LSD and Headphones / Part 2

Given the excitement and the temptation to stay up all night and spin all those 45’s I would never otherwise hear, I slept remarkably well that night.  I woke up, and Larry had already been awake for a few hours.  He seemed happy to see me.  Something told me he slept with one eye open and a gun under his pillow, and he was relieved he didn’t have to use it. 

Larry was packaging records, many to be sent overseas. He went inside the ex’s house to make us oatmeal and brought us fruit as well. I was thrilled to see what the day brought. I was dying with anticipation to buy records, but also eager to learn from this encyclopedia of rock’n’roll, a genre that never excited me a great deal. Everything we listened to the day before blew me away. This was partially due to it being great music, but also his well curated tour of the musics history and deeper meaning was invaluable to the experience.  

After breakfast and a smoke session we went back to the record room. The only chairs in this room were two linked movie theater seats up against a wall, opposite the record player and speakers. He took a seat, and looked a bit apprehensive with one hand on his head. He couldn’t even make eye contact when he said, “I never thought I would say this, but today, every record in this room is for sale”.
 
This took as much strength as a man’s last words to his only child on his death bed. He knew this could be the death bed of his lifelong collection.  The collection that was with him in sickness and health, more so than either of his two wives, or four children, and death would be the only reason they part.  The selfish record junkie in me didn’t give a shit about all that. First thing I did is went to the Bob Dylan bootleg section. There were about 20 in there, with one hand I grabbed half of them, and then the other half. I have a thing for Dylan boots, I would buy nearly every one I saw. Today, including the ones I bought from Larry, I have about 70. He looked sick.

“All of them?!!?!” 
“Yep, all of them.” 

I left him 2 or 3 out of sympathy, likely because I already had them. Then I began filling boxes with all the U.K. pressings he had taught me about the day before, Savoy Brown, Rolling Stones, Cream, Hendrix on Track, Traffic and more. “You’re taking all my Decca’s man! You know how much those cost?” I snobbishly replied, “No, but we will figure that out.” He was sweating it pretty bad. “Could you imagine what it would be like if someone came in your house and started putting all your records in boxes to take them away?!??!” That actually stopped the carnage for a few seconds and made me think. “No, I definitely have never thought about what that would feel like at all.” In an exasperated tone he says, “It ain’t good. You’ve got my right lung in that box and my left ventricle in the other one! I think I might cry today!” 

It was me that was about to cry, tears of laughter and joy. I could tell this would be no ordinary record buy. This was passing the torch, and me taking on an considerable part of his life. The blues stack got devoured like a dingy in an ocean storm, swallowed hole by cardboard boxes. Artist by artist, I went through the rock section, taking one or two copies of nearly every album in there. He eventually had to leave the room, it was better that way. 

When I had finished pillaging his collection, I found him in the other room.  I told him I was finished, and to come inspect what I had done. After seeing he still had at least 4 copies of his favorite albums, he breathed a sigh of relief. Going through the boxes was a bit cathartic. I think he was partially relieved to sell these to a good home and pass on the knowledge, as much as his most loyal companions were tough to say goodbye to. We came to a box full of Hendrix, and he pulled out “Axis Bold of Love” original mono U.S. pressing. This one called to me, the font of “Mono” on front I had never seen before, and it seemed special. “This is the only one you can’t have. I’ll never see one of these again.” I later researched this, and yes this mono U.S. version is rare as hens teeth and worth $2000 in nice shape.  

We went through the boxes, and began to assign prices. We came to the box which held the Moondog albums, all of his Prestige titles including “The Story of Moondog” with Andy Warhol designed cover. All of them are in great condition. In bad shape but ridiculously rare is “Snaketime Series” on Moondog’s own private record label. He shot me a death glance, but also had respect that I knew who Moondog was before I got there. He had quizzed me on him, a test I passed. “Seventy five bucks a piece.” “Deal”. I knew this was not going to be a cheap trip to the record store, but an opportunity I couldn’t pass up.

After a few hours, we had come to agreements on the boxes I had compiled. We then turned our attention to the 45’s. “You know much about these Charles?” I didn’t know a damn thing. Learning 45’s is like learning every language in the world. The best ones are artists that never made a hit, on labels that never made more than a few titles. He put a box in front of me like a professor dropping a thousand page book in front of his pupil and said, “Start learning now. These little fuckers have made me a fortune and I just started going through them.” 

Ones he had already pulled were Celest Hardie “You’re Gone” and The Grateful Dead “Scorpio“. Another he hadn’t sold yet was Tony Sheridan and the Beat Brothers, The Beatles under a pseudonym.  I looked at hundreds of 45’s before recognizing a single name that wasn’t a blues artist or Fats Domino. One really stood out to me.  It was on the Excello label, known for great blues, and the song was called “It’s Your Voodoo Working” by Charles Sheffield.  We put it on the turntable, and one of the most killer cuts I’ve ever heard came blasting out of those speakers!  One of those songs that 5 seconds in, you knew you just found a new life companion. I was blown away, and I wanted to hear everything this room had to offer! I had no idea then what I know now, this was a serious holy grail R&B 45 that might surface online only once or twice a year.

“If you think this is impressive”, Larry said tipping his glasses down to me, “you ain’t seen nothing yet.” The day had come to see the collection he was buying. By this time he trusted me enough to not blindfold me on the drive there. McKinleyville, CA looks like most every other suburb in America.  Cookie cutter houses, nice wide streets, well kept lawns, 2.5 children per household and low crime rates. We pulled up to the house, and it just made me think. I could have walked past some of the greatest collections in the world, and I never would have known it! This was the most unassuming home in the an even more unassuming location. 

We knock on the door, and a younger man who might be 40 at most opens.  This was Alex, the son of the deceased record store owner, and heir to the collection. He greets us and invites us inside. A very polite and hospitable gentleman, he offers me my choice of bubbles or still water. He has great taste in art, and a quality steel range in the kitchen. After a few minutes of conversation, he shows us to the garage. He opens the door, “Holy shit…”

Alex found Larry through Craigslist, in one of the most miraculous twists of good karma and fate I’ve ever known. Alex responded to his want add, “looking to buy posters and records.” The add is more about what he doesn’t want than what he does. “No Barbara Streisand, no Herb Alpert, no Lawrence Welk, no Country, no Classical. I want 50’s, 60’s and 70’s only!!!” When Alex called, Larry had almost forgotten he had made the add to begin with. The call was about posters, not records, and the man said he has some rock’n’roll posters he inherited from his dad. They set up a time, and Larry shows up at his house with $50 in his pocket. He almost talked himself out of going all together. What he was greeted by was any collectors dream. 

He obviously hadn’t brought enough money for all these, so he reserved them and set up a date to come back. On his way out, he casually asked Alex if he had any records.  “Yeah I have some, what are you looking for?”  “Rock’n’Roll and Blues mostly.  I like The Stones, Cream, Hendrix”, he replied.  “Ok, when you come back I’ll show you what I have.”  

Larry comes back with some more money and buys a few posters. Again he puts more on reserve, so they set up another visit. Alex had brought out one small box of records, and it’s all fine material. Larry explains he will buy all of them, but again he didn’t have all the cash on him. This dance goes on four or five visits, each time Alex brings him one more box of records to look at. Every time, it’s full of gold. Not your average “I’ve got some records” records. It’s clear he’s dipping from a private stash, and there’s more where these came from. 

By now they had built a rapport. On the fifth visit, Alex said “Come here man, I’ve got something to show you.” He takes Larry to his two car garage, and it’s literally full of albums! Shelf after shelf, 4 isles of them, and another isle against the wall is all 45’s. There were at least 20,000 records in there, loosely arranged by genre. One whole isle is jazz, and massive sections of soul, rock, blues, soundtracks, and music from around the globe. He can’t believe his eyes!  The folklore legend was true, and now he has exclusive access to the greatest record shop this side of the Mississippi! Larry goes to one of the sections, flips through for about 30 seconds. He goes to another side of the room, flips through a stack, and realizes he’s in trouble. This is going to take tens of thousands of dollars and about that many man hours, and he can’t afford not to. He looks at Alex and says, “Don’t show this to anyone else, I’m gonna buy every record in this room.”

If I thought Larry’s collection was impressive, it was Pee Wee’s Playhouse compared to what was in front of me.  This was beyond anything I expected. 20,000 records is just a number until they are all in front of you, and all for sale. Then it takes on a whole new life, and I can say from experience it’s overwhelming. Most collections you go through, there are only a handful you actually want, and only a handful of those are in good enough condition to buy. This was the exact opposite. You wanted everything in there, and most were in wonderful shape. I knew we only had about 2 hours to be there. Alex was married and had a life of his own, Larry never wanted to bother him for more than two hours a visit. My time had to be used wisely.

I found the isle of jazz, and by reading spines, could tell it was loosely alphabetized. I glanced over the whole thing, reading spines. One of the first sections I found was Roland Kirk, a man who could play three saxophones at one time with a flute up his nose. I flipped through thinking, wouldn’t it be cool if Triple Threat was in here? Just then, there it was! Roland Kirk “Triple Threat“, his first album from 1956, and one of the most desired jazz albums in the world! I couldn’t believe my eyes! I had little time to celebrate, because there was just too much to dig. Impulse albums stick out like a hunter in the woods, their bright orange spines can be seen from across the room. I spotted one and was overjoyed to find an original mono “The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady” by Charles Mingus, one of my biggest wants at the time. 

I was only able to do a small portion of the jazz section, I had to check out the blues and world. The blues section yielded Pink Anderson Vol 1,2, and 3 on Bluesville, albums you see online but never in person.  There was music from all around the world.  This collection introduced me to the Oud, Santur, and other hypnotic instruments I had never heard before.  I can only compare this experience to the game show Supermarket Sweep.  I was shoving records into boxes as fast as I could, like a contestant piling oversized turkeys into a shopping cart, seeing how big a bill they could rack up.

I felt like I had just got started when Larry said, “It’s time to go Charles.”  I easily could have slept on the floor and spend the next 48 hours in there.  Right before he said that I had found, completely aside from the jazz section, Hank Mobley “No Room for Squares” and a true 1st pressing of my favorite jazz record in the world, “Somethin’ Else” by Cannonball Adderley. I ignored his first 3 or 4 demands to leave until he came around the isle and gave me a look that said he meant business. 

We loaded up 9 or ten boxes in that beat up Toyota truck of his, and headed back to the shack in the woods. There were dozens of titles I had been eagerly seeking, and hundreds more I was anxious to hear for the first time.  Including the rock history lesson that was still in session, I knew the next couple days would be the best listening sessions of my life.

P.S. The Acid Test posters sold for $32,000 and now reside in one of the finest private rock’n’roll poster collections in the world.
(‘LSD and Headphones / Part 3’ next Friday!)

by Charles Pearlman

Wanna sell a record collection? Better write Charles! info@vinylwriters.com