Saturday 20th April is Record Store Day, everybody. Whoop! Hurrah! And other exclamations of brilliance.
What does it mean for you, the music fan? Basically, that your local independent music retailer – and here’s hoping you (still) have one – will have some rather wonderfully shiny new, soon-to-be-super-rare releases on its shelves. Limited runs, one-off prints, not-to-be-repeated collaborations. You know, the special stuff.
A complete list of releases marking this year’s celebrations – events are being held at stores worldwide, too – can be found at the official Record Store Day website. Here, Clash has scanned the spread of appealing physical releases and made something of a shopping list for itself. Comprehensive? Hardly – there’s loads we’d like. But if we grabbed one of these beauts, we’d come away happy.
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BEAK> – ‘Welcome To The Machine’
Pink Floyd fans are a little spoiled this RSD. Not only is there a 7” reissue of ‘See Emily Play’ available, but Bristol’s BEAK> are releasing their really-rather-ace cover of the band’s ‘Welcome To The Machine’, originally heard on the Floyd’s 1975 set ‘Wish You Were Here’, on lovely white wax. The 10” single, coming through member Geoff Barrow’s own Invada Records, also features the song ‘0898’. You can hear ‘Welcome To The Machine’ below.
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TOY/The Horrors – split 12”
Take two of the UK’s very best acts, toss them onto the same release and ask them to remix each other. Bingo: instant we-want-this appeal. On side A there’s TOY’s ‘Motoring’ as reimagined by The Horrors’ Tom Furse; on the flip, The Horrors’ ‘Moving Further Away’ as reworked by TOY. Nice. Released by Heavenly, there are just 500 of these being made. So get ready with the readies.
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The Stooges/The Black Keys – ‘No Fun’
The same song played two ways. This limited-run 7” features the original Stooges version from 1969 and The Black Keys’ cover from 2002. On orange-and-red sunburst vinyl, it’s making us go gooey inside just thinking about it.
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The Twilight Sad vs Bill Wells and Aidan Moffatt – split 7”
Form an orderly queue – this will be a popular one. Five-hundred copies on eco-natural recycled board, each one hand-stamped… and what’s that sound? We’re purring. The seven features Wells and Moffatt delivering a low-key cover of the mighty Sad’s ‘Alphabet’, while the turbulent rockers’ reimagining of ‘(If You) Keep Me In Your Heart’, from the duo’s delicately amazing ‘Everything’s Getting Older’ LP, is on the flip. FatCat is on release duties. Like taking candy from a baby.
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The Notorious B.I.G. – ‘Ready to Die’
Long out of print on vinyl, this RSD sees the late Biggie’s brilliant debut album of 1994 get the reissue treatment on two beautiful 12”s. Limited and numbered, expect this one to fly out of the doors.
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Sharon Van Etten and Shearwater – collaborative split 7”
Now Act A covering Act B’s material for RSD is one thing – but when Acts A and B actually record together, now that’s something worth a ruckus down by the till for. SVE and Shearwater recorded a cover of the Tom Petty and Stevie Nicks duet ‘Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around’ last year (for the AV Club, video below); and its RSD release, via Sub Pop, comes backed by a new collaboration: ‘A Wake For The Minotaur’. Three-thousand copies have been pressed, housed in a gatefold sleeve. Play nice now, customers.
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Miles Davis – ‘The Kinda Blue Sessions ‘59’
Davis’s ‘Kind Of Blue’ album of August 1959 is regularly cited as one of the greatest records of all time, regardless of genre. But the jazz legend didn’t chance upon the magical recipe for its success by accident – he and his bandmates, including John Coltrane and Jimmy Cobb, put in the groundwork, evidenced by these sessions. ‘The Kinda Blue Sessions ’59’ proves that ‘Kind Of Blue’ was not, as is sometimes misreported, nailed in a single jam.
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R.E.M. – ‘Live In Greensboro’ EP
The Athens outfit’s commercial breakthrough, 1988’s ‘Green’, is to be reissued in May – but ahead of that, for RSD 2013, there’s something a little less expansive but just as interesting for R.E.M. fans to fight over. Featuring five cuts, the ‘Live In Greensboro’ EP is limited to 2,500 CD copies and each comes with an original patch from the band’s Green tour.
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50 Weapons meets Monkeytown 12”
Benjamin Damage. Phon.o as remixed by SCNTST (hear it below). Mouse On Mars. eLan. Otto Von Schirach. Modeselektor on an edit tip. Sometimes these things just sell themselves.
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Mystery Jets – ‘Live At The Royal Festival Hall’
This gorgeous double-LP release is limited to just 500 copies, so get in quick. Recorded in November 2012, at the end of Mystery Jets’ run supporting ‘Radlands’ (read our 8/10 review), it finds the band on typically rousing form. So it was a bit silly to play an all-seater venue, really. Not that fans were put off from dancing in the aisles. May feature some alarmingly excellent songs, this.
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Pulp – ‘After You’ (Soulwax remix)
Still up for a boogie? Try this: the Britpop superstars as remixed by Soulwax. You just know this is a winner before slipping the 12” onto a turntable.
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MGMT – ‘Alien Days’
Are cassettes cool? Radio 1 DJ Jen Long thinks so – she wrote about her tape-only Kissability imprint for Clash just over here – and so, too, do MGMT. ‘Alien Days’ is the lead single from the pair’s forthcoming, eponymously titled third album, and is released for RSD as a limited-edition cassette. A cassette single, on a major label… will wonders never cease?
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More information on Record Store Day 2013 can be found at its official website.
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