So I’ve been a bit quiet of late, mainly because I’ve not had much work and consequently have been pretty poor, which has meant that I haven’t really bought any vinyl for a while. I’ve still been nosing round charity shops however, mostly coming away empty-handed, but today my luck changed… I was in one of my usual spots, looking through the same old rubbish they had last week, when on another rack, I spotted a Chic record. My heart quickened slightly, but I wasn’t too excited, because as brilliant as Chic are, their stuff does crop up in charity shops fairly frequently. So, I looked behind it, only to see a TK Disco sleeve. Behind that, another Chic record. Well that did it for me, I scooped up the 30 or so records in that section, got comfy sat on the floor, and started to flick. Anyway, you can probably guess where this is going, so here’s what I scored - most of these were £1, a couple were £1.50.
Worthy of first mention was something straight off my wants list, T-Connection’s “Do What You Wanna Do” on TK Disco, a much sampled disco bomb with superb percussion and synth work, and plenty of drama. Then, on the mighty Prelude, and again in near mint condition, was Sharon Redd’s “You’re a Winner”, backed with “Activate”, boogie action, nice! Next up, Third World’s “Now that We’ve Found Love”, produced by the legendary Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff, unplayed copy!! It’s a nice mid-tempo disco number with a slight reggae feel, very cool. Now, Chic, as mentioned…. Can I take this opportunity to say that anyone who doesn’t dig Chic is probably not worthy of this earth, Nile Rogers and Bernard Edwards are 2 of the greatest producers that ever lived! Firstly, and currently wowing the masses in the form of a Todd Terje edit, I found an “I Want Your Love” remix, backed with two other crackers - “Le Freak!” and “Chic Cheer”. Personally I’m not fussed about Terje’s effort, I will stick with the original and the superb “I Can’t Kick This Feeling When It Hits”, a dazzling hypnotic builder which craftily sampled it, by ISM favourite Moodymann. Another Chic 12″ yielded something I’d never heard before, it’s called “Jack Le Freak”, and as the title suggests, it’s a version of the classic “Le Freak!”… basically this sounds like a Fast Eddie remix!! It’s got all the bumping bass attitude, the Chi-style drums, a looped up Jack-ja-jack-jack vocal, and of course the original track sliced and diced to pieces! What the fuck! This has house party written all over it. Now onto something that might divide opinions - I certainly know some people that hate it, but it melts my heart and I love it to pieces - the full, 10′45′ special disco version of Mcfadden & Whitehead’s “Ain’t No Stopping Us Now”, the UK pressing, but I’m not too precious about stuff like that, it’s in great condition and is another one ticked off the wants list! I’ve been on the lookout for the LP with “There’s Only So Much Oil In The Ground” on it for quite a while, and while I didn’t find that, I did find another Tower of Power LP, “Monster On a Leash”, a much later album; this unfortunately sounds a little disappointing, although I’ve only had a brief flick through it so far. Also grabbed a copy of MFSB’s “Love is the Message”: obviously I already have this, but I thought it would make a nice gift for a friend who recently gave me a spare copy of a Stevie Wonder LP I didn’t have. I also picked up a copy of George Benson’s “Give Me the Night”, because although I’m not a huge fan of the title track (Quincy Jones or no Quincy Jones!), it has “The World is a Ghetto” on the flip, which I already have on his LP “In Flight” (Imo his best album), but this looks to be a better pressing, and I absolutely love that track. A Detroit Spinners 12″ came home with me too, on Atlantic, and in great condition - “Working My Way Back to You” (yes, that one!) Finally, a Diana Ross & The Supremes thing which has a medley on the A-side, which I suppose would be cool for weddings or something! But tucked away on the flip- a killer version of “Love Hangover”, with a kinda slow intro section that leads into a mostly instrumental version. Motown goodness…
Christ on a bike, what a jackpot. Well done!
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yeah, good work, we just don’t get that kind of second-hand market over here sadly
nice one on the Tower Of Power, that’s a great tune
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Jitterbug reply on July 18, 2008 12:18 pm:
i just got lucky! i go in the shop all the time as it’s near where i live, but someone had obviously just offloaded some disco and i was the first to stumble on them… but the tower of power LP doesn’t seem to be up to much, sadly, it was recorded about 15 years too late!
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Kenny reply on July 19, 2008 9:38 am:
Yeah, just continueing with what gmos said about the lack of of a decent second-hand market in ireland; i’m not full y ready (or bothered) to go with the disco re-edits backlash that i see kicking off on the net cause its one of the only avenues to get some disco related stuff for myself.
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you got some classics in there! i can get that Tower of Power LP for you pretty easily for mad cheap.
not liking “give me the night” is almost unforgivable, but having his version of “the world is a ghetto” on 12″ is what is up, i didn’t even realise it was out there like that. if you see another copy of that, grab it for me!
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Jitterbug reply on July 18, 2008 12:20 pm:
hey i don’t mind ‘give me the night’ but it’s a little too ‘poppy’ overall i think, needs to be a little less polished. anyway you don’t like mach ‘on & on’ … i’ll trade 12″s with you!
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wow man, some nice finds. I am regular in a few charity shops that are rife for the digging. its always good to catch some shit, but Ive never found that much…
good job!
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Your spidey senses must have gone into overdrive JB. A good days digging indeed.
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Damn that shit, Damn that shit to Hell! AAAARRRGGHH
So i was reading this post the other day and thought “man that was a good days digging, i wish i had luck like that”
And Yesterday as i was downtown i noticed a rather large closing down sign in window of the local music store. This store hasnt sold vinyl (new or 2nd hand) for a good 15yrs maybe but had been for about 20yrs previous..I decided to pop in and see if there was any interesting cds or dvds only to find a pile of vinyl in the corner and remembering this post i though to myself “bet i wouldnt have luck like that” and began to flick through…
The first 3 7″s were Chic originals, then some Cerrone, some Bohannon, some o Jays, some Lou Rawls, some salsoul…Happy Days! SCORE!! Went up to the counter and my new bunch of rare vinyl (almost everything that was there) came to around 20 odd euro…Happy Days
I decided to craftily ask the guy behind the counter had he any more vinyl “which was of no use” and he went on to inform me that those few records were the remains of about 5000 disco/soul/funk/jazz records that had been found in the owners attic which were all sold off over the past 2 weeks for about 2-5 euro each…
I am now sick - sick to the teeth
why did i not wander in two weeks ago, why???
Judging by what was left it is killing me to think what was sitting there, i even had a nightmare about this last night
Why god, WHY?
gggrrr
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Jitterbug reply on July 23, 2008 6:50 am:
ouch! well, at least you got a few nice 45’s as a consolation! i’d love to know some of the stuff that slipped through your fingers. keep on digging!
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Dean reply on July 23, 2008 9:07 am:
That’s what’s killing me the most, thinking about what I missed!
I think the fact that i got a few nice 45’s might be making it worse, a complete tease! I would sleep easier if it were a bunch of barbara streissand records that i found…
**hangs head**
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