This place is like one of those really clear lakes that looks about a foot deep but is actually forty feet deep.
Three clean steps below street level at a storefront that looked like a whitewashed brunch place rather than a haven of used vinyls led into Good Records. So bedazzled was I at the sight of a clean, polished, dark wood floor that I thought, 'Hmm, it's smaller than I thought." Of course I was proven wrong as the sun set outside the bright windows and I got several leg cramps from squatting at the $1 shelves that lined the rectangular storeroom.
Best of all, the store was quiet, quiet, quiet (aside from the music) and on a section of the street that really escaped the whole modern scene. The lack of a crowd allowed me to place my belongings on a nice wooden bench so that I could really be free to browse. Only later did one other dude show up, and he really knew his stuff; he was shouting over the music at the dude in the store about what parts of a hip-hop song could be copyrighted.
Speaking of a hip-hop section, this store definitely had one. What I learned, however, is that a lot of them probably come from deejays, and are thus single (DUUUUUH). I admit that the sale cubbies were just too rich (or too thin) for my blood, and I surfaced with Nas's "Hate Me Now" single, Spandeau Ballet, and Culture Club, only to pass up all three.
My worst temptation here was a Horslips album in an octoganal case featuring intense paper cutwork. I wasn't hip enough to have heard the Horslips yet, but was able to have a listen at one of the stations. Later, I found that of the two stations, the one on the left (when facing the back of the store), was better. The one on the right kind of made Madonna sound warpy like Nico, but an octave higher...though this wasn't an entirely unpleasant effect.
The guy working there admitted that the belt on that turntable was probably very old. He was very laid back in general, and accommodated all my questions, which I called out from all parts of the store since it was just him and me in there for 90% of the time. While I huffed and puffed through endless options, he fiddled with the music. He had a bit of music A.D.D. in fact, but I was able to forgive him this and the paradoxical fact that he was playing mp3s off a humungous Mac because it all indirectly led to the fact that I got to hear "Computer Love" playing as I shopped.
The $3 each (or 2 for $5) sales section is where I mined my nugs of gold. Michael Jackson's Off the Wall AND Thriller in perfectly playable condition, along with Like a Virgin by Madonna and Changes by David Bowie. Having just seen the latter title at another store for eight bucks, I wondered what was the story on all of the things I'd found. "I don't know," the guy said, " usually they sell really fast, but at this point, it was just easy for me to get rid of them for really cheap rather than wait around."
"That's ten dollars," he said, until he saw my bank card. This is how Country Mouse Jia learned that you can get a break on sales tax if you use a card. Oh well, it was still just a little over two bucks per for four albums I would have bought at some point anyway. All in all, a successful trip; nothing to keep me from revisiting. read more