#sprees

Sunday Records shopping list, 2018.

Sunday is the best day to go to a record store. Why have we opened this record store? For you. To see your smile when you look at the records. And, hear your story about how a song or album changed your life. The people who come into the store are happy to be here. We see glowing faces. We see people who are taking a moment out of their busy day to relive a memory that was special to them or discover a new song they never heard before. A very cool thing to witness and be a part of. See you on Sunday. Come in and flip through.

That’s what Sunday Records says on its page. No exclamation marks. No explosive excitement. It spoke to us in a kind pleasant way. They made a point that after a crazy work-week, there should be one day for everyone to enjoy themselves and spend the time relaxing. I’ll co-sign on that statement.

I learned of its existence from my former co-worker and friend Kryssy who made a video of it for journalism. Opened since November of last year, it’s named after the only day of the week it’s open. It seems odd because all businesses nationwide are open at least five days a week to stay alive and for its owners to maintain a living back home. Not Sunday Records who’s open for business for only a few hours per week. I wondered how? Brian is a city lawyer whose second passion was opening this store. He wins either way. It was the longest drive so far for music. Close to 28 miles driving out east to Riverhead, to be exact. Long stretches of road on the Long Island Expressway makes you have Brown Bunny moments where you’re in a zen-like state driving only 55 m.p.h., conjuring up all these mundane events during these trips like the weather, certain people, and anything else that comes to mind. There were plenty of police on the highways, one in an SUV parked on the side of the road with his lights flashing, mercilessly firing a speed-gun in our direction. The 7th precinct is right off the highway in Yaphank so that explains it.

Riverhead is a plain normal leisurely town with plain normal leisurely people. It does nothing to anyone. It’s right at the split of the east end of Long Island buried in trees and near the water. Sunday Records was almost straight-forward to get to with a round-a-bout to switch county roads. I walk in and there were no more than 10 people of all ages 17 and up. Some by themselves, some with boyfriends. There was a listening room behind its’ storefront window for visitors to sit and enjoy the music. All stores have genres, new releases behind the counter, staff picks, dollar-bins, and maybe four-for-a-quarter in all formats. Sunday Records has none of it. There are no bargain bins but titles are priced starting at $3.00 each for singles and $4.00 to $20.00 for most LPs. No CDs or cassettes, only vinyl. It’s the one store on the island to truly pull it off. No behind-the-counter new releases, no registers. Brian, the owner, was sitting behind the dee-jay booth playing tried-and-true classics.

“How are you? Have you ever been here before?” he asked in which I kindly answered “no”. “As you see, all of these records here are categorized by radio station. Over there: there’s WEHM for all the newer stuff, WBAB for classic rock, WLIR for the Eighties, new-wave, and pop hits. Other stuff we have, we have jazz and rockabilly at that back wall, and other music we have listed as ambient.”

That’s right. All albums are categorized by Long Island radio stations, not by genres. Either he worked in broadcast or just like thousands of Long Islanders and I, he loves his classic radio. I should know. I never seen any record store who organized themselves by call letters over genres. Then I realized, I’m now organizing my favorite jazz / fusion songs by channels I watched as a kid in Brooklyn, and my Omega projects are organized by seasons. Then we go back to Brian, whose own system was a first. Commercial radio has formats, so does Sunday Records. That’s the thing. WLIR’s credo was they “dared to be different” and it worked. It’s why there’s a newly-released documentary about it. Adult-alternative station WEHM operates in Manorville with both Billy Joel and ex-wife Christine Brinkley having minor stakes in it. WBAB is Long Island’s long-standing rock station which pioneered the album-oriented format (AOR). All three I never listened to as WEHM’s signal is too far east for me to reach (but there’s streaming, right?), and as an Eighties kid I always listened to Z100 and other stations forward. They’re still in alphabetical order and by artists, not all hope is lost. In fact, it’s in perfect alphabetical order. There’s almost no room for error where people pull things out and place them in the wrong bin. Brian has it down to a tee. All records sold are in plastic sleeves and labeled at the very top right-hand corner. It was easy for my eyes and fingers to scan through the 100 or so wooden 12” bins and 30 7” shelves. I zipped through the entire store in less than three hours. Sunday Records’ majority of stock were chart hits. Classic rock like The Who, Rolling Stones, Ted Nugent, Lynyrn Skynyrd, and so forth were classified under WBAB. They also carried a lot of No Age (which I picked up), Hot Chip, The XX, Sleater-Kinney, Arcade Fire, and other Pitchfork-approved artists mostly under the WEHM umbrella.

But if you’re a fan of new-wave, synthpop, and early industrial, then Sunday Records welcomes you with open arms. As it falls directly into Sunday’s format (WLIR), artists like General Public, Simple Minds, Yaz, Heaven 17, Lene Lovich, Art Of Noise, and Culture Club are featured. Tom Tom Club, Re-Flex, Modern English, Roxy Music, Spandau Ballet, Dead Or Alive, Freur, APB, Kissing The Pink, and so much more. They had plenty of Depeche Mode, Joy Division, and New Order, too. I was even surprised in seeing 12” singles from With Sympathy-era Ministry and Front 242. Less than half of these artists I just listed I never even thought received radio airplay and I totally missed it. It was the Eighties and synth-based dance music was huge, though it wasn’t the only genre they played. Whatever few records not classified under Sunday’s radio system is labeled as ambient, as I did find a few copies from Baby Ford, Aphex Twin, Groove Armada, and other electronic acts. But like radio, Sunday Records abides by format. If it doesn’t fit that format, then it’s not there. That meant no hardcore, underground punk, hip-hop or noise to be found. Not to say that’s bad thing, because if there’s a system, then it’s done right.

I was pleased to find what I did. Three Cabaret Voltaire records which made up giving them up earlier. There was Images In Vogue’s self-titled release whom cEvin Key of Skinny Puppy used to drum for. Nitzer Ebb’s As Is was all for the taking. Hello again, Strawberry Switchblade. My stay there shined with the purchase of many singles that I listened to during my Eighties gamer youth, singles from Dead Or Alive, Tony Basil, Suzanne Vega, J. Geils Band, and Utah Saints. More synth-pop goodness from Fad Gadget and Gary Numan, the first of each artist in my library. How about singles from Malcomb McLaren and Public Image Ltd.? Stray Cats and Madness were two from the turn-of-the-decade rockabilly and post-punk. Finally, there’s Todd Rundgren’s “Hello, It’s Me” and Siouxsie Sioux’s “Hong Kong Garden”, two singles that hit the spot during a essential springtime at Stony Brook.

Let’s not forget the full-size records. I was very relieved to find Steve Jones as everything he does is gold. Steely Dan’s Pretzel Logic was one of the few I was missing of theirs. Why not Patti Smith’s Easter just because? And if there’s only one Doors’ album to have, it’s their greatest hits containing all their songs from a friend’s mixtape given to me in junior year. The only jazz record I picked up was Ramsey Lewis’ Tequila Mockingbird which had “Skippin’”, once used for WABC’s late-night movie intro which has yet to surface.

Of all the visits during this run, here’s where I passed up the most records. There were two Aphex Twin records I gave up as I knew I had them already on disc. Kraftwerk’s glow-in-the-dark “Neon Lights” single caught my eye and yours, too, if you found it. At $40.00, I couldn’t even touch it. That was the second most expensive title Brian had. That honor went to a real metal tin copy of Public Image’s Ltd.’s Metal Box priced at a hefty $125.00. There was Johnny Lydon hiding behind it, looking at me with his sad face when I seen its’ First Issue. It was sadder to put it back on the shelf because $20.00 was too much for a release I may find for less later. The same went for a newly-pressed Velvet Underground non-peel version for $22.00. I also gave up two Parliament records, Mothership Connection and Motor Booty Affair on picture disc, both for at least $25.00. Parliament is one artist I can never seem to find at a low price.

Halfway through some intense searching, some weird dude came in all dressed up in a patterned polo, jeans, and a twee handlebar mustache. I’m not kidding. He was half a cowboy minus the ten-gallon hat. He’s minding his own business thumbing through the crates as I learned it was Caboose, former staffer of the Stony Brook Press. I gave him 20 minutes for him to turn around and notice me. That’s when I spotted him. Time’s up, Caboose. He sees me in “holy shit!” ecstasy. We haven’t seen each other since our time at Stony Brook. Knowing I been going across the island, he had to catch me at one of these ten stores. He had his ninth chance and found me here. Congratulations. It wasn’t until recently that he took up record collecting, which he didn’t have in him back then. He was still heavily into anime and had a few visits in the city lined up for the rare Japanese metal band coming to the states.

“Do you buy records because you really like them or just for the art?” Caboose came across as inconsiderate and snide, but this was a legitimate question as I myself made purchases based on record cover or artwork alone. Make no mistake I was familiar with all the artists I bought today. Not that it mattered. He then asked how many records I have. Let’s just say he almost died right in the store. We kept on catching up with each other. Both of us haven’t seen our fellow Press staffers in our paths since but one of our own, The People’s Republic Of James, was in the hospital for diabetic shock. As we’re talking, Frank Zappa’s “Catholic Girls” came on from Brian’s dee-jay booth and it was the most cringe-worthy thing I ever heard. It’s well-known that Zappa pushed the envelope for creative freedom and our right to enjoy blue comedy. I’m all for it, but it’s way below me now. There were perverse people in my life who still get a kick out of it, insignificants with drop-out mentalities who still operate on cheap one-track minds I want no part of. But a few minutes later, Brian offered us to play Public Image Ltd.’s Album, so all was back to normal. Caboose mentioned to Brian that I was from WUSB and a conversation struck up. Brian asked about my show and my experience at Sunday. I thought it was great that his store was set up for a specific nostalgia factor that truly hit home and personal. Towards the end of my search, more people entered saying positive things about Sunday Records. I couldn’t agree more. With a few more sacrifices, it’s time to pay up.

There was one more thing he wanted to show me as he added up my records. Some of them had stickers designating some copies as “screamer & screecher of the week” as per number and week, referring to WLIR’s special feature where its’ dee-jays nominated their favorites and listeners chose the winner by call-in vote. A feature that ran for 17 years of the station’s history, that, if someone were to see each entry (and Discogs has it posted, don’t worry), would see WLIR’s evolution over the years. Many people think Brian’s an eccentric only being open on Sundays and classifying records by radio station. I agree. But guess what? It’s a good eccentric. Here’s a guy who cares about the history of radio so much that he’s made a store of it. I swiped my card, signed off my purchase, shook his hand and said thank you.

Nine down, one to go. The experience at Sunday Records had me thinking of how different people classify things in their lives and how they make it work. It also had me thinking what was really out there decades ago and what else I could’ve picked up living as an Eighties kid. The only record store left to visit is now Innersleeve in Amangansett all the way inside Long Island’s south fork and right before Montauk (The End). I’m not going at it by myself. I’d like to enlist a few of my friends to chip in, and come with me to put the finish on a great record-store run.

Cabaret Voltaire  The Arm Of The Lord

Nitzer Ebb  As Is

Strawberry Switchblade  Who Knows What Love Is?

Steve Jones  Mercy

Patti Smith  Easter

Ramsey Lewis  Tequila Mockingbird

Doors, The  Greatest Hits

Cabaret Voltaire  Drinking Gasoline

Utah Saints “Something Good”

Image In Vogue self-titled EP

Steely Dan  Pretzel Logic

No Age  Losing Feeling

Dead Or Alive “Brand New Lover”

Cabaret Voltaire  The Drain Train

Public Image Ltd. “Home”

Gary Numan “Cars” / “Metal”

Malcomb McLaren “Soweto” b/w “Zulu’s On A Time Bomb”

J. Geils Band “Centerfold” b/w “Rage In The Cage”

Fad Gadget “One Man’s Meat” b/w “Sleep”

Tony Basil “Mickey” b/w “Hangin’ Around”

Stray Cats “(She’s) Sexy + 17” b/w “Lookin’ Better Every Beer”

Madness “Our House” b/w “Cardiac Arrest”

Todd Rundgren “Hello It’s Me” b/w “Cold Morning Light”

No Age  Eraser 7”

Suzanne Vega “Luca” b/w “Night Vision”

Mr. Cheapo’s (Commack) shopping list, 2018.

If there was one store that started it all for me, it was Mr. Cheapo’s. It was the first in a long line of mom-and-pop record stores that sold used titles. Brentwood’s Pine Hollow Video was the first store I went for all my hip-hop and rap CDs and cassettes, but realizing that my interest in music was growing, Mr. Cheapo’s showed me what potential was about. The first year of earning a paycheck was the same year I discovered this store. It was where I bought my first stack of used CDs notably from Pearl Jam, Marilyn Manson, and Filter, whose “Dose” promotional single would be the first-ever I’d buy. It’s been around for decades and hasn’t been renovated as long. It’s also the only record store on Long Island to have two locations: Commack and Mineola.

Cheapo’s is just like Talking Heads: same as it ever was. Nothing has changed except for its’ overall stock. New releases behind the counter, near-endless bins of new and used vinyl and CDs with a cassette wall nearing the back. What used to be shelves upon shelves of VHS tapes now have the most extensive used DVD and Blu-ray library of any store. Vintage and classic vinyl 12″ and 45′s were pinned up on the back walls. Boxsets, posters, other 45′s, music-related books, DVDs, and more rows of obvious titles on vinyl and CD made up the rest of the store’s real estate. And plenty of shelves of used pop CDs for $3 each. No. Thank. You.

I didn’t scan the entire store as I was uninterested in all those used pop CDs, so I go right to the jazz / fusion section as I always do. About seven to eight columns wide with another three for soul, funk, and R&B, they didn’t let me down. One, two, three Bob James albums; the stuff of samplists. Blackbyrds, George Benson, and Deodato were mine and so was Jon Lucien whose “A Sunny Day” stood as one of my most-played tracks of all time. Tough that wasn’t found on his Columbia’s Best Of... The Hubert Laws that I passed up a while ago? It’s back in the bin and I wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. What I also picked up was The Rolling Stones Undercover. Once in my possession, I decided to give it away to friend and collector Tommy when he found a dump of 500 records one of his customers threw out on the sidewalk. 

A category I haven’t thumbed through in a minute was the hip-hop section, we’re not talking vinyl. For the first time in a while I scored some good titles on disc. Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth and Naughty By Nature were titles that’d be in my collection starting out in the Brentwood days. Jedi Mind Tricks because Vinnie Paz is real underground hip-hop. Got to have M.I.A. in my collection, too. Then I come across P.O.S. whose truly-innovative packaging with interchangeable transparent and solid panels with CMYK theme caught my eye. It harkened back to the pre-internet days of discovering certain artists you never knew existed by purchasing blind. An inquiry for anything Suicide led me to search through the punk bins where I found The Unseen. Watching The Blank Generation made me see Richard Hell & The Voidoids Blank Generation disc with bonus tracks in the bins but at first passed it up. Then I find the vinyl re-issue of the same album with live and alternatve versions for double the asking price. In that case, I ended up going for the disc version.

I rounded out my two-hour visit with other odds and ends. Other titles I bought for $2.00 and less were The Jerky Boys, Katt Williams, and Last Stop Standing, a record-shopping documentary. How fitting! Finally, I got a Paula Abdul cassette, one I used to have in my collection until my bro- misplaced it on me. Like I have to answer to any of you.

Blackbyrds, The Action

Deodato 2

Jon Lucien The Best Of…

Bob James 2

Hubert Laws Romeo & Juliet

Deodato Love Island

Rolling Stones Undercover (stickered)

Bob James 3

Deodato Whirlwinds

George Benson White Rabbit

Bob James 4

Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth Mecca & The Soul Brother

Jedi Mind Tricks Legacy Of Blood

Naughty By Nature self-titled

M.I.A. Arular

P.O.S. Never Better special edition disc

Unseen, The Explode

Richard Hell & The Voidoids Blank Generation

M.I.A. Kala

All Dogs 7”

Last Shop Standing DVD

Katt Williams The Pimp Chronicles Vol. 1 DVD

Jerky Boys, The Stop Staring At Me cassette

Rosie’s Vintage shopping list, 2018.

Two more stops to go before the music shopping spree is history. Whatever locations are on the list seems to be further away each time. Today’s theme is the record annex which is picking up on Long Island. It started a year-and-a-half ago when Hideaway Vinyl set shop in Rosie’s Vintage in Huntington. Looks like they have an online presence still despite nothing being updated in a few months, so why not take the trip to see what it’s all about?

It’s been quite a while since being in Huntington. I do have some personal history there. My ex- Yenny brought me over to work there (our second job working together) for several years and it’s where she used to live. And let’s try to forget a dreaded miserable summer post-rain day out with former friend and staffer Molina, who took me through a cemetery, burger place, and an isolated park in an attempt to get close to me. No dice.

I walk in to Rosie’s and it’s bonafide vintage. Looks like the owners took over a small Fifties-style house in white-bread suburbia. Walk in and you’ll certainly feel the loud creaking of the all-wood floors. Its’ living room, dens, bedrooms, and many closets are filled with tons of kitsch, knick-knacks, and collectibles from the mid-century. Street signs, old threads, compasses, jewelry, board games, wardrobes, dolls, salt-shakers...I can go on. There’s many stories and tales to be told by each and every object that survived its’ era; all neatly organized, piled, and sorted. As an added touch, there’s the classics played on the overheads. Collections were posted on its page and testimonials from its customers recall their purchases: old vials and medicine jars, pill and spice tins, matchbook collections, sports pennants, dishes, and the occasional naughty glassware. I can still go on if you want me to.

The guy behind the register greets me and asks what he could do for me. I’m here for Hideaway Vinyl, I say. He tells me that they left shop a few months ago. Could’ve fooled me. They no longer exist. They’re still present online on social media but it all made sense why the lack of updates. Had Hideaway stayed, there’d be a presence of punk, hardcore, surf, ska, and rockabilly. He did show me where all the vinyl is now deposited by Vinyl Paradise. Remember them? There were twelve shelves top and bottom of pre-owned vinyl, four of the same across from those bins of newly-pressed and Record Store Day releases. 

Of the first twelve were plenty of rock, pop, dance, and 12″ dee-jay singles most for $10.00 and less with the occasional new hardcore pressing. I found a lot of 12″ hip-hop and dance singles; Nice & Wild and Harold Faltermeyer were two hits New York’s Z100 played growing up during my single-digit Eighties youth. Everything else in Shabba Ranks, Mad Skillz, Boogiemonsters, and Blahzay Blahzay were all summer hits going to Brentwood. WBLS, Hot 97, and Kiss FM played them all. As always, there’s the pop-rock quotient from Genesis and Dire Straits. Hello, nice to meet you again. Also relieved to find was the complete Malcomb McLaren & The World Famous Supreme Team’s “Buffalo Gals” in a die-cut label sleeve.

In comes Thea, co-owner of Rosie’s Vintage in her rockabilly / Rosie The Riveter motif. She says hello and sees the stack in my hand. She offers to put it aside for me which I obliged. I kindly ask if there would be more vinyl and does tell me there might be some upstairs. That’s where I’m going. Heading up is possibly one of the steepest set of steps I experienced walking. I also had to dodge a heavy-set punk couple decked with gauges, tattoos, low-cut tank tops and tees coming from downstairs. I walk up and there’s a closet with a secret crate of records on the floor containing The Talking Heads’ 77 for $20.00 and its’ sister Tom Tom Club’s Close To The Bone for $15.00. Shucks. I scour the upstairs to find many more antiques. Compasses, typewriters, old magazines, books, brochures in one room with very little traces of 7″ records in one crate. The kitchen was full of dishes, glasses, and silverware stacked in the sink and on its’ counter but no records to be found.

Thea rings me up and I’m golden. This became the shortest time spent in any store with the smallest stack and the least amount of money paid. 45 minutes to look through 16 bins of records for a total of $29.00 and I say good-bye to Rosie’s Vintage and Huntington until next time. Only two more stores are on the list to go before calling it quits on record-shopping for a while: Sunday Records in Riverhead and Innersleeve Records in Amagansett.

Genesis Abacab

Nice & Wild “Diamond Girl” 12″

Shabba Ranks “Mr. Loverman” 12″

Dire Straits self-titled

Mad Skillz “Nod Factor” 12“

Boogiemonsters “Recognized Thresholds Of Negative Stress 12″

Blahzay Blahzay “Danger!” 12″

Harold Faltermeyer “Axel F” 12“

Spyro Gyra self-titled