What is the oddest way you have acquired a record?

I once was given a free gift by my local refuse dump, a DVD of the Orson Welles film The Stranger.

 

Nice monicker Harry. Shame about result last night.

Bought a t-shirt with a record shop’s cool logo on it. It was wrapped around a pretty decent copy of the “Mondo Cane” soundtrack album

 

About 20 years ago, I took a Greyhound bus from Oakland to Eureka, basically an overnight bus trip. My purpose was to see The Yardbirds (Your Mayo was their guitarist at the time). The Yardbirds weren't playing in more metropolitan areas of California like the San Francisco or any other Bay Area city (despite the fact that the band were actually using Berkeley as a base of operations that they would travel from to get to their Northern California gigs -- they had friends they stayed with in Berkeley).

Shortly after I boarded the bus for the long trip north, I noticed one of the other passengers had an Amoeba Records bag. I would have sat next to him as I was curious about what the guy had bought, and would probably have enjoyed talking to him about records and music, but the seat next to him was already taken. I sat in the closest available seat, which was one row back on the other side of the center aisle. I figured I might have a chance to talk to the guy later if the seat next to him became vacant.

I remember glancing over and seeing the guy a couple more times, but eventually forgot about the stranger with the mysterious bag of records. I did wind up switching seats once or twice (on Greyhound, seats were not reserved, so if a seat isn't occupied, you can sit there). I wasn't traveling with any luggage, so I wasn't worried about staying with my stuff in the overhead rack, as I didn't have anything stashed overhead, so I didn't see any reason to remain in the same seat for the entire trip.

The bus finally arrived in Eureka not long after sunrise, and I got off the bus and started to walk away, but I heard a call from behind me and turned back to see one of the passengers holding out the bag from Amoeba and saying, "You forgot this, didn't you?"

Well, I had about a second to decide whether to be honest and decline, or say yes and find out what was in the bag. So I accepted the bag, said thank you, and the bus continued on its way to Seattle and I found a spot to examine my acquisition.
I realized that the fellow who bought the records must have gotten off the bus at a previous stop while unintentionally leaving the records behind, and I had unconsciously wound up sitting where he had been sitting, so when I got off the bus, someone had noticed that the records had been left behind overhead right where I had been sitting and naturally presumed they were mine (yes, I look like someone who would buy records at Amoeba).

I knew that if I had said that the records had been belonged to another departed passenger, the person who bought them wouldn't have gotten his records back, and it wasn't my fault he'd left them behind.

The records? There were 2, a folkie singer-songwriter album by Jamie Brockett, and a Root Boy Slim lp. The receipts for both records were in the bag, so I saw that one had been bought from Amoeba Berkeley, and the other from the SF store. When I got back to the Bay Area, I returned both albums to Amoeba for the 75% credit that they give for any return within a week with a receipt. So potentially the person who bought the would have been able to find them if he revisited Amoeba.

The Yardbirds were fun. They were playing a free afternoon show in a small park in Old Town Eureka. I caught the Greyhound going south that evening, and arrived back in Oakland the next morning. No hotel expenses necessary for the trip!

 

Many years ago, I was walking home late at night and stupidly decided to take a short cut. A guy came out of the shadows, pressed a gun against my forehead and said, "Take this album or I'll blow your f***ing head off." Not wanting to die, I did what he told me to do. Since there's always someone who gets offended whenever you bring up an album you consider terrible, I'll avoid mentioning the title, but to this day, I think I made the wrong decision.

 

An ex gf went to see Root Boy Slim and his SXX Change Band at Toads Place in New Haven Ct. Being one of the first ones there she got their lp Boogie Till You Puke, a tee shirt and a Root Boy Slim barf bag. She gave me all the loot later. I haven’t seen her in 42 years but I still have the lp and the bag.

 

My parents won a free album in a radio contest. It was a Count Basie 2-LP box set from Time-Life. The album was actually very good with excellent tracks and nice liner notes. They gave it to me for my growing record collection (soon to grow OUT OF CONRTOL!!)

 

My mother's dentist (after hearing her son "played records",) gave me about 8 crates of records, many of which were quite nice.
He had them in his garage, and his wife wanted them "gone"... I went to his house and picked them up.

 

It doesn't seem so odd to me, but back in the early 1980s, I saw Bobby Callender's LP Rainbow on MGM on the top of a pile inside the open dumpster outside the cafeteria at the MSU Union building as I was leaving the building after working stage crew at a show there. I couldn't see leaving it there. It was kind of beat, but playable - I hadn't heard it, and didn't even have to 'dive,' so it went home with me.

 

Were any of them things that you liked?

 

Not a record, but a CD.

Several years ago, I was walking in our extensive municipal park system. Lining the path down to a pier overlooking a waterfall is a wooden fence with thick posts. Balanced on top of one of those posts was a CD — no case, no label on the disc.

I figured "What the hell" and brought it home. It turned out to be an album by Funkadelic. Since I had none in my collection, I was glad to get it.

 

When I was 12 I won a disco contest with my cousin at a conference. As a prize that gave me a Michael Franks record, Burchfield Nines. I didn’t like it then but I do now.

 

Bought the first Brockett LP when it was "new" after hearing Legend of the U.S. S. Titanic lots of times on local FM.
Remember The Wind and the Rain?

 

When I visited Moscow in 2013, I was able to find a record store (called "Magical Mystery Tour" or something similar) and started talking to the man working there about Brazilian music, which he liked. I bought some stuff and he gifted me a first pressing Russian "CHOBA B CCCP" McCartney LP. During that trip I learned how to pronounce that title correctly.

A few years later I casually read on Twitter that McCartney was releasing on that day a limited (100 copies, I think) vinyl called "Sweet Thrash" (with "Hope For The Future" remixes and a handwritten white label) to be sold only at record stores, one per customer. I told a fan who lives in London about it, he was grateful and asked his daughter to visit another record store and buy one for me as well.

A couple more years went by and I booked a room in London for a McCartney concert. A few weeks before my departure he announced the limited-edition boxed set "Wings 1971-1973" would be released during my trip, so luckily I was able to place an order and have it delivered to the hotel.

More recently, Paul released a green vinyl edition of "McCartney III" to be sold only at Target stores in the USA and it immediately sold out. My only option was Ebay, so I sent a message to a random seller asking about the shipping cost. We started talking and realized we went to the same McCartney concerts. He felt bad about profiting from a fellow fan and lowered the price to whatever he paid for it at Target. He even offered to include a setlist as a gift, as he had worked for Paul at a few concerts. I'm waiting for that package, it should be delivered soon.

 

Yeah, I know I kept all of them. The only ones I remember is the Loggins and Messina Live album, and the Rolling Stone's 'Angie" in a cool 'LIPS' picture sleeve.

 

That reminds me of the oddest way I acquired a record: I was staying in a Victorian flat when a 45 of “With a Little Luck” suddenly dropped from the ceiling, knocking over my tea.

 

My first guitar teacher lent me his copy of Eliminator. I promised to return it at our next lesson, a week hence. Arrived to find his flat empty. A neighbour said he'd moved to England. As Bob Dylan said, "I can't help it if I'm lucky."

 

I killed a guy once over a record.
The death was within a video game, not the record though!

 

Not so fast.

In 1982 I was dating a nurse that was 27 and I was 21. She was getting divorced and her soon to be ex husband's records were at her apartment. She gave me all of them. About 100 LPs. Allman Brothers, Humble Pie, Free etcetera. That was a good day. Got laid and a pile of records.

 

Flexis on the back of some 70s cereal box. A couple magazines had some flexis included.

 

In 1967 paging through a pile of discarded Life mags on way home grade school. There was a picture sleeve and 45 of I'll Cry Instead/HJTDWY! Saved from the landfill!

 

That was a very good day!

 

I had borrowed Chicago IX (their 1975 greatest hits compilation) from the library around 1980. (It was on vinyl)

When I was returning it to the library, I dropped it on my driveway, and somehow it landed edge on and broke in such a way that it no longer looked like a circle -- the first five minutes of each side was unplayable. It was such that if I had tried to put the arm at the outside of the disk, the arm would have been badly damaged when it dropped through the gaping hole that was where the vinyl had hit the driveway.

So I had to buy it.

 

Jamie Brockett? Was it Remember the Wind and the Rain with the track Legend of the USS Titanic? If so you returned a good one. Also probably worth way more today than what you got in return.

 

I traded a street hockey goalie mask for Abbey Road

 

I also remembered when I was about 10 yrs old, my older cousin would want to play chess with me. I could play the game, but wasn't very passionate about it. I was passionate about records, and had very few (I've since over-compensated for that). So I agreed to play chess with him, on the condition that if I won he would give me one of his many records. He had an arrogance about himself, and being much more academic than I was (at the time) and several years older than me, he thought he had nothing to lose.

He didn't take into account the motivation and determination I would bring to the game in my desperation to get more music. To this day I am proud that I was able to win quite a few games, resulting in some of the records now in my possession. One I specifically recall is a Manfred Mann EP (with The Might Quinn, Semi-Detached..., and two other tracks on it; he drew a spiral in biro on one of the labels by drawing on the label when it rotated on the turntable). I probably got a few Beatles singles as well, but no LPs.