its cover, but LPs? A whole different story. One glance at the cover of The Dictators’ 1975 debut Go Girl Crazy!—which features roadie turned singer and “Secret Weapon” Handsome Dick Manitoba hamming it up in a wrestling outfit and a 200-watt smile, resplendent in Jewfro and dark sunglasses, an outrageous red glitter jacket bearing his name hanging from a gym locker nearby—and you know you’re in the presence of something truly outrageous and great.

Oh, how I love The Dictators. The New Yawk proto-punkers may have produced only one brilliant LP, namely Go Girl Crazy! (which sold like shit), but talk about influential; you can draw a direct line between it to The Ramones and straight to The Beastie Boys. All three bands have the same smartass “fight for your right to party” punk attitude; they all deliver tons of snotty and hilarious one-liners; and they all use great guitar riffs to deliver the goods. If The Ramones (who later did a version of “California Sun” off Go Girl Crazy!) and The Beastie Boys didn’t cop their entire shtick from The Dictators’ debut, I’m Michael Bolton, mulleted version.

But to be honest I don’t give a shit whether Go Girl Crazy! was the Sgt. Pepper of proto-punk and the Rosetta Stone for hundreds of bands that came later. All that matters to me is that Go Girl Crazy! is one of the rockingest, funniest, and most gleeful albums ever made. And it’s good-natured, too. I used the word “snotty” above, but The Dictators are a friendly lot, and as a result get away with a lot. You would expect songs like “Master Race Rock” and “Back to Africa” to be prime examples of the deliberate punk outrage, but both turn out to be just the opposite of what they appear to be, namely funny and friendly. Why, these guys don’t even swear; co-lead vocalist Andy “Adny” Shernoff says “heck!”

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The Best of Radar:
The Podcast with Dylan Hundley, Episode 170: Oliver Ackermann of A Place to Bury Strangers

PHOTO: DEVON BRISTOL-SHAW | On this episode of Radar, I speak with Oliver Ackermann who is the founder and creator of the Brooklyn-based effects pedal company Death By Audio, and is the guitarist and lead singer for New York-based punk/noise/shoe-gaze band A Place to Bury Strangers.

They have released seven LPs, fourteen EPs, a live album, and more singles than I can count. They are prolific and committed to the cause. Their most recent is called Synthesizer (Dedstrange). It is a wonderful record that also comes in a limited edition series of LPs where the album cover itself doubles as a circuit board and functional synth for curious and enterprising fans. “It’s pretty messed up and chaotic. But it feels really human,” says Oliver. “In an era of making music where so little is DIY and so much is left up to AI, never setting foot in a practice room or a home studio, making something that feels deliberately chaotic, messy, and human, is entirely the point.”

I had a wonderful time talking about the record with Oliver along with his approach to live shows, his love of art, community, and mixtapes.

Radar features discussions with artists and industry leaders who are creators and devotees of music and is produced by Dylan Hundley and The Vinyl District. Dylan Hundley is an artist and performer, and the co-creator and lead singer of Lulu Lewis and all things at Darling Black. She co-curates and hosts Salon Lulu which is a New York based multidisciplinary performance series. She is also a cast member of the iconic New York film Metropolitan.

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Graded on a Curve:
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Henry’s Dream

What’s all the fuss about this guy? And does anyone listen to him for pleasure? Between that sepulchral voice and the black attire and the overheated Gothic death dirges, which split the difference between folk music and lurid (and despite his rep as a “poet,” not very well written) and lugubrious blues melodrama, I just don’t see (or hear) the appeal. His “dark vision” is verbosity for verbosity’s sake and might work as comedy, but the man ain’t in it for the laughs. He’s for dead real serious.

Or is he? “I consider myself to be first and foremost a comic writer,” he once said. “The way I entertain myself—especially in those long and grim hours in the office—is to write stuff I find funny.” Is Cave a black humorist, and I’m simply too dumb to get the joke? I don’t think so. My sense of humor is blacker than Cave’s usual attire, and I’m not laughing. And I find E.M. Cioran funny.

I only have two problems with Nick Cave—his music and his lyrics. The former is dreary, morbid (he’s got a lot in common with the death metal crowd) and should be kept out of the hands of those with suicidal ideation. His lyrics show he spends a lot of time in the company of the Oxford English Dictionary, and it’s not doing him any favors. Take the opening line of a song I picked at random, “We Call Upon the Author”:

“Our myxomatoid kids spraddle the streets
We’ve shunned them from the greasy-grind
The poor little things they look so sad and old
As they mount us from behind.”

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A morning mix of news for the vinyl inclined

In rotation: 4/18/25

US | Record Store Day 2025 Report: Swift Sales and Long Lines, But Weather and Economy Cloud Some Results: Taylor Swift, Gracie Abrams, Wicked and Oasis were among the in-demand titles as Retail Track trekked to eight indie stores in NYC and L.A. Record Store Day delivered another triumphant sales day to brick and mortar indie retailers with the hot sellers being Taylor Swift, Gracie Abrams and Charli XCX titles, while the Oasis and Wicked releases were among the most in demand—if only more copies had been manufactured for the event. While this year’s Record Store Day (RSD) represented the usual sales bonanzas for retailers, merchants in some of the stores visited by Billboard reporters said that even with one of the stronger release day schedules in recent years, it was difficult for them to top last year’s RSD, which at the time many retailers proclaimed as their best day ever. However, there were other mitigating factors beyond the strength of last year’s performance that were felt by stores.

Minneapolis, MN | Record Store Day at Minneapolis’ Electric Fetus With Bootsy Collins & Guests: Bootsy Collins celebrated the release of his new album Album of the Year #1 Funkateer at the Electric Fetus in Minneapolis. Decked out in purple and black as an obvious homage to Prince. Bootsy and Peppermint Pati danced and sang to Bootsy‘s new album with the crowd. The Fetus was packed with excited fans, picking up new albums for RSD, and checking out Bootsy, local Dj’s and artists like The Linda Linda’s signing autographs in the parking lot. After Bootsy’s DJ set, they proceeded to the parking lot to sign autographs, take photos, and chat with the fans. Dave Pirner from Soul Asylum was also in attendance, waiting his turn to say hello to the legendary funk hero.

Detroit, MI | Record Store Day hits the right notes: Andrew Dore and Andy Colohan were ready to shop on Record Store Day April 12. The Madison Heights residents stood in line outside Solo Records in Royal Oak with about 40 other music collectors before the store opened, hoping to find a few titles to be released only on Record Store Day. “I’m looking for the Jerry Garcia Band re-release and the Prince record,” said Dore, 26. “They also put out non-Record-Store-Day records. It’s fun to see what gems they have. I lean toward jam bands. This is the record store I go to the most.” Colohan, 26, was in search of Joey Valence & Brae. Even if he didn’t find it, “I’m just here to have fun,” the hip-hop and jazz music fan said. “Coming out early is always fun to get the exclusives and all the new Record Store Day picks.”

Evanston, IL | Record Store Day brings music fans to Evanston shops: Two record store owners discuss the importance of Record Store Day and physical media. Vinyl enthusiasts gathered at shops downtown on Saturday, April 12 to celebrate Record Store Day. The unofficial holiday honors independently-owned record stores and the role they play in their communities. Warm and sunny weather made for an ideal day of searching for exclusive releases and classic records. Conveniently located within walking distance of each other, two Evanston small businesses — Vintage Vinyl and Animal Records — participated in Record Store Day. Both displayed exclusive records from artists like Joni Mitchell, David Bowie, The Cure, Post Malone and Taylor Swift, among many others. …The shop has celebrated the occasion for its entire existence, according to owner Steve Kay. He said the day remains special for music enthusiasts and collectors, both old and new.

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TVD Radar: Dusty Springfield, Longing vinyl debut in stores 6/5

VIA PRESS RELEASE | In the early 1970s, Dusty Springfield relocated from her native England to Los Angeles in an effort to pursue new opportunities in her career and signed with ABC/Dunhill Records. Her 1973 album Cameo showcased Springfield’s soulful pop in splendid fashion but failed to generate significant traction outside of Billboard’s Adult Contemporary listings. For her sophomore project with the label the following year, Dusty travelled to New York to team with producer Brooks Arthur, renowned for his work with Phil Spector’s 1960s coterie of girl singers.

For Longing, Arthur chose to frame Dusty in the 1970s singer-songwriter milieu, surrounding her with material from Colin Blunstone (“Exclusively for Me”), Melissa Manchester & Carole Bayer Sager (“Home to Myself”), Janis Ian (“In the Winter”), Stephen Schwartz (“Corner of the Sky”), Chi Coltrane (“Turn Me Around”), Barry Manilow (“I Am Your Child”) and others. In many cases, the songwriters themselves contributed directly by playing keyboards on their respective creations at Arthur’s famed 911 Studios. Bruce Springsteen was also known to sit in on some of the sessions in admiration.

As the sessions wound down in the summer of 1974, Dusty found herself suffering from emotional exhaustion and professional uncertainty. She subsequently chose to put the album on the shelf and part ways with the label, ultimately re-recording a pair of the tracks when she signed to United Artists Records a few years later.

In 2001, under the supervision of producer Arthur, nine of the ten tracks he recorded with Dusty were released on CD as part of a collection of her ABC/Dunhill period. A tenth track (“Corner of the Sky” from the Broadway musical Pippin) was reworked as a duet with Petula Clark and included on a pair of her anthologies. Now, all ten tracks make their vinyl debut, including the first-ever solo release of “Corner of the Sky” along with new mixes for eight of the other selections for this dual CD & LP release.

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