Shutter Noise

Vinyl Addiction

Ok everybody, it’s Monday and Mondays suck, so let’s have some distraction in the form of a question.

I stopped by Waterloo and End of an Ear this weekend (purchases: Matador’s Casual Victim Pile compilation, Grizzly Bear – Yellow House, Fugazi – Red Medicine, Wolf Parade – Apologies to the Queen Mary), and as usual it set off a need for more. Vinyl love is a serious sickness, y’all; I also bought paper and plastic sleeves and spent way too much time lovingly reorganizing my records.

But now for the part you care about, if you do…

QUESTION: What are your absolute album must-haves?

You can dream big – I’m still looking every time for Clinic’s Internal Visitations, but that shit isn’t even on EBAY – or go basic, with just-released and awesome (Surfer Blood’s album is on red vinyl at End of an Ear, white vinyl at Waterloo… choices, choices).

Comment with your picks. A few of mine, to start you off: Surfer Blood (totally about the red vinyl), Dum Dum Girls, the Kills, Sigur Ros, the Antlers, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah.

Austin Record Store Binge

For the past few weeks I’ve been taking photos for Austin Vinyl, a new website that’ll be up, running, and telling you all you need to know about the local record store scene very soon. It has been great discovering so many stores that I didn’t know about, but the temptation of all that vinyl means my bank account isn’t speaking to me at the moment.

Here’s your own brief tour of the six stores we hit. All these photos + more are here.

First and largest, Waterloo Records. Doubly dangerous in that I went weeks ago, then again for Spoon, and couldn’t resist buying both times.

Record count: Anni Rossi – Rockwell, HEALTH – Get Color, Dengue Fever – Escape From Dragon House

Cheapo, right up the street

Record count: Radiohead – They Might Be Wrong (live recordings)

Brief interlude to say that I have absolutely loved these recordings for years, and am so happy to finally have them on vinyl. The versions of Like Spinning Plates and True Love Waits on here are so, so good.

Backspin Records, my hands-down favorite new find. I actually had to stop looking, because it was getting more and more difficult to choose which albums I should buy and which I could wait on.

Also, they have a Billy Idol wall.

Record count: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin – Broom, HEALTH – s/t, Spoon – Kill the Moonlight, one more I can’t remember

End of An Ear

Record count: Bedřich Smetana (who had a thoroughly depressing life), the Chariots of Fire soundtrack, the Roadie soundtrack with its awesome classic rock, LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver

Friends of Sound, where I stumbled into by accident last sxsw and ended up with some Billie Holiday and Holy Fuck… great location also, right off of South Congress.

Record count: Nina Simone – Best Of Collection, Dirty Dancing Soundtrack (hell yeah!)

Breakaway Records, aka ohmygod so many awesome $1 albums wow.

Record count: Dave Brubeck – Solo Piano Songs, Cindy Lauper, Beatles – 1967-1970

The sad thing is, I probably bought even more that I forgot about… vinyl love is a sickness, I tell you!

New Albums Live

There are some kickass albums coming out this month, and some of your favorite local spots are offering you a chance to listen to them before forking over your hard-earned cash. NPR’s online stream is also out to spoil you (don’t you love those guys?).

Yeasayer’s new album, Odd Blood, is supposedly even trippier than the first, and though it drops February 9th, you can check it out weeks ahead of time this Friday at both Waterloo Records and End of an Ear. And while you’re thinking of them, you should probably buy your tickets for one of their two Parish shows before they sell out.

NPR is streaming Spoon’s new album in its entirety, and what I’ve listened to so far is pretty kickass. You can catch them live for free at a Waterloo Records in-store Monday the 25th at 4pm, but if you want to actually make it in the building, I’d recommend showing up very, very early. They’re also kicking off SXSW with a show that Wednesday at Stubbs.

Vampire Weekend’s Contra is also streaming, and there’s a listening party for it Tuesday night at Scoot Inn. Sadly, I don’t have any pics of them yet, though they are playing Stubbs April 10th so I can maybe remedy that.

Oh yeah, and my Free Week photos will be up asap.