Rediscover Records at Amazon Marketplace

We now have a storefront at Amazon dot com. It's the Rediscover Records site! Look for some of the best in gently used and new vinyl. A few choice, diverse selections to start. More will be added on an almost daily basis so check back often at Rediscover Records Amazon Marketplace.

Also, look for a forthcoming website! It's gonna rock!

Here is the link. Please bookmark it for frequent visits

http://www.amazon.com/gp/shops/storefront/index.html?ie=UTF8&marketplaceID=ATVPDKIKX0DER&sellerID=A1WKCWA7NFC257

Record Store Moment

We're spinnin' Bruce Springsteen's 1980 double LP "The_River". I turned over side 1 and flipped it to side two and out pumps the opening drums of the hit single, "Hungry Heart". An elder statesmen in the store was suddenly brought back in time,

"Aaaah," as he smiled big, "this reminds me of Alaska. I worked in Valdez, Alaska and on our lunch breaks the girls would put this song on the jukebox because they wanted to dance to it. This is a great cut."

You could sense just by the music he was brought right back to a special place in his life. Sometimes working in a record store isn't about money at all. It's hearing, listening, sharing, stories just like these.

"Everybody needs a place to rest

Everybody wants to have a home"

Josh White records at Rediscover Records

It is no secret that we buy your used records at Rediscover Records and one of the major coups we've come across in our quest for the best vinyl in town is a singer by the name of Josh_White.

Josh White was one of the more influential Blues, Folk, Spiritual singers of his time. This is quite the understatement and is painted with quite the broad brush. His influence is so much more than a blog entry for a record store. To read more, pictured left, is the biography "Society Blues, by Elijah Wald.

As a child he witnessed a black man being tarred, feathered and lynched. White played regularly for Franklin Roosevelt (in fact, after the death of Roosevelt, White's little brother William, became Eleanor's personal assistant, chauffeur the rest of her life). White was an actor, a sex symbol, he was blacklisted in the 1950's and was the first black artist to play in the Greenwich Village nightclub Cafe_Society, the first inter-racial nightclub in the the U.S. White was one of the first black singers to have a white audience following with help from the song, "One Meatball". He was lifted off the blacklist when President Kennedy invited him to play on the CBS civil rights special, "Dinner with the President". White performed at Lyndon Johnson's inauguration. He had a stamp made for him in 1998.

The list of admirers and people he influenced is a who's who of actors, musicians & politicians. He frequently sang with Billie Holiday, Leadbelly, Pete Seeger, Burl Ives, and Lena Horne, among others. You talk about a list of admirer's, here are just few of White's, Elvis Presley, Dave Van Ronk, Bob Dylan, Phish (they've frequently covered "Timber") Roger McGuinn, David Crosby, Robert_Johnson (yes, that Robert Johnson), Nat King Cole, Harry Belefonte, Odetta, and Ray Charles. Poet Langston Hughes wrote the liner notes for White's record, "Songs by Josh White". "Jesus Gonna Make Up Make Up My Dying Bed" became Led Zeppelin's "In My Time of Dying", so yes, count Mr. Jimmy Page as a fan. "Silicosis Blues" was later covered by the Jay Farrar & Anders Parker's project Gob Iron on the record "Death Songs for the Living"

The best way to experience an artist is through the music. We have several Josh White records in stock. They are in great condition, including "Josh White at the Town Hall". We have a couple of very rare, highly coveted, 10 inch records that date back to 1949. Come in to check them out, we can even give them a spin to listen to them for yourself before you buy.

In the meantime, witness this video of Josh White singing "Nobody Knows You When You Are Down and Out"

Josh White died in Manhassett, New York in 1969 of heart disease.

Placing an order, questions

Being a new business and just getting our feet under our little selves we are in the process of getting a web presence. Sure, we'd like to have had a web presence when we first swung the doors open but for the time being, we are an old school retail shop. That means, you go to the store, look around, browse, get a cup of coffee from a nearby establishment (Ravenheart Coffees and Elgin Books are great places for coffee) and browse through the record bins.

If you would like to place an order before we get the full on shopping cart (with the wobbly wheel) we'd be happy to send something out. We would gladly accept payments to our paypal account. A list of new vinyl will be posted soon. If you see something from this blog, our twitter account, or facebook postings, by all means, send a note. We can get it in the mail (+ shipping) as soon as we can.

In the meantime, if you have questions, inquiries, or would like to know what we have in stock, send an email to rediscoverrecord@gmail.com or give us a call at 847 961 8445. We'd be glad to help answer any questions.

Okkervil River "The Stand Ins"

Okkervil River is one of the great critically applauded yet largely unheralded bands of the "aughties" (If you've come up with a better term for the decade of the 00's, lemme know). Their big break through after a couple of records released was the concept record, "Black_Sheep_Boy". It's a powerful collection of songs primarily penned by front man Will Sheff. Sheff is, arguably, one of the great songwriters of this decade and it's criminal he doesn't receive more praise outside of indie music circles. Here is a video off of Black Sheep Boy, the powerful "For Real". If you like this, watch a live recording of it as well.

Okkervil River's next two records were almost companion pieces, "The_Stage_Names" and "The-Stand Ins in that they had similar loosely-based themes on the music industry. "The Stage Names" was originally conceived to be a double-album but instead released as two separate records. Look for "The Plus Ones" with several pop culture references with a "plus one" added, such as, "Eight Chinese Bros", "Nine Miles High", and the "51st Way to Leave Your Lover". And of course, as most rock show attendees can attest who have been added to a guest list, you are a "plus one". Check it out, Will Sheff solo.

And with their latest release on Jagjaguwar label, The Stand Ins, Okkervil River continues on with these themes with songs like "On Tour With Zykos", "Singer Songwriter" and this catchy little gem titled "Lost Coastlines". The band also recorded several youtube videos of bands they've toured with covering songs from "The Stand Ins" as a promotional tool for the record.

Here is one last video, "Lost Coastlines" from Okkervil River. "The Stand Ins" is in stock and available at Rediscover Records.

I hate the F***ing Eagles

For better or worse, (umm worse in most circumstances) we have plenty of The Eagles music in stock at Rediscover Records. This great snippet is one of Jeff Bridges finest hours (but if you ask this author, he'll tell you "The Fisher King") in "The Big Lewbowski". If you've never seen it, do yourself a favor and add it to your queue for your next film fest. If you have seen it, watch it again, but you don't need me to tell you that.

Paul was in a band before Wings? Huh?

This is the first of, hopefully, many blog entries regarding all things music on behalf of Rediscover Records. Tonight, we are going on a bit of a limb here, putting whatever musical cred on the line in discussing the music of Paul_McCartney, Sir Paul, or Macca, if you will. Did you know that he was indeed in a band before he assembled Paul McCartney and Wings in the early 1970's?

It was hard not to hear McCartney and Wings songs in the early to mid-1970's on the ol A.M. radio dial. They put together a string of hits that even decent hit makers of any era would covet. Thus if you are a person a of a certain age, you may really *not* have known that McCartney was in a band before Wings. The pinnacle of his solo career may have come with the release of the record "Band on the Run" in 1973. This led to a string of decent, but sometimes spotty records that included "Red Rose Speedway", "Venus and Mars", and "Wings At the Speed of Sound". Prior to "Band on the Run" McCartney released his first solo record "McCartney" with arguably one of the great love songs of all time, "Maybe I'm Amazed" and the very overlooked album "Ram", to name a couple. With the release of "Venus and Mars" and "Speed" McCartney toured the United States for the first time since he was in that other band in 1966. Here's a video of Venus and Mars/Rock Show. "It looks a lot like the one used by Jimmy Page!"

My own first record bought with my own money was a copy of "Wings Greatest" at a little record shop in Sycamore, Illinois. It was like an appliance center/slash music store. It was only the beginning of my musical sojourn that has taken me to many places that may or may not be discussed here on this blog, or in person, if you stop into Redisocover Records.

There's a lot of things you can say about McCartney but one thing he seems pretty decent at is surrounding himself with a good band. That "other band" withstanding, the Wings line-ups he assembled included (former Moody Blues) Denny Laine, Joe English, Steve Holly, Lawrence Juber, Jimmy McColluch, as well as, the much maligned Linda McCartney. In the late 80's and early 90's his band included Paul "Wix" Wickens and former Pretenders guitarist Robbie_McIntosh. McCartney still tours and his current touring band is very solid. The list of other artists he's worked with reads like a "who's who" of musicians, much too long for one blog entry.

Even as a McCartney apologist, I've had trouble following his career post the 1980 release "McCartney II". "Tug of War" in 1982 had some redeeming qualities but soon after that he was giving his regards to Broadstreet and doing duets with Micheal Jackson. What was he going to do next, offer Jackson the rights to his other bands songs? Hey, wait a minute . . . Two later releases got my attention in the 1990's, the rockin record of covers, "Run Devil Run" and "Flaming Pie", which as you listen to it now, really sounds like a farewell to his beloved wife, Linda.

There's been times when I think of McCartney and can only think, "Oh how the mighty have fallen" and then I'll put on one of those early Wings records and I'm brought right back to those A.M. hits of the 1970's and going to that little record store in Sycamore to buy that *one* record...

However, for my (first) record buying money and for a good pop song on the radio in the 1970's it was hard to top McCartney and Wings. So if you were 9 or 10 years old in 1976, you were too young to remember The Beatles but heard all those Wings records you may have asked your parents one day, "You mean Paul McCartney was in a band before Wings?"

now playing as we write: "McCartney"