I was in Chicago the weekend of 11/19 to see DJ Shadow with Pigeon John at Park West. My friend Erik came along. Before the show we hit Laurie’s Planet of Sound. We both walked out with some good finds. Here are mine:

The Moody Blues – Caught Live + 5 (2 LP, London Records, 2 PS 690/1, 1977)($2.99) Kind of a controversial album in the Moodies catalog in that it was released without the band’s permission. The “Live” part was a concert recorded in December, 1969 at The Royal Albert Hall during the To Our Childrens Childrens Children tour. The band felt that it wasn’t a good performance. In fact, the album wasn’t available on CD for a very long time (it finally came out officially on CD in 1997) and I had paid to have a CD made from a cassette in the early days before commonly-owned burners! The article on Wikipedia expresses the opinion that London/Decca released this as a way to drive interest in the band’s 1978 album Octave which marked the swansong for the the classic second lineup of Hayward, Lodge, Pinder, Thomas, & Edge. The “+5” part was five unreleased studio tracks. The five tracks were actually recorded in 1967 and 1968. The two tracks from 1967 were actually recorded before Days of Future Past. The deluxe release of Days includes all five of these tracks in addition to some demos. These five tracks were also included on the 1987 CD Prelude along with some other b-sides. I had been watching for a clean copy of this album for a while. Clean vinyl and a good cover although notched. The cover art was designed by infamous graphic arts house Hipgnosis, whose work with Pink Floyd you might be familiar.

Buffalo Springfield – Last Time Around (LP, Atco Records SD33-256, 1968)($7.99) Aside from some spine wear on the “unipak” sleeve, this record is in really great shape. The “unipak” sleeve is an interesting variation on the gatefold– the sleeve opens book-style like a gatefold, but the record pocket opens at the spine on the inside! Makes for a slightly difficult time re-sleeving the record, but interesting nonetheless. Last Time Around was the third and final release from Buffalo Springfield and was recorded after the band had effectively split up as a contract fulfillment. None of the tracks were recorded with the whole band present. All of that said, the album is still very good– not the consistent album that the 1966 self-titled release was, but still important if only for the Neil Young tracks, in my opinion. “I Am A Child” is still a great Young song.

New Order – Low-Life (LP, London/Factory R1 25289, 1985, 2009)($15.99) Still sealed in the used bin! This is the Rhino Records 180g reissue from 2009 of the classic third New Order album. Mastered by RTI. This is the first album from New Order I own on vinyl. I have a few 12″es, but never bought any full albums until this weekend. “The Perfect Kiss,” “Love Vigilantes,” and “Subculture” were the bigger songs from this release.

Dreams So Real – Rough Night in Jericho (LP, Arista Records AL-8555, 1988)($3.99) a radio station promo, apparently, based on the huge decal on the cover that has all of the press information. I bought this on CD when it came out based on the strength of the first single “Rough Night in Jericho” and the song they contributed to “Athens, GA Inside\Out” documentary, “Golden.” The album doesn’t sound like their Peter Buck-produced debut album or the song from the film– which had them sounding like a cross between R.E.M. and Echo and the Bunnymen. The producer of the album was bragging on the PR sticker that his goal was to have the album sound less like the regional sound of Athens, GA and more power pop. In fact, I think the album sounds a lot like The Outfield. The band had one more release on Arista before they were dropped from the label.

The Doors – 13 (LP, Elektra Records, EKS-74079, 1970)($5.99) In some respects this February 1970 compilation of The Doors has been on the back of my mind for a long time as one I wanted. This is the first Doors LP in my collection. 13 is the first of many compilations that would be released over the years by Electra of The Doors– arguably the cash cow of that catalog. It is an odd one in that it really isn’t much of a “Greatest Hits” for the band. It does include some of the bigger hit singles of the Doors– “Light My Fire,” “People Are Strange,” “Touch Me,” “Hello, I Love You,” “Love Me Two Times,” “Roadhouse Blues”, but also includes some other album tracks that the casual listener might not be familiar with. My dad borrowed this album from my mom’s sisters and taped it to reel-to-reel and played it a lot when I was growing up. The result of the familiarity with this compilation is that I had always been disappointed that tracks like “Wild Child,” “Land Ho,” and “You’re Lost Little Girl” were never included in the subsequent “Greatest Hits” compilations, including the first real Greatest Hits in 1980 that everyone seemed to own. The other interesting detail about this album is that it was released  before the band’s last album, so it is incomplete from a hits perspective since it is missing “L.A. Woman,” “Love Her Madly,” and “Riders on the Storm.” Throwing this on the turntable will be a time warp for me.

The Call – Let the Day Begin (LP, MCA Records MCA-6303, 1989)($2.99) I picked this up for Sherry who is kind of a fan of The Call. She saw The Call in concert in the Twin Cities some time in the 80’s.  When I find any Call in my digging, I try to pick them up. Prior to meeting Sherry, my only real exposure to The Call was through it’s singles and one cassette I picked up a long time ago, Into the Woods from 1987. Sadly, the Call’s catalog has been very neglected from a reissue standpoint and pretty much the entire catalog is out-of-print at this point. This album has the big single “Let the Day Begin” (“Here’s to the babies in the brand new world, heres to the beauty of the stars…”). It will be interesting to hear the rest of the record. Sadly, lead singer Michael Been passed away in August this year while on tour with his son and his band Black Rebel Motorcycle Club.

Don Dixon – Romeo at Julliard (LP, Enigma Records ST-73243-1, 1987)($0.99) This was really a pretty big find at a super deal at $0.99! Truth be told, this is likely the same copy that was in the bins back when I visited in March and they reduced the price since then. It’s been on my Amazon wish list on CD for a very long time, actually. I’m a fan of Dixon’s work whether it is as producer (R.E.M.‘s early albums, Game Theory, Let’s Active) or as musician and songwriter (“Praying Mantis the notable “big hit.”). I had been meaning to pick this up since 1989 or so, believe it or not. I bought the live CD Chi-Town Budget Show, which was a live show that WXRT put on that had his wife– a notable musician in her own right– Marti Jones on it. The live show included some songs from this album, the fantastic “Heart in a Box,” “Your Sister Told Me,” “February Inginue,” “Cat Out of the Bag,” “Borrowed Time.” It’s time to get re-acquainted to Don’s back catalog. He returned to recording in 2006 with The Entire Combustible World in One Small Room to critical praise. Don Dixon Fun Fact: Dixon wrote and performed (with Marti Jones and members of Let’s Active) the song “Teenage Suicide (Don’t Do It)” for the movie “Heathers.”

10,000 Maniacs – In My Tribe (LP, Elektra E1-60738, 1987)(FREE) I got this from my friend Erik who had three copies of this. While I’ve owned 10,000 Maniacs on CD, I’ve never had any on LP. While In My Tribe is not the major label debut of 10,000 Maniacs, it is the album that first gained them national exposure and has the first big singles for the band– “Like the Weather” and “What’s The Matter Here.” It also has “Peace Train” which was also a single for the band, but Natalie Merchant had the song removed from subsequent CD releases after Cat Stevens  aka Yusuf Islam famously was interpreted to advocate the execution of Salmon Rushdie. This record also has Michael Stipe from R.E.M. on “A Campfire Song.”

I also picked up two of the DJ Shadow Handmade vinyl releases at the show that I’ll cover at a later time.