Double Live Elton

This album might be rare. I can't find anything about it on the Internet and it is rarely for sale on eBay. The Pickwick label mainly dealt in cut-outs and bargain bin records. This album has one of my favorite Elton songs on it – called, Can I Put You On. The songs on at least one of the disks are also on the way-more-famous single live albums called Here and There and/or perhaps from the “17-11-70” album. It's Saturday - so that means Garage Sales!

Neil Young's On the Beach

I do not know much about this album and actually have never even played it. It was in a box I bought at a garage sale this summer. At garage sales, I typically make an offer to the seller like, "how much for the whole box?" and then see what I've bought when I take them home and go through them. I am posting it because a cool guy whose office suite is next door to my office is a huge Neil Young fan. Rolling Stone magazine's initial review of the album described it as "one of the most despairing albums of the decade (seventies)." Hope you like this, Michael.

Mountain - the band

Mountain – a seminal hard rock band from out east - Long Island or NJ was formed in late ‘60’s. Styled somewhat after Cream, Wiki says their fourth ever live performance was at Woodstock. I got these two records at a garage last summer. My pal Mac told me about this band and how good they were and their influence on many other early '70's hard rock bands.

Nuthin Fancy

This is one of my favorite Album covers, it is on the back side of Lynyrd Skynyrd's Nuthin' Fancy album - it is their 3rd (1975) studio release. Keyboard (mainly piano) player Billy Powell, who passed away recently, is the one flipping off the photographer. My favorite track on the album is titled, "Am I Losin.'" I hope no one is offended by this picture. It seems pretty harmless.

Summer Garage Sale Season

If you like my blog on collecting vinyl records - join the group I modertate over on Linkedin. At http://linkedin.com it's called Vinyl Record Collectors and there are now over 50 members. It has a pretty active discussion board. As we get close to the 4th of July - that tends to signal the end of the spring/early summer Garage Sale season. I did great this year. I usually make a fair (low) offer and try to buy the whole lot of records at any one garage sale. The seller are happy to get rid of all the records at once. I got Led Zeppelin I and II, Elton's GYBR, and some Bee Gee's records.

When I buy all the records at one time at garage sales without first going tthrough all of them, it reminds me of buying football cards. You didn't know what you were getting until you got home and opened the packets. I suggest blue-collar areas (suburbs) that might be less afluent - those areas seem to have the most vinyl at their garage sales.

Getting Started

If you are wonding about price - check and see what they are going for on eBay. And if you have a store near you called Half Price Books (Records and Magazines) that is a great start. They have store locations in many states: http://www.halfpricebooks.com/find_a_store.html The one near me has lots of decent records starting at just fifty cents each. With "better ones" up at $2.97 each. Rare ones up above ten dollars.

Book - Vinyl Junkies: Adventures in Record Collecting

I found out about this book, called: Vinyl Junkies: Adventures in Record Collecting (Paperback, available at http://www.amazon.com/), by Brett Milano from fellow blogger - Robert Crumb, artist and 78 record album collector. The author talks about the “creepiness” of collecting records in the book. Collecting records is not creepy. Chicks are cool with it – ask my wife.

My new blog - Vinyl Recording Collecting

The group I moderate on Linkedin is call Vinyl Record Collectors. So if you are reading, or have found my blog based on knowing me that way – cool. Thanks for reading.

At a web content convention post-party, I was convinced to start my blog, by - of all people - the guy known as the Content Wrangler. So, here goes nothing.