I stumbled across this site the other day while doing research, happened to check out this thread and was immediately hooked. I spent the better part of the day reading these stories and enjoying the hell out of them???there are some real jaw-droppers here! I started thinking about my own record hunting experiences but, being a real amateur compared with most of the storytellers here, I didn???t immediately recall anything all that exciting or interesting. And then some memories suddenly rose to the surface???
I???ll start with some background. I had a deep interest in music from a young age, thanks mostly to my father, who???s a musician and had a pretty eclectic record collection when I was a kid. My first real music obsession, as is the case for many white suburban boys, was the Beatles, starting around age 13 (so this is 1993/94). The obsession with their music turned into a desire for their records???I wanted that connection to the past, the format in which people originally consumed the music. My mother helped me dig out her old Beatles (and other) records from her mother???s basement, and I was HOOKED???I wanted more.
One day mom???s mom (Granny) says she???ll take me to this record shop she???s seen down on Lindley Street in Bridgeport (CT). Those who are familiar with Bridgeport know it has some dicey areas, and the Lindley St. area is in one of them. Not that I was a stranger to B-port???Granny (and my mom) grew up there and still worked as secretary for my cousin???s construction company deep in the heart of the city, and we used to visit her and other relatives down there frequently. Still, my first time going to this record shop???the name was Platters Plus???I thought, yikes, not the greatest neighborhood.
But ya can???t judge a book by its cover and inside the store???which was like a little garage building next to a big, kinda run-down, three-story, multi-family home???was a pretty awesome selection of stuff. By ???94 CDs had pretty much already taken over so a store almost completely devoted to vinyl was an eye-opener for me. And there wasn???t just vinyl but a bunch of cool, music-related stuff all over the place. The proprietor was a short, soft-spoken, white bespectacled dude with long hair, who was a wealth of knowledge and introduced me to my first Beatles bootlegs and picture sleeves. Sadly, this is also where my dad ended up selling most (I did rescue a few things) of his record collection.
So for a time I was going down there with Granny with some frequency, but after a year or two the Beatles obsession faded as I got into other artists, and though I was still very much into music my interest in record hunting began to wane. I went to college in Maine???not what many would consider ideal digging territory, unless you???re REALLY into Pat Benatar???but thanks to a roommate who really got me into jazz and a few surprisingly good record stores my interest in vinyl made a small comeback. I still prize the very clean OG copy of Horace Silver???s ???The Jody Grind??? that I scored up there for just a few bucks, the highlight of my very limited Maine record hunting. Sorry to admit I was buying lots of Cds back in those days.
After college my interest in records went almost completely dormant for a few years, but then around ???05-???06 I had an R&B/Soul/Motown epiphany. Thanks to websites like soul-sides.com and Funky16corners, mixes like Impalaville and the original Soul Boulders, and the fact that I was getting bored with my usual listening fare led to a new obsession with soul music. After listening to most of the obvious classic stuff at a furious pace it didn???t take me long to realize that all the true soul/funk/R&B nerds were vinyl hounds, and that record hunting was the path to more exciting, uncharted musical territory.
So???trust me I???m going somewhere with this???I started digging, mostly for 45s, wherever I could: mostly at the local Sunday morning flea market and at the (very) few record shops here in CT. It was really hit-or-miss (finding black music here beyond the Supremes and 5th Dimension can really be a challenge), and I didn???t have much knowledge but I was learning and having fun. And then one day???I think it was October ???08--as I???m driving not too far from Bridgeport it occurs to me, maybe I should check out that place Granny used to take me when I was a kid???could it still be in business?
I shoot down the rt. 25 connector to the Lindley St. exit and find the place by instinct???it???s exactly as I remember it, the little garage building with the big sign still on the roof. The neighborhood hadn???t gotten any better in the 12-13 years since I had been there and despite being quite a bit older with lots more urban experience under my belt I still had the feeling of being obviously not from around these parts. I get out of the car and before I even get to the shop door my heart sinks???I can see through the dingy windows that this place is nearly empty and definitely no longer in business. I put my face up to the glass for a better look???there???s the old counter where the register sat, a few mostly empty racks, some packing boxes and random junk scattered around, and a dusty old late-50s era jukebox sitting askew away from one of the walls. Brought back a flood of memories just to look through the windows but sadly it was clear I was not going to find any records here.
Then just as I???m about to open my car door and get out of there, the back door of the big three-story house opens and out walks the shop owner???he looks a little older, with more gray in his hair, but I immediately recognize the guy.
???Did you come here looking for records???? he asks me sheepishly.
???Yeah, I used to come here a long time ago and I was hoping you???d still be in business. What???s the story???? I ask.
With a disappointed tone he tells me that there???s a family squabble over the property and that he has to get out or risk losing all his records. I don???t quite understand the situation but I don???t question him on the details. He asks what I???m looking for and I tell him: 45s. I was surprised by what he said next:
???Well, as you can see the shop???and all the LPs--are pretty much packed up, but I???m not quite done packing up what???s upstairs in the house. 45s from I thru Z are still alphabetized on the shelves up there if you???d like to take a look.???
Of course I say yes, absolutely, and he leads me through the back door of this rambling, run down old house complete with creaking floorboards and stairs, peeling paint, etc??? and takes me up to the third floor where the ceilings slope with the roof. It???s a chilly, overcast fall day and I can tell there are windows open up here. From what I can see, at least on the third floor, the house looks pretty abandoned. The guy shows me into what was probably once a bedroom where to my left the wall is lined with empty shelves and to the right the wall is lined with the same, homemade shelves FULL of organized 45s. In the center of the floor is a morass of garbage???old lamps, magazines, all sorts of crap (I distinctly remember there being feathers blowing around in there) and a few boxes full of even more 45s. Aside from those organized shelves the room is a disaster. By now I???m thinking this is kind of weird and not at ALL how I expected to be shopping for records.
???So what kinda stuff are you looking for???? he asks.
???Mostly R&B, soul, Motown, that kinda thing,??? I reply.
He says something along the lines of: ???Yeah???seems to be what they???re all looking for these days. Couple years ago the Brits came in here and cleaned out a lot of the rarities. They???d come in saying ???Oy mate, d???ya have [uber-rare song] by [obscure artist] on [no-name label]? I???ll give ya $300 for that one!??? Just offering crazy money, it was unbelievable. They went through everything just like that.??? He proceeded to rattle off a bunch of titles I had never heard of and the approximate prices said Brits offered. (Side note: about two years later I heard almost EXACTLY the same story from the owner of a record shop in Orange, CA. As he put it, ???all the stuff that never quite made it???the Brits and Japanese cleaned it out years ago??????)
I probably said something like ???Well, I???m not really looking for anything quite that rare.??? Which was true???I probably didn???t have the knowledge at that point to even know when a $50 45 was staring me in the face. He told me take my time looking around???he???d be in the house for awhile???and to just holler downstairs when I was ready to buy anything.
???Oh, and by the way,??? he adds, ???if you really want to look at some of the boxes I???ve packed I can open them for you.???
???How much do you have???? I ask. I forget the figure he tells me but it???s in the tens of thousands. He quickly brings me down to the end of the third floor hall and opens the door to another former bedroom absolutely jam-packed with boxes. I???m completely overwhelmed and tell him I???ll probably just stick to what???s out on the shelves. It???s cold up there, I???ve been talking to the guy for probably over 15 minutes and I haven???t even started digging yet. So I get down to business???
And it???s a shame I didn???t know more back then because, even if the Brits had cleaned out all the true heat right away I could tell there was some very good stuff on those shelves. And it was all PRISTINE, despite the feathers, garbage, peeling paint and all. I don???t think I pulled anything off those shelves that wasn???t NM or damn close. I can???t remember everything that ended up in my stack but it included beautiful copies of Syl Johnson???s ???Different Strokes,??? J.J. Jackson???s ???But It???s Alright,??? and a few from the Impressions. Nothing outrageous but all stuff I???d be hard pressed to turn up at my local flea market, especially in that condition. And this was just me going directly to those artists in the alphabet because it would have taken me hours to go through it all. After finding about a dozen records???not a lot, I know, but remember I don???t know how much these are gonna cost, it???s weird and creepy up there and my hands are getting numb from going through records in the cold???I holler for the guy, he comes up and quickly shuffles through the stack.
???How???s 20 bucks sound????
???Sure,??? I say, knowing that???s pretty fair and pulling out my wallet. All I???ve got are a few small bills and a hundred. I ask if he???s got change for the hondo and he says no, but you can change it at the bodega across the street. So I hustle across the street into the kinda place where Omar would buy a pack of Newpo???s and look for something to buy. Being a white boy from the suburbs I???m a little self-conscious about whipping out a hundred in this place but I buy a bottled drink, they change the bill no problem and I hurry back over to the big house and pay the man.
He thanks me and I ask him what he thinks will happen with his store and all the records. He sighs and replies, ???I really don???t know???it depends on what happens to this property?????? and I can tell he doesn???t expect a good outcome. And I honestly can???t remember this 100% but he may have said something like ???check back in a few months, or give a call if you???re looking for more.??? I thank him again the unexpected shopping opportunity and hit the road.
Now I can???t explain why, I don???t have a good excuse, but I never go back or call the guy. I travel a lot for my job???maybe I got really busy at work, was on a long business trip and just forgot about it? Maybe I had the feeling I had intercepted the guy right before he disappeared from that place for good? Maybe I just wasn???t a serious enough collector at that point to put in such legwork? I don???t know, but time marched on and in my mind I wrote the place off as a dead end. In fact up until reading this thread I hadn???t thought about this whole episode in a long, long time.
Epilogue: A few days after this thread brought the whole story to mind, an errand brought me just a few miles away from Platters Plus, so I couldn???t resist the urge to check it out. Unfortunately the sign is now gone from the shop building, and the house truly looks abandoned. There???s still an old faded sign for the store on the front porch that lists the phone number, but it???s out of service. Weirdly enough the place is still listed in bunches of internet directories with the non-working phone number, and there???s even an old picture of the shop exterior on merchantcircle.com. I have to wonder what happened to the poor guy and all those thousands of records. Any strutters ever hit this store up back in the day? Heard of it? Not that I???m necessarily interested in tracking him down, but it kinda haunts me and I???m curious.
