Sunday, May 09, 2010

Sunday at the record fair..  


I managed to drag myself out of bed this morning and ride my bike over to the other side of golden gate park for the KUSF record swap benefit. The sun was out and I had a little bread to spend, so I thought I would head over and scope it out, its all for a good cause and helps keep KUSF on the air, which in turn helps me mentally as when your stuck in the city with only an FM radio for entertainment there is only really whatever the nerd uni students are playing on KUSF or if your lucky the 'club classics' DJ might be spinning on meth head energy 92 whatever FM (but usually he isn't spinning, its some meth amphetamine abusing trance DJ). But anyway..

 As per usual the popular myth of the deep pocketed black music record collector was blown away by their little known, less sexy counterpart, the aging, now middle aged and super wealthy, punk 45 collector.  These guys spend serious scrilla on those angry sounding little records, without even a second thought or briefest attempt at negotiation. It was something to behold. I on the other hand, struck out for the most part, stupidly beguiled by the Achilles heal of many a disco hoarder, the 'still sealed' 'private press' 12" single. I have to remind myself sometimes that the reason that nobody has heard of some of these independent releases, and the reason they are still sealed, is not because of their rarity, its more often than not because they are shit.

 I did pick up a few good ones though, and here are my favorites from today's stack. A proto house jam from Brian & Zan on sounds of new york records, a sick French disco funk classic from the strangely named Crystal Grass, and the instrumental flip of the Skyy hit Bad Boy. 

Brian & Zan - Pump your Body

Crystal Grass - Crystal World

Skyy - Bad Boy (instrumental)   

Posted by Black Shag | 5 comments

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5 comments: to “ Sunday at the record fair..


  • May 10, 2010 at 12:00 PM  

    The bass line off that Crystal Grass track was used as the basis for the 2007 Chemical Brothers track "A Modern Midnight Conversation." Both nice tracks. Check out the Chemical Brothers track here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sL2wVKEssvM

    (It shows up around the 0:32 second mark.)


  • May 11, 2010 at 9:19 PM  

    I dropped the 45 of Crystal Grass last weekend at a lounge gig and it was quite a crazy reaction - top notch tune indeed!


  • May 27, 2010 at 8:20 PM  

    I came to rave about the Crystal Grass track as well..when I heard it I had that nagging "there's something familiar..can't quite put my finger..." feeling so kudos to Mr Don Birman for the Chemical Brothers sample ID and my 'thats where I have heard it..doh!' moment.

    LMAO as the "reasons why records are still sealed" observation, you get them home and think to yourself "THAT should never have been unsealed...my gods, what have I done!"


  • June 18, 2010 at 11:13 AM  

    Crystal Grass was also sampled by S Express in the 80's....


  • October 7, 2010 at 8:00 AM  

    Any chance of sharing the "Club Version" of "Pump Your Body"? I used to own this many moons ago and from what I remember Tony Humphries goes tom-tom crazy about half-way through which is sadly lacking on the original version...

    ...and the first time I ever hear someone say Beatelectric are assholes I can point to this act of kindness to counter such baseless accusations ;)