On The Rack

Despite my frequent enthusing for the wonders of downloading music, at times it's also great to go to a proper record store. Not a dump like HMV: a proper record store.

At the suggestion of a friend, I took the train up to Bolton - a short trip highlighted by the thoughts of a guy who was clearly still drunk from an all-night bender on his way to Wigan to visit his son, whose mother was apparently a "bag head". Once there, we trooped down to X-Records.

Taking a look through their website (http://www.xrecords.co.uk/), once I got past the initial distaste of a bit too much Kiss for my liking, I reckoned there was plenty to interest me, and so it seemed. The only downside was that the copy of the Bodines' album that I'd honed in on online seemed to have gone. Curses. Still, there was more than enough there to entertain a further visit.

Because, of course, one of the many joys of the independent record store is browsing and the laughs you get when you find they don't have one but about ten Transvision Vamp LPs/12"s going. Who knew Wendy James and the lads had been so prolific? Plus the punk section of X Records had some real comedy gems and who'd have thought you could still find copies of Gary Kemp's solo album that hadn't been left in a skip?

Back when I was a skint student, the local record store there was vital as the only way to pick up music for cheap. Why spend £10 on a CD when you could get the same (slightly scratched) album in a weathered sleeve for £1? Add to that the benefit that if you asked nicely, the guy behind the counter would play a song or two off it before you handed over your precious coin.

Around the time I moved to Manchester, there was a great little shop about 30 seconds walk down the road from my bedsit, run by this fella with a Billy Idol fixation, which had the added bonus of a book store in the back. Cue a large chunk of what little wages I had being spent there on a Saturday. It was later taken over by somebody else and I picked up most of my Felt vinyl there, but it was then converted into just another cafe bar, which saddened me no end but seems to be atypical of the fate of many indie stores these days. Appreciate them while we can, would seem to be the message of the day.