I wonder if music will evoke the same memories for those growing up today as it did for me and my generation, and the ones before me for that matter. I can look back over forty plus years and pinpoint albums that were crucial to my youth, adolescence and everything before, after and in between. I can remember trips in to Manchester to buy certain records on the day of release, visits to my friend Barry’s magnificent record store in Sheffield where I would wade through rack after rack of American imports along with other hidden gems…which weren’t really that hidden as he would guide me to the appropriate section in the store where I would bury my head for what seemed like hours.
Great shops manned by great staff made our lives easier. Their vast knowledge would help me maximize my spare time, they knew what I’d be interested in and were only too happy to help. I wrote a while back about walking in to a record store in Ybor City in Tampa and feeling the thrill all over again, of picking up a record and scrolling through the credits to see who appeared on it, what label it was on. That kind of buzz never goes away and you start to realize how the business kind of ruined it for the fans, how they took away the excitement from those who were their livelihood.
As the industry changes, evolves, disintegrates, call it what you want, the more you grasp on to what made it so unbelievably exciting for us all. Records, like nothing else put you in a particular place at a particular time and with somebody. And it all becomes so clear. Whenever I think of a record special to me it’s ‘Life in Mars’ I’m back there dressed in the same clothes doing the same things. We all remember where we were when 911 happened and for people my age where we were when when Kennedy and John Lennon were shot. But that’s always surrounded with sadness. Music makes us rejoice, makes us happy, it makes me reach for that record, and it really pisses me off if I no longer have it!
I thought it would be worth taking some time out to rediscover some of those magical moments and to re visit some records from my collection. The reason for this blog was I remembered Leonard Cohen, quite why I haven’t a clue but then again what reason do you really need to write about one of the most incredible artists of our time. And that’s what I intend to do the moment I get up in the morning.
