But this morning, I found myself with some time to kill waiting for an appointment, so I wandered over to a nearby Salvation Army store, where I knew they had some bins of old vinyl. All I can say is that this was the most productive digging I've ever done in such a place. Today, I kept stumbling upon albums I was actually really keen on. When I came across two Partridge Family records, I noted that I already owned them, but that these looked to be in better condition. Given the already low price, plus the 50% sale discount, I was looking at peanuts for these LPs. So I set those two aside... The Partridge Family Album (their 1970 debut), and Sound Magazine (1971). As a kid, I loved tuning in to the Partridge TV show after school, and my enjoyment of their melodic pop hasn't waned one bit today.
Then as I did some further flipping, I was astonished to see a couple of Cheap Trick albums, Dream Police (which was on my wish list) from 1979 and Cheap Trick at Budokan (with a rather worn outer sleeve, but clean-looking LP), also from '79. Yup, those went into my personal stack. I was a serious Trick fan back when, as a young teen, I began collecting music. Nice to have these back in the collection. Cool to see that the previous owner even included the original inner lyric sleeves and the Budokan booklet.
Then the Cornerstone album (1979), by Styx, caught my eye with its distinctive cover art. I'd been knocking around the idea of getting something by Styx, but hadn't decided on what yet... but at this low, low price (a buck fifty), I figured it was safe to take the chance. As I write this very sentence, the Cornerstone record on my turntable just came to its conclusion, and I'd say it was a very good purchase. Some cool music on there that I'd never heard before - along with the huge hit Babe (memories of high school as that one played). I had never bought a Styx studio album before... just their greatest hits compilation... so this was a first. A solid choice.
Then another familiar album cover appeared as I riffed through the bins of dusty oldies... Freeways, by good ol' Bachman Turner Overdrive. Back in my youth, when I was building my first music collection, I had BTO's Greatest Hits (So Far) from 1976 on vinyl, and I played that thing like crazy. When it was time to "upgrade" (downgrade, really) I grabbed it on cassette tape, then later on CD, plus their BTO's Greatest (hits) from '86. Just to cover all the bases. But Freeways was a studio album that I vaguely knew of, so I snapped it up. I know at least a few rockin' tunes on there, including the title track, Can We All Come Together, and Down Down. Classic Canadian music. The record jacket needs some repair, but it's nothing a little glue can't fix.
Lastly, as I dug down through a stack (these folks have no idea how to arrange records; stacking can warp them) of mostly classical box sets, my eyes settled on the snazzy album cover of the Amadeus movie soundtrack. Loaded with music by none other than Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, this double album was not exactly something I thought I'd listen to much. I mean... I already have the CD set of this and I haven't even touched that in years. But if anything could prompt me to get back to it, it would be a nice vinyl version. And the gatefold presentation is really sharp, with photos inside plus a few pages of text about the music. And the records look to be in very nice condition - and no warp. Again, super cheap.
So - quite the haul today, and all for less than ten bucks. I'm really happy with my new records, at least so far. I'll need to give them all a test listen to make sure they're up to my standards. Already three records in, all sounds nice and clean. I did give everything a thorough swabbing before committing them to the turntable. The house is rockin'....
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