Category: Vinyl

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Vinyl

Vinyl love: No Joy “Wait to pleasure”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: No Joy
Album Title: Wait to pleasure
Year released: 2013
Year reissued: 2023
Details: 10th anniversary, tan vinyl

The skinny: Here’s another great shoegaze album celebrating an anniversary this year and while this one is not quite widely recognized as a classic, it certainly is held as such in some circles. No Joy’s sophomore album “Wait to pleasure” was my introduction to the Montreal-based outfit led by Jasamine White-Gluz. They came up on my Facebook feed one day in 2013 from a group about shoegaze that I had forgotten that I’d joined. When I checked out the album and its mix of My Bloody Valentine and Sonic Youth crunch with Cocteau Twins and early Lush gauze-y goodness, this fan was sold. Ten years later, their Canadian label Hand Drawn Dracula* has reissued and repressed one hundred copies of the album to translucent tan vinyl to celebrate its anniversary. I pulled the trigger on Bandcamp as soon as I saw it there, which also happened to be a Bandcamp Friday. So win-win-win all around.

Standout track: “Hare tarot lies”

*Quite possibly my favourite indie label of the moment.

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Vinyl

Vinyl love: Slowdive “Souvlaki”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: Slowdive
Album Title: Souvlaki
Year released: 1993
Year reissued: 2011
Details: Music on Vinyl, 180 gram

The skinny: Just over five months ago, another great 90s record turned 30 years old and this one an iconic shoegaze classic. But as I wrote when the song mentioned below appeared at number twenty-two on my list of favourite songs from 1993, Slowdive was a group from the original scene that I never properly appreciated until much later. I had “Souvlaki” dubbed to cassette but rarely listened to it. I had to track it down again much later when I felt compelled to give them another chance and of course, this time it stuck. So by the time the original members reunited again in 2014, I was getting to be quite the fan and I had already added this Music on Vinyl, 180 gram reissue to my record shelves. Of course, both of their post-reunion records are also on my shelves and I’ve seen them live now twice, including their amazing show in support of their newest record in Toronto back in September. And I can tell you, this record hit the platter a few times before and after that show for the mood-setting and memory shake-ups.

Standout track: “Alison”

Categories
Vinyl

Vinyl love: Beach House “Teen dream”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: Beach House
Album Title: Teen dream
Year released: 2010
Year reissued: 2020
Details: Gatefold sleeve, clear vinyl, Love Record Stores 2020 release

The skinny: A few weeks after the COVID-19 pandemic shut everything down in March 2020, a campaign called ‘Love Record Stores’ was started in support of brick and mortar independent music vendors in England and a number of musical artists, big and small, threw their weight behind it. Many record stores, not just in England but worldwide, had to rethink how they did business and shifted from analog and tactile sales towards the online marketplace. It didn’t happen quickly enough to rescue the Record Store Day festivities in April but Love Record Stores managed something in June, which saw a bunch of artists offer a lot of great albums for special edition pressings in support of the cause. I found and purchased once such record, this clear vinyl reissue of Beach House’s third album, “Teen dream”, a couple of years after the original event. This no-brainer purchase came courtesy of one such indie record store in England that actually has a great online presence and from whom I order quite often. The album had been on my wish list for a while, being one of my favourites by the Baltimore-based dream pop duo. “Teen dream” took the well-practiced elements from their first two outings and amplified them into a collection of memorable numbers. Victoria Legrand’s vocals feels more pronounced, more melodic, and pushed to the fore, breathing new life and energy into their sound. It’s an album that, from the start, I was able to delve into deeply, soak my whole body into its warm flowing eddies and let it stream through my fingers.

Standout track: “Used to be”