Record Digging Stories (Please Add On)

The UK dudes have stories for days and many were doing this long before I was??????here is a UK related story.





In the late 80???s I was finding little pockets of soul and funk 45???s at various Salvation Army stores around town and it was obvious they were all from the same source. For about a month I???d randomly find 25 at one location and then a week later 50 at another. They were all unplayed, mostly Chicago based labels but also had things like The Jackson Five on Steeltown(many) and lots of 60???s blues on labels like Bea & baby and Cobra. They were a quarter a piece and by the end of the month I had nearly 200 of them. I decided to call the main Salvation Army warehouse and see if there were a lot more. I was told that there were 2 pallets of them and that no one under any circumstance could get to see them before they went to the satellite stores.





This ate at me for about a week and I decided to just go to the main warehouse and see if I could talk my way in. I showed up in a suit and tie(9-5 related) and asked the receptionist who I would need to see about getting into the warehouse. She gave me a name but quickly followed up that no one was allowed back there and I was wasting my time???..so I left. The name she gave me did sound somewhat unusual and familiar and about halfway back to work I realized I had once worked with a guy by the same name. The next day I called the warehouse, asked for the manager by name and sure as shit, it was an ex-coworker of mine.





I explained why I was calling and said I would pay double the price if I could get back there and see what they had. He said it was against policy but that he could make it happen during a one hour window if I came that day. I left work and headed over there pronto. My guy meets me at the back door and says???.???You have one hour???not a minute more??? and he leads me to an area that has pallet upon pallet of records???..4-5 pallets alone of the Springsteen 3 LP set on cassette??????and 2 pallets of very neatly boxed up 45???s. Now at this point realize that I have very little knowledge in the soul and funk areas and I???m pulling stuff that I know or private presses that look cool. I pull out and box 1,000 45???s in my hour, pay $500.00 and thank the dude profusely???..still having only gone through less than half of what was there.





Amazingly, within a day or 2 I get a call from a UK collector who just happens to be in the area and was given my name. There was no way he could have known about my Salvation Army score so it was pure coincidence. He was a pretty young dude and if I remember correctly his name was Adrian. He came by and bought a big stack of my S/A 45???s which I had priced at $2.00 - $5.00 each. A week later I get ANOTHER call from two UK collectors who had obviously heard about me from the Adrian dude. They come by and buy a bunch more. They asked where I had gotten them and I told them the Salvation Army story.





A month or so later I get word from a fellow dealer that word is out that some UK guys made a big 45 score in Dallas and I assume he???s talking about the guys that were at my house. I realize I must have sold stuff way too cheap and decide to give my buddy at the Salvation Army another call. This time I???m ready to tell him I???ll pay a buck or two a piece. He answers the phone, we say our hellos and I pop the question. His reply was ???I can???t, those two English guys you sent over here bought them all???
 
ok, I've got one... it's not that good, but it's a classic story of things just falling into your lap. So, I sell cars. I have a small operation, and I used to have an employee. He was a salesman, but he was WEAK. Anyway, on the side, I would always be buying and selling records. He never seemed interested in music, but would take interest in all the records that were coming and going from my office.


He knew a guy who worked at a local dump. One day he told me he was getting some records and asked if I would help him sell them. I found this strange as I had just given him his notice that I would be letting him go. Well, one day I come into work and there must be 10 crates. He told me to take anything I wanted and sell the rest. I start to flip thru it all....it's mindblowing, everything is sealed or unplayed, all promos from ABC, Blue Thumb, , Sire,etc. Multiple copies of the first 4 ramones records, a few copies of the RAMP records, lots of sealed blues and jazzz. I kept about 100, sold 500 or 600 for him at the flea market, and everyone was happy. I still remember the feeling of coming across the RAMP LP
 
DocMcCoy said:Not to derail what's shaping up to be a fascinating thread, but the o.g. British skinheads were largely anti-racist. They more or less grew out of that section of the mod movement that didn't grow its hair and get into dope and acid, and continued to take inspiration from black music and style, the skinhead look being derived from that of Jamaican rudeboys.




Common knowledge/101 on here for most right, no? This makes me feel 14 again...Now, back to your regularly scheduled programmes.
 
When we were done digging and were paying Johnny for our finds he says ???Too bad I have to leave now or else I???d take you to the warehouse that has all the Stax stuff I just bought???. We suggested we could come back the next day but it wasn???t happening???..I followed up a few times but could never make it happen???.my guess is that it was because we hadn???t found that much stuff or spent much money with him at the first spot..





It's too late now, but if he was that fazed by you guys not spending much $$$, I doubt if he would have led you on with the Stax story.
 
Rockadelic said: ???I can???t, those two English guys you sent over here bought them all???




that is pretty messed up.
 
Here's one that actually went down very recently --





My buddy and I had been pointed to this place by a woman in a small neighborhood (somewhere in the east coast ( ;-) ). After I told her I was looking for record stores, etc, she said "oh you're looking for records? there's a guy who we work with a lot who's got a room full of em. a lot of DJ radio promo 12s". The woman who had told us was the puffy hair, gold glasses, type -- w/ the big red sweatshirt with a pic of a dog on it which, of course, was worn over a white turtle-neck. So I was a little surprised to hear something like "DJ radio promo 12s" come out of her mouth.





Anyway - we made it over to this location with very little hope of turning up anything major, but wanted to give it a shot to see. Pretty interesting in the store up front, the owner seemed very friendly and didn't seem to really know much about records (he was selling them for a friend). But in the back, sure enough, were stacks of crates. I got stoked, but didn't get TOO amped bc I'd been that situation before and certainly had it be a chud factory.





This, however, was kind of a craze. There was a lot of techno and house, but every now and again I'd hit a pocket of 12"s organized by label, and they'd all be white label promos --- and there were multiple copies, sometimes as many as four. This was some rare stuff that you never come across, a lot of WLPs from smaller groups on Epic, Arista, A&M, etc. This was rad --- I was getting stoked, and I would quietly tell my buddy that there was some pretty good stuff here. This, however, was getting him pissed bc he knew what this was turning into --- it was going to be one of those 2-3 hour spiels where he would just wait for me to finish (he ain't really a collectro). BC of this, he'd walk out a number of times for a smoke, etc.





While he was out on one of his breaks, I came across another one of these pockets of 12"s organized by labels. This one was a bunch of white jackets, the spines facing me, and the records inside em were all Heavenly Star, Sound of New York, etc. Nooooow I was getting amped. Got the super giddy feeling, yada yada.





So my buddy comes back in and gives me the "what the f*ck bro -- it's time to get the hell ouf of here" face. I had just hit quite patch of luck, and I wasn't even halfway through the collection yet. Nothing was priced, but I knew these were going to be cheap. So, quietly but not too quietly, I explained to my friend what was going on, how amazing some of the shit was, and how I was about to come up heavy for next to no dough. I was trying to explain the value of some of the pieces, telling him how this could be a gold mine, all that. He understood, wished me luck, and walked outside. I kept looking, and sure enough kept finding great stuff. The Carol Douglas 12" on New Image, random private boogie 12s, etc.





About 20 mins later, he comes back in and is clearly baked with a big grin on his face. He says "hey did you get that email? someone just sent us a funny email". I take a break and check my phone. Few new messages, but one of them is from him. I open it up, and it reads "dude....the jig is up. they've been watching and listening to us via security camera the whole time we've been here."





I assume he's either just being an idiot or is being paranoid bc he's clearly lifted. I laugh. He looks at me dead serious and says "dude I'm not kidding".





So I put my stacks aside and walk to the front, acting like I'm catching a breath of fresh air. There is NO ONE else in the store beside the two owners up front, and surely enough, there's a large television displaying the backroom where I'd been killing it / audibly bragging about it with the volume BLARING from the tiny speakers. I'm mortified, and my stomach drops.





Owner looks at me and says "hey if you want to bring some of that stack up I'll start pricing it for you."





Pretty sure my voice cracked when I said "cool". I slink away, bummed out like crazy. Can't believe my idiocy, but at the same time was sort of creeped out that I was being monitored so intensely. So i figured I'd test my luck.





Anyway, to wrap it up, I did end up pretty much making out like somewhat of a bandit. Got the Paper Dolls 12, the La She Ba 12, a bunch of other Peter Brown joints and a ton of private weird boogie 12s for next to nothing. He priced all the known stuff super high, using Music Stack as his guide ("there's a copy of this online for $900, I'll sell it to you for $175"). I passed on some of the more valuable items bc he was charging too much for em, but anything that wasn't on a major he pretty much sold for under $16.00.





Never really knew if he picked up on everything I'd said -- but man that shit sucked for a minute.
 
Sounds like your lesson was learned, don't let your pokerface slip until you have cashed up & are driving away. I have to remind my partner of this, she will see good stuff & get all excited & loud, gotta be cool........
 
holmes said: Why I chose to walk home that route on that day, I just don't know.




This quote, and another quote on one of those links to Soulsource about "waking up and smelling vinyl" reminds me of my first visit to Bangkok. Not an amazing story, but more about following your nose.





This was in the summer of 2000 or 2001, and I was a green 22 year-old backpacker on my first visit to Thailand, and after a couple of weeks out there I started to look for records in earnest. Tuk-tuk drivers seemed like good people to ask as I figured they would know the city inside out, but whenever I mentioned vinyl, they would try and direct me to bootleg CD sellers. I had already found one spot that Mo Majid (sp?) mentioned to me on the Breaks list, and I had a title to look for thanks to John Stapleton, but I knew that in a city of 10 million, there had to be other record spots.


One night some Thai friends I'd met took me across Bangkok away from the Khoa Sarn locale that I was familiar with to get some Chinese street food at 3am. At some point on the journey, I spied something from the back of the taxi that set off alarm bells in my inebriated mind: grimey shops with piles of second-hand stainless steel, car rims, cooking pans and assorted junk outside them. Scrap merchants.


That night I dreamt about records, and the next day, I woke up and I could smell vinyl.


I don't know why a fleeting glimpse of stainless steel sinks piled-up outside some shops down an alleyway got my attention, but I had a gut instinct that this district would also have second-hand record shops. I bought myself a couple of bottles of water, and with a foul hangover I started walking in the direction that I thought we'd headed, through an alien city that looked completely different by day and on foot, following some kind of homing instinct. This wasn't a short walk. It took me about three hours in the midday sun and I couldn't ask for directions because I didn't know where I was going (and my Thai was crap), but my nose turned out to be impeccable. I eventually stumbled upon a district I learned was pronounced Sapan Lake, and there were three second-hand record shops there, and a guy selling portables. Unforunately for me, I don't think they'd ever seen a tourist in their neck of the woods; the guy with a shop full of portable turntables and records of 1950s American commercial jingles flat-out refused to sell me anything, one of the record shops ushered me out as soon as I walked in and said something about "closed for lunch", and the last spot was run by a little old Chinese woman who'd cost me three visits before she'd part with a copy of The Impossibles Hot Pepper.





I guess this just a "follow your instincts" story, or perhaps I should end this with the saying "Where there's muck, there's brass".
 
behemoth said:Rockadelic said: ???I can???t, those two English guys you sent over here bought them all???




that is pretty messed up.




Nah....I pretty much chalked it up to them being more knowledgable and ahead of me in the game.....I take this type of experience as part of my education......lesson learned and respect to those folks who can come into my backyard and scoop stuff up......there's enough vinyl out there for everyone who wants to put in the time..
 
Rockadelic said:there's enough vinyl out there for everyone who wants to put in the time..

Any Florida people ever visit Jim Kidd in remote Indiantown?


Any trip there makes for a good digging story.
 
DCarfagna said:Rockadelic said:there's enough vinyl out there for everyone who wants to put in the time..

Any Florida people ever visit Jim Kidd in remote Indiantown?


Any trip there makes for a good digging story.




Here's one for you DC....





In '09 my brother and I were taking a 8 day roadtrip through Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa, Missouri and Arkansas. We planned ahead trying to line up as many leads as we could and Dante gave us a tip about a guy in Northwest Arkansas named Orlis. I had also found a Craigslist ad for the same town posted by a guy named Wayne. I called the Orlis dude and set up a tentative day/time to meet and I took the Craigslist ad along with me to call once we were on the road.





The trip overall was hit and miss......ranging from walking out of a store in Marshalltown, Iowa empty handed to finding a sealed Gloria Ann Taylor in a box of C&W records at a roadside Flea Market in Missouri. The last day of the trip we were to hit Arkansas so I called Orlis to confirm our time and then I dialed the phone number for Wayne from the Craigslist ad. When the other end answered it was very obvious that I was talking to this Orlis dude again and I immediately thought I had dialed his number by mistake. I felt kinda foolish and realize that Wayne and Orlis had the same phone number and were indeed the same person. Orlis laughed and said he goes by two names and he would explain when we got there.





We arrived at Orlis's house and we were greeted by this very friendly but rough looking character who invited us in. As we walked past some vintage pinball machines and a bevy of cats he directed us to sit down and watch a video. He was watching the Band's "Last Waltz" and immediately began quizzing us on the band and it's members.....he told us it was a test to see if we could look through his records. When I identified Levon Helm he went into endless tales of drinking and fighting with this fellow Arkie. He also showed us posters of a band he was in during the 60's out in San Francisco and told some tales about that as well. Once we had passed the test he let us look through his 2 rooms of records and we pulled out 5-10 decent things(Lesson: Sloppy seconds after DC are truly sloppy) and we negotiated a price for them which took some work.





Before we left I had to ask about the Wayne/Orlis story and here's what he told us..........





There were two big companies in his hometown, Wal-Mart and Tyson Chicken. Still being an active musician he played many company functions for both of these corporations. Wal-Mart was very stuffy and conservative and when working for them he went by Wayne, his "straight laced" personality. But when working for Tyson he could just be Good 'Ol Orlis. He told tales of being at parties where Bill Clinton, Willie Nelson and Mr. Tyson sat at a table with a big pile of cocaine in the middle of it.....and how Tyson had free reign to run drugs or do whatever else he wanted to....kind of a "HIllbilly Diplomatic Immunity". We had to get going or else Orlis would have told stories long into the night....and in the 2-3 hours we were there he must have smoked 2 packs of cigarettes......quite a character.
 
Rockadelic said:behemoth said:Rockadelic said: ???I can???t, those two English guys you sent over here bought them all???




that is pretty messed up.




Nah....I pretty much chalked it up to them being more knowledgable and ahead of me in the game.....I take this type of experience as part of my education......lesson learned and respect to those folks who can come into my backyard and scoop stuff up......there's enough vinyl out there for everyone who wants to put in the time..




that is true. but them using your name was a little messed up. i mean you were allowed in there by the skin of your teeth. if your former co worker didn't let them in and then you went back it might of messed things up for you that you supposedly told them you know? whatever its just kind of eh
 
behemoth said:Rockadelic said:behemoth said:Rockadelic said: ???I can???t, those two English guys you sent over here bought them all???




that is pretty messed up.




Nah....I pretty much chalked it up to them being more knowledgable and ahead of me in the game.....I take this type of experience as part of my education......lesson learned and respect to those folks who can come into my backyard and scoop stuff up......there's enough vinyl out there for everyone who wants to put in the time..




that is true. but them using your name was a little messed up. i mean you were allowed in there by the skin of your teeth. if your former co worker didn't let them in and then you went back it might of messed things up for you that you supposedly told them you know? whatever its just kind of eh




I hear ya.....





Lesson = Americans are suckers for an accent.
 
not a story of a nice haul or anything...just the strangest transaction for records I have ever had.





Nrich and I made a house call in White Settlement (suburb of Fort Worth). We get there and have some difficutly getting someone to answer the door. As we wait, we notice a ton of cameras around the property. Finally the dude answers the door...a quite large, older gentleman. We go in the house and there are TV monitors all over the place...all of those surveillance cameras. Guy is definitely a shut in and a paranoid one at that. We start going through the records, nothing great, but I do find a couple and I think Nrich found a couple. We really didnt want to leave without getting anything due to the strange nature of this dude (and I always want to have a memento of this strange encounter). So we tell him we want these particular records, so he considers it and then we ask what he wants for them. "Bread". Of course, how much money do you want for them? No, he wants bread...a couple loafs...wonder bread. So we agree, and run to the Tom Thumb and buy the bread...take it back to him and get the records and go home.
 
F it.


I'll contribute one story, Roc you choose:





1) Andean Mountain Priest


2) Mexico City Womans Prison


3) Sacrifice Your Manhood


4) New Dehli Mattress Factory


5) Dig & Fap


6) Murder in the street


7) Escape from The Schoolhouse
 
So i responded to an add about 600 records for sale. The guy selling the records said they were in excellent condition and that they were mostly mid 70's - early 80's soul/disco type stuff. He was asking 2 bucks a record or 1 dollar each if 50 or more were bought. I said cool and went over to check them out. I figured most would be crap but i was hoping to find a few things i could use....
 
Driving in TX on some Government lease property in the middle of nowhere.





We see a sign that says "Lemonade & REAL Beef Jerky" on this little shack no cars in site. We are about 50+ miles from the nearest ANYTHING. It's August in TX 100+ outside so we stop and Mark (RIP) gets out and goes in for "Lemonade & Jerky". I stay in the car with the A/C, well ten minutes go by and he ain't coming out. Then this pickup pulls up and these 2 Redneck hunters get out and go in. Another 5 minutes pass and I am starting to think something is wrong (TX Chainsaw sh*t). The 2 Rednecks come out and there looking at me weird and they get in the truck and leave. Well I get out and start in. Just as I get to the door he comes out the 50+ LP's in his hands. The place was filled with Lp's Crazy Rares. Industrial








Lemonade, REAL Beef Jerky & RECORDS!! Hell my kind of store.
 
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