Music lovers paying homage to their hometown record stores on Saturday were treated to dozens of releases of old-school recordings from artists ranging from Adam and the Ants to David Bowie to the Grateful Dead.
Chris Brown from Maine-based Bull Moose music hatched the idea of Record Store Day while sitting at his desk in 2007; he gathered support and the first event launched a year later with 600 participating stores.
“Within an hour, I outlined the basic concept of all of the independent stores doing an event on the same day, having a customer appreciation portion, some special giveaways and some special things to sale,” he said.
Seven years after the first one, more than 2,200 records stores worldwide were part of Saturday’s event.
The Foo Fighters, along with Metallica, released albums with previously unreleased demo songs on Saturday.
Special vinyl releases include The Animals’ “We’re Gonna Howl Tonight,” a seven-inch single of Adam and the Ants “Kings of the Wild Frontier” and a Grateful Dead box set from a live concert from 1990. Disco fans will relish extended versions of Bee Gees songs from “Saturday Night Fever,” and the Doors’ “Strange Days” mono mix available for the first time since the late 1960s.
Perhaps the most coveted item was a limited-run vinyl re-release of the first-ever recording by Elvis. Rocker Jack White purchased the recording in January and transferred the 1953 acetate disc to vinyl.
This year’s ambassador was Dave Grohl from the Foo Fighters, who became hooked on music thanks to record stores while growing up in Springfield, Virginia. Now he’s experiencing it again through his children.
“Let me tell you: Nothing makes me prouder than watching my daughters spin that first Roky Erickson LP one of them picked out for their very own on one of our weekend trips to the record store,” he wrote.
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