Nerd Vinyl Buying One

I like a regular fix of buying vinyl, loving to mainline from charity shops though these have had a drastic fall in supply of late. I don't think the source has diminished. Indeed, now should be a prime time for those of my generation and older who in departing to the spinning turntable beyond are leaving behind their album/lp collections for redistribution. However, charity shops have presumably become more savvy to the value of these and are disposing any contributed collections through alternative channels to their shops. Oxfam is always an existing sound source - and I recently purchased a couple online: a Chambers Brothers and a Robin Trower - but their pricing is becoming too astute to find many bargains which is a significant part of the fun of the search [and I know I can't begrudge their pricing accuracy considering its purpose...]. I do know one local Oxfam shop that offers genuine treasures, but I'm not talking.

I work in Manchester every year for examining and it is important to satisfy the vinyl addiction there. One of the places I always visit is the Empire Exchange.

They actually have a 'proper' collectible selection, but I tend to trawl through the cheaper racks looking for what I don't already have and the occasional surprises. The guys that work there will always do a deal on the overall stated price and it is a wonderful, eclectic secondhand shop to visit and enjoy.

This summer I didn't make it to the Empire Exchange. The first time in a while. But I didn't need to. On they way back from work at the University on the Oxford Road, a guy in a white van had pulled up to the side and off-loaded a heap of records and books that he placed in various containers on trestles with old boards laid quickly across them. The van itself was still a mess of other books and records, a proper Aladdin's van-den of what had been chucked in and not chucked out for brisk display - before he was moved on [I asked him if this happened much and he said it did and 'they' took his stuff, but he just went out and got more. I didn't ask]. Below is the selection of mainly pristine vinyl I got for £3 each: I tend to go for lots of about 6 - I don't know why. A handful under £20 always seems a good buy. I was particularly pleased with Cosmo's Factory. I'd initially picked out a copy in a box on a table, but I then found this other near mint copy inside the van in a box of various drivel. My other favourite is the Kossoff Back Street Crawler - I already had a reprint copy [bought, interestingly, at the Manchester Vinyl Exchange some years earlier] but this is an original.

And you can stop giggling at Piledriver. Early Quo is good enough stuff before they got lost in a timewarp riff. This is 1972 and solid rock'n'roll.