Today on the Wayback Machine… we return to the Battle of Britpop! In last week’s corner at The Vinyl District: Northern England standard-bearer and contender for the crown, Oasis’ (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?! In today’s corner: Southern England’s pride and glory, Blur’s Parklife!
Let the fight begin!
I should state from the outset that this is a battle involving different weight classes. The heavyweight Mancunians in Oasis opted for the knock out; (What’s the Story) is a slow but methodical series of big, telegraphed hooks to the pleasure center of your brain. Blur, on the other hand, is a lightweight and a dancer, and Parklife comes at you like a flurry of lightning quick blows to the thinking part of your cerebral cortex.
While Oasis opted for monolithic, Blur went the eclectic route; stylistically they’re all over the place. And they’re all over the place for a reason; they’re making a statement on the richness and variety of London itself. Samuel Johnson once said, “If you’re tired of London, you’re tired of life,” and Damon Albarn is clearly not tired of London or the multiplicity of genres and influences that have long made it one of the world capitals of rock music.
Unlike Noel Gallagher, who took his cue from Seinfeld and wrote a whole slew of songs about nothing, Blur’s Damon Albarn is a social satirist and details man. From the polymorphous perversity of “Girls and Boys” to the closely observed details of the title track to the working class desperation of the very punk “Bank Holiday” to the industrial dehumanization of “Trouble in the Message Centre,” Albarn is concerned with what it means to be young and English.
Brattleboro, VT | Over beers, shop switches hands: Downtown has been home for the last 13 years to Byron Greatorex’s record store, which now has a new owner. “Brattleboro is unique,” Greatorex said. “It’s bittersweet. There will be a day this week, where I walk out and won’t walk back in for a while. The reality of that is starting to sink in a tad bit.” On Wednesday, Greatorex sold In The Moment Records to Sujay Patel. The two had discussed the possibility via email then things happened quickly. Through social media, Greatorex had made it known that the store was for sale as he planned to relocate to the Philadelphia area. But several potential buyers had dropped out in earlier talks. Eventually, Greatorex and Patel made 
Telluride, CO | An addiction that feeds: Music occupies an enormous amount of my life. It is not an escape from reality, but it is my reality. Music is therapy. It inspires, it incites, it soothes, it soars. Music is life. Given its importance, the delivery method is key. If it can’t be heard live, the only legitimate way that music’s depth and range and nuance can be experienced is when the needle hits the groove on a delicious slice of vinyl. My love affair with vinyl — I more often refer to them as albums or records — began as a curious, small human skittering my parents’ jazz, folk and classical records across the living room floor. I have no recollection of this event, but obviously, 
NEW RELEASE PICKS: Daniel Bachman, The Morning Star (Three Lobed) Bachman is deservedly well-known for his post-American Primitive guitar prodigiousness, but as quietly forecasted by his S/T effort of 2016, he came to a stylistic fork in the road (coinciding with a move back to Virginia from North Carolina), and he chose the more experimental path to brilliant, often captivating result. Experimental can often be shorthand for “fluctuating level of success,” but time was taken with The Morning Star (Bachman’s first release in two years), and the 74-minute 2LP is remarkably consistent with the focus on drone and field recordings; at 18-plus minutes, side-long opener “Invocation” brought Henry Flynt to mind. Plenty of fine guitar playing is to be heard, but sometimes there is none (e.g. “Car”). A
V/A, Freedom of the Press (Kith & Kin) A benefit for the Freedom of the Press Foundation, featuring such worthy names as The Weather Station, Garcia Peoples, Hans Chew, Wooden Wand, Tom Settle & Friends, Bob Hughes, Elkhorn, and 75 Dollar Bill. A lot of various artists collections aiming to help good causes round up participants that are so stylistically broad that actually listening to the assembled contributions can become something of a chore, but new label Kith & Kin have tightened the focus to the “modern psychedelic songwriter scene,” and the results flow like a mixtape from an old, discerning friend. CD and digital only, but as phony populist fascists, corporate whores, self-serving political frauds, and contemptable bigots are currently attempting to destroy the USA, format is immaterial. A-
REISSUE/ARCHIVAL PICKS: Charles Mingus, The Complete Sessions of The Clown & East Coasting (Wax Love) Of these two 1957 recordings, The Clown was originally released on Atlantic, and is the better known. Opening with the glorious “Haitian Fight Song” and closing (on the original wax) with the title track, an ambitious piece featuring an improvised story by the great writer-broadcaster Jean Sheppard, a solid blues and a sublime Bird tribute in between help solidify The Clown as an early masterpiece from the bassist-bandleader. Quibble: the bonus cuts eradicate a powerful ending. I’ve have no such issues with the extras on East Coasting; first issued by Bethlehem, the set persists as underrated, especially since the pianist for the session is Bill Evans. If not as bold as The Clown, it’s still essential. A+ / A
Paul Page and His Paradise Music, Pacific Paradise (Subliminal Sounds) This 2LP/ CD collection documenting a little-known but indefatigable Alaska-born, Indiana-bred, and as an adult, Hawaii-based singer-bandleader-record maker offers a bountiful plunge into private press tourist lounge exotica. As detailed in Domenic Priore’s extensive liners, across a long string of LPs and 45s, Page combined Bing Crosby-ish pop sophistication (he was quite a crooner), a “seafaring Anglo working sailor man” approach, and legit Hawaiian-Polynesian-Pacific influences. With a few exceptions, e.g. the wonderfully zonked “Chicken Kona Kaai” and the spectacular “Auwe, Wahine,” this is pretty well-mannered stuff, but it coheres into an impeccably assembled and researched tribute to one guy’s passion. B+
Minneapolis, MN | Hymie’s Records, a famed spot for vinyl in Minneapolis, is for sale. The owners are pledging to sell it only to someone who wants to keep the music spinning there. One of the Twin Cities’ best-loved record stores is for sale, but the owners are pledging to sell it only to someone who wants to keep the music spinning there. Dave and Laura Hoenack, who bought Hymie’s Records in Minneapolis nine years ago, want to spend more time with their two kids. So they are fielding offers to sell their vinyl specialty store, located on a revived stretch of East Lake Street in south Minneapolis. They are not interested in just liquidating their stock of vinyl records, however. “I want to still be able to go to 
Cuyahoga Falls, OH | Pekar Music celebrates 20th anniversary in Cuyahoga Falls: …After nearly 30 years of working for someone else, Pekar said he decided he wanted to be his own boss. He first opened his shop on Portage Trail between Third and Fourth streets. When he opened his doors he had six guitars and $600 worth of S.I.T. brand guitar strings (made in Akron) hanging on the wall, along with some posters. He also had some record albums. Rent was $400 a month for 1,500 square feet of space. “I had $600 in the bank and I was wondering how I was going to pay the UPS driver,” he said. “The UPS trucks were pulling up with merchandise and I had to pay them [cash] because I wasn’t established … 
Chicago, IL | Val Camilletti dies at 78; ran Oak Park record store loved by music fans: Music lovers would walk into her Val’s halla Records store and say, “I heard this song I love, and it goes like this” — and start humming. Owner Val Camilletti could usually figure out the artist, the label and the pressing — sometimes, instantly. She died in hospice care early Tuesday at the British Home in Brookfield, about two years after being diagnosed with breast cancer, according to Joanne Busiel, her friend since they attended Chicago’s Austin High School. Ms. Camilletti, who lived in Cicero, was 78. For 46 years, Val’s halla Records — overflowing with thousands of CDs, LPs, cassette tapes, eight-tracks, 78s and 45s, from Abba to ZZ Top – has been an audiophile’s portal to another world…Her devoted customers, who preferred 
Gizmo Geek: The sound that you can touch: There is a photograph often circulated on social media of a cassette tape and a pencil lying side by side. The caption says something to the effect that kids today have no clue about the connection between the two. Yet for those of us above a certain age, the image never fails to elicit a smile. For true audiophiles, though, analogue sound is no smiling matter—sales of vinyl records have never been higher over the past few decades, and there are whispers that even the cassette might nudge its way back. Analogue sound and magnetic tapes are serious business because nothing else can replicate the experience of “being there”. As Roland Schneider of Ballfinger said, “Digital media is great, but experiencing music is more than just listening to a sound file—it’s sensual, it’s reels that turn and 
