you know i really should, to be sure, unpack one of my record playing devices, or if you like turntables, and get it set up. this would be, look you see, because i seem to be picking up those elements of vinyl which one would ostensibly use such decks to hear the music of them on.
well, hey ho, no, as i have not set up a deck or if you like stag yet, the least i can do is share, show off or maybe flaunt some records what i have picked up of late, here within this very blog post. for all i know someone reading this might have an interest.
indeed, each record shall have a closer look below. also, to keep it interesting, i will give all of the provenance that i am able to, and throw some trivia in too. the latter is the one and only reason i suspect people keep coming back to this blog, and very welcome all are.
let us commence, then, with the "no brainer" of my recent acquisitions. as a matter of some interest, the first here was also the most expensive, and bar one surprise inclusion probably has the shortest running length of them all.
yes, one of three David Bowie releases put out for Record Store Day 2018. the other two were, i think Welcome To The Blackout, a rudimentary live recording, and i think Bowie Now, which appeared to be a sort of "best of" overview from roughly 76/77 to 79. both of those lavish sets were priced north of £30, however. this one, the "full" demo for the song Let's Dance, was a good deal more modest in cost, coming in at just or an eye watering 1p south of £15.
provenance of my copy of this? Rough Trade store in Nottingham. when i was stood holding it, i was about 2% "do i really want to spend so much on something i am not that interested in"; 98% "if i do not buy this then i am just going to regret it at a later stage". so, as should be the case, majority rule won.
no, i have not opened it up yet. but, i will. perhaps to play it when i have my stag set up, or just to look. yes, i know opening it will "devalue" it, with many or most of Record Store Day releases being bought purely to sell for profit on that ebay thing. i have no intention of ever willingly parting with this, or any of my Bowie collection, though.
next up is a compilation of The Rat Pack, then, imaginatively called The Rat Pack. despite the price sticker saying £7.99 i got this for £1, for the store what sold it was selling all their records off for this fee. per item, of course. frankly, i paid that for the gorgeous image of Dean, Glass Eye and Mr Sinatra. an image that i had, as you can see in the above, in a much smaller form, over the expansive 3CD set of the same name.
does the record seem any good? yes. whereas the 3CD set has some 74 songs, this lp has 14. 5 by Mr Sinatra, 4 by Glass Eye and a respectable 5 off of Dean. it is highly likely that the royalties due to the Estate of Mr Dean Martin off this record are being paid directly to the Estate of Mr Sinatra in respect of debts racked up for all the broken and busted Betamax video machines Mr Martin was encouraged to purchase from Mr Sinatra. you can read more on that by clicking here, if you so wished.
whilst we possibly have just as good singers about today, no, we will not see the likes of The Rat Pack again. it is just impossible. there was always an air of mystery around celebrities back then, and it was like they were doing the world a great favour whenever they appeared and shared their talents. now any sort of singer or celebrity is granted blanket 24/7 coverage due to social media, and there's no mystery or intrigue. quite sad, but so it goes.
conspiracy theory fans will love the above, and no not because for some reason the above has uploaded sideways. i am sure you spotted this in the first picture, but if not, there you go. the version of the picture used for the vinyl version has been doctored, airbrushed or "photoshopped", removing the jacket behind Mr Martin.
you might think that this was done to move Mr Martin closer to Mr Glass Eye on the vinyl cover, making for a much better square image. but there's also a compelling case to suggest that maybe the jacket had to be removed on legal grounds. perhaps the owner of the jacket is influential, powerful and infamously notorious. it could be that when the image showing his jacket was used on the CD, those responsible found that they had their noses, legs and so forth busted, and the people doing the lp version had no wish to endure the same or worse.
if you have absolutely nothing else better to do, then why not sit and think about this, and create your own conspiracy theory about why the jacket was removed? this can be quite a fun activity to do, and something of an outlet. for example, you could think of such things and create a blog or similar web presence to share them on. who knows, perhaps one day i will do something like that.
many - mostly my brother Richard, and Spiros, but in a room of three that would be many - would consider the above to be something of a "holy grail" in terms of post-Rocky II musical releases. that's because it is a song off of top(ish) group Survivor that was in a Rocky film but was not Eye Of The Tiger. instead, it is Burning Heart, a song in which Survivor reflect on the then present state of the Cold War, and explored how it could be won by a bout of fisticuffs.
Rocky IV was a most smart film when it came out, and if anything it has aged surprisingly well. at the time we were perhaps prone to considering many of Stallone's films in the 80s were driven by Stallone's vanity and ego. in retrospect, he was a master of pacing and of creating truly exceptional action sequences.
as for Burning Heart, well, it is no Eye Of The Tiger but it is still smart. probably my second favourite tune off of the film soundtrack, right after Living In America by Mr James Brown. oddly, it is not like Eye Of The Tiger was ever supposed to be all that it now is. the only reason, giving you some of that trivia i suggested, that it even featured in Rocky III was because Queen refused to give permission for Another One Bites The Dust to be used, which was Stallone's first and only choice.
oh yes, the cover of the single - like the film poster - is one massive spoiler for the motion picture Rocky IV. but, bar a few simpletons and maybe some senior members of the poliburo of the Soviet Union, nobody really went to see the film with any expectations of a surprise ending.
above is another record i got for £1, despite it being priced far north of that. yes, same place as the Rat Pack one, cheers. this one is a live recording of Bruce Springsteen, from back in 1988, in Argentina of all places. i know it is a live recording because it says so on the front, and on the reverse each and every song has [Live] written next to it, just to make sure you know.
this is, i think since i have not played it, the widely circulated "not official" recorded release from The Boss of a concert gone done for human rights / amnesty international, etc. well, 9 of the songs of it, if i remember right most bootleg CDs and tapes of the same had 14 or 15 tunes on. but this has a decent enough selection.
do i like The Boss? yes. what's not to like?
finally, then, the no brainer. provenance was once again Rough Trade in Nottingham, and this is the double lp vinyl of the soundtrack for The Man Who Fell To Earth, for £9.99 or if you like 1p south of ten quid.
there really was not much chance of me passing up on the opportunity to purchase a 12" sized image of David Bowie at his most beautiful for such a fee. it helps, of course, that the soundtrack for this, ostensibly one of his most celebrated film roles, is lavish and superb. although of course no, Bowie did not do the soundtrack.
one of the greatest rock legends or myths ever surrounds the David Bowie soundtrack for The Man Who Fell To Earth. for years the story was that Bowie recorded one, but it was "so bad" that it had to be binned, and an entirely new one composed and rushed in straight away. supposedly the Bowie recordings are locked away in a vault, never to be seen or heard.
that had never sat well with me. for a start, if you look at Bowie, say 74 - 76, it was clearly impossible for him to have recorded anything bad. the linear notes, in both the CD and the smart 40th (ish) anniversary Blu Ray of the film, tell the truth. Bowie simply rushed off to record a soundtrack without the film being finished, and thus the music's pacing and timing were so far off the action on screen it could not be used.
in my view, the music Bowie innocently recorded for The Man Who Fell To Earth has been heard. most likely on Station To Station, Low or even much later releases. as my "Random Bowie" series of posts has explored, Bowie didn't ever let material go to waste.
of course, now that i have gone and stated that, watch his in fact hidden away all unheard recordings go and get released at some point. if so, well that's all win from what i can see.
no, i have no problem with the fact that in at least two instances above i have bought vinyl of something i have in CD form. should a tape be available i'd buy that too. back in the mid to late 80s, and to an extent early 90s, it was a "thing" to own the same album on all different formats. no particular reason for it, this was just what we did. or i did.
and that would be all that it can be for this post, then. once again, to be sure, and as ever, look you see, hopefully this was all of some interest to someone somewhere. well, if not all, then at the least bits or pieces of it.
be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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