Blog Post

Sir Elton Walks into a Record Store...

Dave Frankel • Apr 13, 2017

Music legend spent about $200

From CBC News, by Jesse Johnston

Store clerks ask, "May I help you, sir?" all the time but it's not every day that they get to ask, "May I help you, Sir Elton John?"

That's what happened in downtown Vancouver on Thursday when the British music legend strolled into a record shop and dropped a couple hundred dollars on vinyl.

"I came in from the back and there was Elton John standing there with his two bodyguards, digging through records," said Beat Street Records manager Lindsay Tomchyshen.

The bodyguards weren't the type to get mistaken for tiny dancers.

"They were big guys," Tomchyshen said.

John signed a copy of his 1973 album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road before he left the store. (Beat Street Records)

So, what did the artist known for hits like Rocket Man and Bennie and the Jets want to buy?

"He asked my boss if we had any Tech N9ne, like, the gangster rapper and I was not expecting that," Tomchyshen laughed, referring to the Kansas City-based artist.

Unfortunately, Beat Street was sold out of Tech N9ne, so John settled for a stack of albums from the 1980s British pop band Scritti Politti instead.

Tomchyshen said John was polite, posed for some pictures and signed a copy of Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.

Then he was gone, kind of like a candle in the wind.

John, who will be 70 later this month, plays two shows in Victoria this weekend before continuing his world tour, which is set to wrap up in December.

Record Store Day is now June 20
By Dave Frankel 13 Mar, 2020
Record Store Day has postponed its annual international event until this summer due to Coronavirus. ---------------------- From Record Store Day - https://recordstoreday.com/ We’ve decided that the best of all possible moves is to change the date of Record Store Day this year to Saturday, June 20. We think this gives stores around the world the best chance to have a profitable, successful Record Store Day, while taking into consideration the recommendations of doctors, scientists, the World Health Organization, Centers for Disease Control, and the need to be good citizens of both local and worldwide communities. We’re working with all of our partners and our stores to make this change as smooth as possible for everyone who participates in Record Store Day: customers, record stores, artists, labels and more. Record Store Day is everywhere and we want to hold our party when everyone can gather around safely to celebrate life, art, music and the culture of the indie record store.
By Dave Frankel 07 Mar, 2020
Record Store Day 2020 is coming up on April 18. Today, the full list of releases has been announced. Highlights include A 12″ single of RSD 2020 Ambassador Brandi Carlile covering Soundgarden’s “Black Hole Sun”, David Bowie’s I’m Only Dancing (The Soul Tour 74), a double album bringing together performances from Detroit and Nashville , A 40th-anniversary edition of U2's 11 O’Clock Tick Tock from 1980, and "Baby Shark." Additional notable releases on this year’s list include: Post Malone’s Hollywood’s Burning making its vinyl debut and his songs “Wow,” “Sunflower,” “Saint Tropez,” and “Goodbyes” on novelty 3″ vinyl David Bowie’s CHANGESNOWBOWIE, a BBC radio session aired to celebrate his 50th birthday in 1997 Denzel Curry covering Rage Against The Machine and Bad Brains on a new 7″ single Mac DeMarco’s Other Here Comes The Cowboy Demos, exclusive demos of previously unheard compositions recorded during the Here Comes The Cowboy sessions Archers Of Loaf’s comeback single “Raleigh Days” with a cover of the Rolling Stones’ “Street Fighting Man” as the B-side Ruston Kelly’s Dirt Emo Vol. 1, featuring covers of Dashboard Confessional, Wheatus, Chemical Romance, Saves The Day, Blink-182, and Taylor Swift A Beck 7″ with Khruangbin remixing “No Distraction” and St. Vincent remixing “Uneventful Days” Robyn’s 2005 self-titled album on vinyl for the first time with a reconfigured tracklist, bonus tracks, and original cover artwork Two new and unreleased songs from Best Coast, “Birthday” and “Sweetness,” recorded during the studio sessions for Always Tomorrow Lethal Weapon, Austin Powers, and Batman & Robin soundtracks Refused’s Maida Vale in-studio session for BBC Radio 1’s Rock Show With Daniel P Carter, pressed on crystal clear vinyl and including previously unreleased track “Economy Of Death” A 7″ single of John Prine and Kelsey Waldon recording in the studio together for the first time, singing “Paradise” with a B-side cover of the Merle Travis song “Kentucky Means Paradise” A Greg Dulli 7″ with his new song “A Ghost” and a cover of Bob Dylan’s “Girl From North Country” featuring Mark Lanegan on vocals as the B-side A limited-edition, one-sided 7” of Pink Floyd performing “Arnold Layne” live for the final time in 2007 with Jon Carin on keyboards and Oasis’ Andy Bell on bass The The’s “I WANT 2 B U” b/w “Muscle Scream,” new songs taken from Gerard Johnson’s upcoming film Muscle Hiss Golden Messenger re-recording two of their songs, “Cat’s Eye Blue” and “Standing in the Doorway,” at Spacebomb Studios with contributions from their in-house orchestra Take You On A Ride, an EP featuring new and unreleased songs from the funk metal supergroup Infectious Grooves featuring Suicidal Tendencies’ Mike Muir, and Dean Pleasants, Metallica’s Robert Trujillo, and Avenged Sevenfold’s Brooks Wackerman Jimmy Urine and System Of A Down frontman Serj Tankian’s collaborative LP Fuktronic, the soundtrack to a made up British gangster movie All the Weird Kids Up Front (More Best Of Spoon), a fan-selected companion piece to Everything Hits At Once: The Best of Spoon with a tracklist submitted by and voted on by fans The first-ever vinyl release of Squirrel Nut Zippers’ 1995 LP The Inevitable; long live the swing revival ROCKABYE BABY!’s Lullaby Renditions Of Wu-Tang Clan — Wu-Tang really is for the children Coke bottle green 7″ of “Birds Tricked Into the Trees,” the first single from Damien Jurado’s forthcoming LP, with exclusive unreleased track “From Devils To Davis” as the B-side A deluxe 50th anniversary edition of Elton John’s self-titled LP David Bowie’s CHANGESNOWBOWIE, a BBC radio session aired to celebrate his 50th birthday in 1997 Steve Earle’s “Times Like These / It’s About Blood,” a limited edition 7″ recorded during the Ghost Of West Virginia sessions Dinosaur Jr’s Swedish Fist (Live In Stockholm), recorded at Stockholm’s Vattenfestival during a European before the group disbanded and went on an eight year hiatus The complete five-song performance from Def Leppard’s Hall Of Fame inauguration featuring guest stars Brian May and Ian Hunter A 7″ of Dehd rarities “Go” and “Without You”
By Dave Frankel 28 Feb, 2020
Brandi Carlile and her band mates Phil Hanseroth and Tim Hanseroth are Record Store Day 2020 ambassadors. This year’s Record Store Day will be held on Saturday, April 18. Record Store Day was founded in 2008 as a way to support independent brick-and-mortar record stores. Carlile and the Hanseroth twins appeared in a video announcing their role as Record Store Day 2020 ambassadors. The clip featured Carlile playing an Elton John vinyl record while detailing some of her favorite records from her collection. The twins also appeared in the video, which was recorded in their self-built home recording studio, and discussed some of the significant albums in their collections. Previous RSD ambassadors include Iggy Pop, Pearl Jam, Jack White, Dave Grohl, St. Vincent, Chuck D, Metallica, Run The Jewels and Ozzy Osbourne. Watch Carlile and the twins’ announcement video below:
RSD 2019 Photo Gallery | Inner Groove Records | Collingswood, NJ
By Dave Frankel 29 Nov, 2019
rsd-black-friday-2019-collingswood-nj
By Dave Frankel 11 Oct, 2019
Since its inception, Black Friday has turned the day after Thanksgiving into the unofficial start of the holiday shopping season. Traditionally, Black Friday was about super-cheap prices on mass-produced goods and primarily took place in mails and big box stores. In some places, that's what this is still about. But we really like the idea of a shopping season, especially when that shopping is, at its heart, a way to show the people you like that you like them. (And a way for them to show you. Gift-getting is awesome, too.) We work year-round to shine a light on the independent businesses in your local community that sell you records and other things that make you happy, make you smile, make you sing, bring you comfort, bring people together. Everything you find at a record store would be a great gift for someone, so being part of that holiday shopping season, and the biggest shopping day of the year, makes sense to us. So we work with labels, artists, managers and distribution companies who feel the same, and put together a list of titles for that season that are available at participating record stores. They come out on Black Friday (11/29 this year) but may be available at record stores throughout the rest of the year, because record stores are the best place to go with a Holiday Wish List. View RSD Black Friday List
By Dave Frankel 06 Mar, 2019
Record Store Day has revealed the extensive list of limited edition vinyl, cassettes, and box sets that will be available as part of its 2019 edition taking place on Saturday, April 13th. As previously reported, Pearl Jam serve as this year’s RSD Global Ambassador . Highlights include new music from Courtney Barnett and Erykah Badu; a cover of “Stairway to Heaven” by Mastodon”; unreleased recordings from Jeff Buckley, Joe Strummer, and Bob Dylan; a new collaboration between Foo Fighters’ Taylor Hawkins and the surviving members of Queen; and covers of T. Rex songs by Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Chad Smith and Josh Klinghoffer. You can find specifics on some of the most notable releases below, and find many more detailed at the Record Store Day website . — Pearl Jam ’s live performance at Seattle’s Easy Street Records in 2005 will be released on vinyl for the first time. Limited to 6,000 copies. — Red Hot Chili Peppers members Chad Smith and Josh Klinghoffer have teamed up to cover two T. Rex songs, “Jeepster” and “Monolith”. The 7-inch vinyl is limited to 3,000 copies worldwide. — Courtney Barnett will release a brand new single called “Everybody Here Hates You” (b/w “Small Talk”). Featuring hand illustrated artwork by Barnett herself, the 12-inch vinyl is limited to 2,000 copies. — Erykah Badu and James Poyser have teamed up to cover Squeeze’s signature single “Tempted”. The cover also features contributions from Thundercat , Derrick Hodge, and Ali Jackson, and will be pressed on 7-inch vinyl limited to 3,500 copies worldwide. — Seven unreleased Jeff Buckley studio performances will be collected in a new release called In Transition . Recorded during his first studio session for Columbia Records in 1993, the release includes early versions of songs from his lone LP, Grace , as well as a unique interpretation of Nina Simone’s “If You Knew” and an early rendition of his iconic “Hallelujah” cover. Limited to 3,000 copies. — Third Man Records will release four tiny 3-inch vinyl records containing music from The White Stripes , The Raconteurs , The Dead Weather , and Jack White solo. Each release is limited to 2,000 copies. — Foo Fighters are also releasing a tiny 3-inch vinyl version of their classic “Big Me”. Its limited to 5,000 copies. — Foo Fighters’ Taylor Hawkins has teamed up with Queen ’s Brian May and Roger Taylor to finish “Holy Man”, a song written by The Beach Boys’ Dennis Wilson in 1977. — Mastodon will pay homage to their late manage Nick John with a cover of Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven”, which they’ve dubbed, Stairway to Nick John . Limited to 1,500 copies, the 10-inch vinyl will benefit the Hirshberg Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research. — Death Grips will offer the first physical release of ” Crouching Tiger, Hidden Gabber” and “More than the Fairy” features Les Claypool. Limited to 3,500 copies. — Bob Dylan will release the original New York test pressing of Blood on the Tracks . Limited to 7,500 copies, this LP is an exact duplicate of the test pressing, containing unique mixes from Dylan’s New York session, available commercially for the first time. — Death Cab For Cutie’s Ben Gibbard will pay tribute to friend and collaborator Richard Swift with a new 7-inch split single featuring two unreleased tracks recorded by the pair. The A-side is an unreleased demo of “Me and Magdalena” which Gibbard wrote for The Monkees’ 2016 album Good Times! . The B-side is an alternate unreleased version of Teenage Fanclub’s “The Concept” from Gibbard’s cover of the band’s Bandwagonesque album, which he released in 2017. Limited to 1,600 copies, with proceeds benefiting MusiCares. — Elvis Costello & Imposters will release Purse , a new EP bringing together the songs Costello has written with Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, and Burt Bacharach. Limited to 3,000 copies. — A pair of unreleased Joe Strummer recordings from 1993 will be packaged in a limited-edition 12-inch vinyl called The Rockfield Studio Tracks . — The Goblin rarity “Yell” will be reissued for the first-time ever on red vinyl. Limited to just 500 copies. — Green Day will release a live vinyl recording of their 1994 performance at Woodstock. Limited to 6,800 copies. — Green River , the short-lived supergroup featuring Mark Arm and Steve Turner of Mudhoney and Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard of Pearl Jam, have unearthed an unreleased live recording from 1984. Titled Live at the Tropicana 1984 , it’s limited to 2,000 copies. — Greta Van Fleet ’s From the Fires will be released on vinyl for the first time. — Mark Lanegan Band will release a new single, “Stitch It Up”, b/w an exclusive b-side called “Song To Manset”. The 7-inch is limited to 1,000 copies. — Mission of Burma ’s 1988 album Peking Spring will receive its first-ever vinyl release. Limited to 2,000 copies. — Sigur Rós will offer up two exclusive vinyl releases. The first is 22° Lunar Halo , the soundtrack to a brand new work by Taiwanese choreographer Tsung-lung, and the second is Variations On Darkness , the band’s soundtrack to a series of choreographed performances from the Iceland Dance Company. Both releases are limited to 2,000 copies. — Weezer will release their rarities collection Dusty Gems and Raw Nuggets on limited-edition vinyl.
By Dave Frankel 26 Feb, 2019
Pearl Jam will serve as the official ambassadors of Record Store Day 2019, set to take place April 13th at independent record stores around the world. To accompany the announcement, Pearl Jam shared a video in which guitarist Mike McCready goes crate-digging and discusses the important role record stores have played in his life. The clip is interspersed with footage of Pearl Jam bashing out their their Riot Act track, “Save You,” for a small crowd at a record store. “Independent record stores are hugely important to me, and have been ever since I was 12 years-old,” McCready said in a statement. “Before I even really knew what they were – there was a certain feeling of ‘this is a dream come true,’ and it’s a wonderland and there’s so much to learn in here… and it’s still that way.”
By Dave Frankel 18 Oct, 2018
Highlights include:
By Dave Frankel 25 Apr, 2018
By Dave Frankel 17 Mar, 2018
On April 21st, vinyl enthusiasts will descend on independent record stores across the nation in celebration of Record Store Day. This year, those music fans will have their hands locked in the fist and gun position, because Run the Jewels have been dubbed the 2018 RSD Ambassadors. “BRING ME MY SCEPTER AND CEREMONIAL ROBE,” El-P tweeted gleefully, announcing the news, “FOR @runjewels ARE THIS YEARS RECORD STORE DAY AMBASSADORS. i was told i can park anywhere now.” The duo’s Twitter account also revealed the official RSD Ambassadors badge (above). Download / View Record Store Day, April 21, 2018 List
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