English Record Stores

Eng-Rock forever! Electro-rock...¡que viva! Vinyl, you will be all mine'l!

This is what my molecules were screaming as my plane's wheels left the tarmac and I began my journey to London.

Many people plan trips to cities around seeing famous sites, but Ryan and I plan our visits around records stores. In my carry-on, I had a carefully researched list Ryan had compiled. He'd spent hours on that thing, researching and compiling a list of British vinyl, and because Ryan was holding down the fort stateside I felt a burden to deliver the goods.

My London hosts are kind, and though I was determined to avoid obsessing over records stores on their time, they made some special trips for me to Soho and the Notting Hill 'hood.

I was hoping against hope that my love of English bands would finally work in my favor...surely there must be an abundance of (affordable) Mancunian rock and Banshees records in London? Surely! And you know, maybe some Pulp...and...and...ok, probably not affordable for the early 90s goods.

The original Rough Trade- in the Basement! Notting Hill 'hood.

The first shot at record shopping I got was on a visit to the Notting Hill neighborhood (newsflash: there is no way that Hugh Grant's character in Notting Hill  could afford to live in this neighborhood!!). We visited Portobello Market, had a bit of English style breakfast (eggs on toast! veg!) and meandered about. There's an awesome art display of vinyl records called the Portobello ReCollection there. It's quite a neat thing that no matter where you are going in London, you will accidentally discover something really interesting, unique, famous, or infamous. For example, I walked past houses of famous folk on many of our jaunts; places where Orwell, Hardy, and Ghandi had lived.

Wearing a weird facial expression: I pretend it's my punk face.

Like good music stores everywhere, Rough Trade opened at 10 AM (believe it or not, we were there early enough to have to wait around a bit). The BASEMENT was amazing. Right away I found Boomerang, by The Creatures. I spent about $12 getting a record that usually goes for upwards of $30. There was a massive Prince singles collection, a New Order "True Faith" remix lp I'd never seen but was immediately identifiable because of the leaf image.

The Original Single

12" Remix Single

Whilst there, Mark (one of my very patient hosts) took the opportunity to explain music categories I'd never seen before (Pub Rock and one I've forgotten the name of that was rock music for sport fans!), and to be shocked by all the bands I'd never heard about. It was neat to be shopping abroad and see categories for US New Wave, US Punk, US Rock, Surf Music, etc., a million categories for dance music, as well as the ever so un-PC category of Kraut Rock.

Music & Goods Exchange- Soho

Later in the week, on a Friday night as all the natural-born entertainers came out in Soho, Rae and Mark took me to a few more record shops. Music & Goods Exchange reminded me of CD/Game Exchange a bit, except things were reversed: this place had tons of cool records, and CDs were available in lesser quantity. These are neat stores because each branch specializes in something besides the music they sell. The branch in Soho specializes in comics (in the basement), which wasn't super interesting to me, but given the chance I would definitely visit other branches to check out their collections (one store has vintage clothes, another books, and one has films). My visit there was quite invigorating as I felt I was finally getting a true, English record fix with my purchases.

Upon approaching the counter to purchase the records at this store, I had a couple of realizations. This was the second store I had purchased records from, and I had noticed that they stored the vinyl behind the counter so shoppers would have to bring the sleeves up for what they wanted to buy. I thought that it might perhaps be a space issue-- the shops are pretty small-- or a thievery issue. But, like the first time I had purchased records, the clerk asked me to look at the quality of the vinyl before buying-- he didn't ask me if I wanted to, he expected me to do it. I adore this practice! How cool is it that record store folks in England are concerned about this on a customary basis? It would be considered odd NOT to look at the condition of vinyl before buying.

Sister Ray in Soho- you should visit!

The same thing happened when I purchased records at Sister Ray, just down the street. This was especially exciting because the shop had multiple copies of the Siouxsie & the Banshees singles I was purchasing, and I got to select the best copies. Even cooler, I
got to select from multiple gatefold, limited, clear vinyl editions of one of "The Killing Jar"; I ended up with pressing #13. I loved this store...they had so many records I wanted that I had to put things back. This is highly unusual for me!

Overall, I did pretty well for only purchasing records from a few stores, and I felt very satisfied. I did see quite a few awesome records I couldn't afford to buy, but I also got a fair price on Cure, Banshees, New Order, Prince, U2, James, and Kate Bush records (I got those last couple at an Oxfam in Shaftesbury, but that is a different story).

The weight of my carry-on as I lugged it around Heathrow, JFK, and PDX on my way home was extremely satisfying. The look on Ryan's face as he pulled out all his treats was even better.