Anyone besides Munves remeber the closing sale at the Record Hunter in NYC?
We were all under tables, behind desks and up ladders when the lights went
out. Cooly, Tom Clear reached into his pocket for his flashlight. And he
was nowhere near the fusebox.
The leftovers ended up in big fibre-paper barrels at Eichler's, 10th St. and
Broadway where the mayhem continued. To Eichler, all records were the same.
So much per disc with a negotiated reduction for quantity. He was the
Jewish Fred Sanford, complete with mock heart attacks.
Eichler's was where I first met Pete Munves. I was in my late teens. What
a great hobby- I made a friend for life.
Steve Smolian
-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of David Weiner
Sent: Wednesday, August 11, 2010 5:07 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Fw: Harold Moores
The worst "scene" I've ever experienced were several of the Lincoln Center
Performing Arts Library sales in the 80s - people would begin lining up
around 5 AM for the sale which began at 10. The powers that be kept
rearranging the setup of these sales, but they always turned into a
free-for-all, with everyone piling in the revolving doors and racing up
stairs and down halls to the various rooms where records, books, playbills,
sheet music, posters and ephemera would be arrayed. All duplicates from the
library's collection. My friends and I all found fantastic stuff there, but
the pushing and shoving was a real pain. People would grab things right out
of your hands and run, or sweep up everything in a box and stuff it into
boxes of their own to drag across the floor and sift through later. Once,
while waiting on the huge line to pay, some guy stood at the top of a
staircase and screamed at us, "You're all ANIMALS! ANIMALS!"
Many times you'd see the life collection of a formerly famous performer,
musician or writer, all there for two bits. The saddest assortment I
remember seeing was the memorabilia of comedian Harry Hershfield, who was
huge in his day. His gold-plated membership card to the Lambs Club, all
manner of framed testimonials and gifts were sitting forlornly on a table,
marked between 25 and 50 cents apiece, with no takers. One friend did buy a
souvenir megaphone that Rudy Vallee had given to Harry - for a buck!
Dave Weiner
-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Don Chichester
Sent: Wednesday, August 11, 2010 4:42 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Fw: Harold Moores
I can foresee a new show on History Channel: "American Record Pickers." 8>)
Don
In a message dated 8/11/2010 4:10:41 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:
Note that "THEY PLAN TO REFILL THE SKIP ALL WEEK"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is a wonderful story with a great twist of irony in the video. One
British collector raves that this is like Christmas, but then an American
collector remarks that the great records are not to be found here. BUT,
then comes a young British lass, obviously too young to remember when this
record came out, holding up the find that is especially exciting for her
because it contains the stars of the Goon Show, Peter Sellers, Spike
Milligan, and Harry Seacombe. In case you do not recognize it -- the only
other copy of this record I have ever seen is the one I own, which friends
mailed me from England when it was new
-- it is "How To Win An Election (or not lose by much)" Philips AL 3464
(A10779L) written by Leslie Bricusse, and recorded in 1964 with Sellers
doing his parts in the U.S. and mailing the tape to England. Also in
her hand is "That Was the Week That Was" produced on Parlophone by George
Martin in between the first several Beatles albums. I can't see if her
copy is mono or stereo, but stereo copies were unobtainable in England
because they were all sent to the U.S. with Odeon labels pasted over them.
I hadn't known it was available in the U.S. and my friends in England even
tried a special order of the stereo but had to send me a mono. I found my
stereo copy several years later when The Record Hunter on 5th Ave were
selling out the remainders of all of the Odeon paste-overs from Capitol Of
The World. I think that those two albums would fetch perhaps $50 U.S. each
on Ebay. What ELSE is in the pile she is holding???!!!!
Ironically a friend on Facebook yesterday linked an article about some
swimming pools NYC has manufactured out of dumpsters and are placing them
on city streets -- including Park Ave just South of Grand Central Terminal
-- and I replied that this gives new meaning to dumpster diving. Then
another friend said that she hated shopping and I remarked that I love to
shop for books and records but not cars. Now comes THIS!
Actually Leah and I have a reputation around ARSC of not feeling that
dumpster diving is beneath our dignity when it comes to records. And I
know of collections of Old Time Radio that were found in dumpsters.
Some irreplaceable Columbia matrix file cards were likewise retrieved from
an early form of dumpster.
Back in the mid-60s I was in the middle of a mob scene at Bambergers
Paramus NJ when they advertised an open-reel pre-recorded tape sale at
$1 each for Saturday. There was a mob of men at the doors when it opened
at 10 AM and 600 tapes were gone in less than ten minutes. I would dive in
and grab an armful and toss back the ones I didn't want and go in for
another armful. It was a stereotypical mob scene like in Filiene's
basement. There was a similar but smaller mob at Sam Goody's Paramus one
day in the mid-70s when they put out a browser table which
had the entire Victor Vintage series cut-outs at $1.69 each. That one
I lucked into because the cut-out and the sale were both unannounced.
The records here bring to mind two things. A few summers ago
Footlights in NYC sold out its store stock at prices that eventually
reached down to 50 cents in a store which specialized in rare shows and
personalities. Leah and I went back there maybe ten times that Summer
and got perhaps a thousand LPs. Some 50 cent records had original price
tags of over $25 as they started to bring out their back-room stock.
The other occasion these types of records seen in the dumpster brings to
mind is the classical section in this years Archive of American Music sale
in NYC. Since they do not collect classical, all classical was priced at
50 cents. Ironically, many of them had stickers from my favorite NYC
store, Acadamy. for 10 or 25 cents! I should have gotten them there, and
many times I have. Actually, one time Acadamy had five sealed boxes of 75
or so classical LPs by the door that were free. So the next morning I took
my car into the city and took the boxes. The Archive sale this year had
sealed boxes of about 100 classical LPs each by the door that were $5 a
box. As we were getting close to 200 records and LaserDiscs already I
didn't partake of any of the 5 buck boxes.
Then of course there are the occasional library sales we have had at ARSC
and the Belfer sales in Syracuse. 78 sales tend to be a little
more reserved because of the fragility of the items, Leah and I have
developed a teamwork approach at these massive competitive sales, and it
certainly helps me to have someone young and nimble to help grab and guard,
and having a second set of eyes on the lookout has been very advantageous
because she has found some great stuff I would have missed.
Mike Biel [log in to unmask]
On 8/11/2010 4:13 AM, Steve Abrams wrote:
> Here is a link to story and video :
>
> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-10930145
>
> SA
>
>
> --------------------------------------------------
> From: "Steve Abrams"<[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Wednesday, August 11, 2010 8:24 AM
> To: "Association for Recorded Sound Discussion
List"<[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: Harold Moores
>
>> Harold Moores is arguably the best record shop in London. Yesterday
they
>> closed for refurbishment. With permission from Westminster Council
they put
>> out 4,000 records in a skip. I gather there was a riot, thanks for
Twitter.
>>
>> Is there anyone on the List who can give a first hand account?
>>
>> SA
>>
>
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