My secret place
In one of the numerous small towns surrounding Lawrence, there is a thrift store. I go there once or twice a year, wander into the basement, and ransack their record section. It’s a small section - just about ten or twelve feet of shelving - but it yields high-quality, well-maintained, insanely cheap records. I’m talking the best selection of old-school country I’ve ever found, along with a surprising number of funk and soul albums. Sure, there’s the usual Tom Jones, Mantovani Strings, and Mormon Tabernacle Choir records… but the finds!!!
Merle Haggard & the Strangers’ Same Train, A Different Time, the soundtrack to Mondo Cane, Isaac Hayes‘ Black Moses and …To Be Continued, Ernest Tubb’s My Hillbilly Baby & Other Hits… seriously, these are all in such good condition, they might as well be new. The jackets have some wear, but they’re all together and pretty good. The LPs look like they just got pulled out of the shrink wrap. And that list is only partial - I still got some Left Frizzell, Roy Clark, Robert Goulet, and even more. Twelve LPs. Two bucks, plus tax.
The ladies who work there don’t ask any questions. They just let me wander, sit on the concrete floor (kneeling will mess up your back and knees quite quickly), and dig. Then they ring me up, and I wander out, barely containing the giggles. If I were a better person, I’d share this with my friends. But really… I don’t want to share. Everyone should have it this good.
See? You only get places like this in the Midwest. They don’t exist in big cities.
Isaac Hayes - “The Look of Love” (from …To Be Continued)