Category Archives: album

Legendary Pink Dots Vinyl

For Sale, Media, Vinyl Finds

The Turntabling Collection (my pretentious-yet-accurate name for the inventory of vinyl and CDs I sell online at at conventions) includes several titles by the one-and-only Legendary Pink Dots.

Those who don’t know the Dots aren’t hip to their unique brand of audio surrealism, psych-tinged epic journeys into the imagination that recall the best of Syd Barrett and like-minded fellow travelers. But if any or all of that description sound good, you owe it to yourself to become what some used to call a “Dotty phrend”. Here’s a selection of titles you should get to know:

Legendary Pink Dots Asylum double LP.

This is the record some reviewers and Dots fans describe as LPD at their most crazy, psychotic and creative. Standout tracks on this one include Echo Police, which sounds oddly reminiscent of the Liquid Sky soundtrack in places–at least at the start.

This is one of the older releases in the massive LPD catalogue, and the double vinyl presentation is pretty amazing. The artwork alone is worth a look…the album? One of the most unique even for the band itself. Here’s a video clip of LPD performing Echo Police from the Asylum album, shot live in 2008.
 



 

 

The Legendary Pink Dots album Island of Jewels is half experimental and half structured, featuring plenty of surreal wanderings, but does have a playful side at times. Some nice sax interludes give this a–dare I say–50s beatnik vibe in spots, which is not a bad thing for a fan of the Naked Lunch soundtrack.

Some fans call this album a must-own, others say it’s their least favorite in the collection. The band is like that–inspiring rabidly devoted followings but with wildly opinionated and divergent opinions on the group’s output. Call this one a good sampling of what you can expect from the rest of the band’s recordings and you probably can’t go wrong. The wild mood swings are all here, the sonic experimentation, the light-and-dark shifts…pretty fine, if you ask me.

The Legendary Pink Dots vinyl record The Golden Age shows you a side of the Dots that many love–surreal, beautiful, with a touch of what I call “morbid hippie”. Nobody does that quite like the Dots, with tracks like “Even The Vegetables Screamed”. The wonderful “Hotel Noir” is reminiscent of some other great LPD albums (The Lovers comes to mind–another essential title to find).

“The Month After” even has a little Simon Boswell/Italian horror soundtrack vibe going on there…very nice. I’m also sure it was unintentional, but no matter…

 

There are plenty of 12-inch singles which are sought-after too, including something brilliant called the Pre-Millennial Single and a wonderful little 12-inch called Princess Coldheart. This is a prime example of Dots storytelling at its finest–bizarre, twisted fairy tales that meld ancient medieval imagery with modern technology. Acid music? You’ll know for sure on the first listen–here’s a sample of that single, courtesy of YouTube. (see below)
 



WTF Album Covers: Atrocity Upon Atrocity

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WTF album covers don’t have to necessarily be technically awful or tastelessly inept. They can also simply lend themselves to pure mockery by obvious double entendre titles or conceptual silliness. Look at these two beauties:

I don’t want to know about their happy hands. I do NOT want to know about their happy hands. Please don’t tell me about their happy hands.

Burning question: how much cocaine did it take for this cover to seem like a GOOD IDEA? The name of this record is “Ride A Rock Horse” but “rock” isn’t the word you’re thinking of right now. It does RHYME with “rock” though.

And finally, an open letter from the future to born again recording artists of the past. KNOCK IT OFF WITH THE EFFING PUPPETS ALREADY. Thank you.

Graham Norton Vs. The Bad Album Covers

WTF?

Turntabling’s WTF collection of repellent, frightening, and just plain bad album covers is not an original concept–plenty of websites have a section devoted to them, though some like to believe that Turntabling is a bit more slavishly devoted to bad album covers than others.

Whatever the case, people LOVE crap album covers–and if YouTube is any indication, they love them a lot more than previously suspected. There’s just something really gratifying about laughing at the expense of these paragons of awfulness–who can deny the cheap yucks? Not Turntabling, and certainly not the uber-fabulous Graham Norton (a turntabling favorite) who spotlighted these familiar howlers on a recently posted edition of his show:



Crate Digging In Chicago

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A YouTuber called Zolione76 posted this video about adventures crate digging in Chicago. The clip features Dave of the Chicago vinyl stalwart Dave’s Records, a shop I’ve long enjoyed. Dave’s is a friendly, genuine vinyl-loving shop and if you come to the Windy City you owe yourself a look there.

There is also a look at Dusty Groove Records which you cannot miss if you come here. Turntabling, being based in Chicago, is VERY spoiled with the availability of great LPs, rare stuff comes through here all the time and is definitely a destination city for vinyl in the same way as Pittsburgh, PA.