Last weekend I rendezvous’d with my good pal and fellow Top 5 Records co-host, Michael Warren for some record digging at Shinjuku’s main Disk Union Shop (among the 4 (or is it 5) other Disk Unions within a stone-throw away, each one dedicated entirely to specific genres). Anyway the main shop, also known as “Vinyl Union” is the almighty of them with, believe it or not, 8 floors of music and that’s where we met
Having blown through my record store budget at Coconuts while waiting to meet Michael (on an uncharacteristically cheap copy of Beastie Boys Ill Communication, which I’ve wanted for ages and never owned, I was just window shopping and people-watching.
My eye was caught by a young woman in headphones, standing much taller than all the other shoppers. I kept my eye on her and when she bounced, I approached her outside the door, only to discover she hadn’t actually scored any records. I ended up having a nice chat with Sultan, was her name, from Turkey, who was traveling through Japan, and who recommended I check out Turkish psych rocker Barış Manço which I did, and who was awesome. Michael came out and we chatted about music, but in the end, I didn’t make her photo, which I regretted, especially after such a nice chat about music.
So I’ve decided to make a new policy for myself, because this has happened a few times now, approaching music lovers who, for whatever reason, didn’t actually score any records. Henceforth, if you can recommend to me some great music, and are willing to pose for the camera, you needn’t even have a record to be featured on Tokyo Record Style. I expect these exceptions to be few and far between, but I’m glad I came to this conclusion, cuz in the end, this is all about loving music.
After we said by to Sultan we met cool guys Massimo and Mack, who will be featured in my next posts, but I’m posting some behind-the-scenes photos made by Michael here (Thanks Michael). It ended up being a nice little collaboration and maybe more behind the scenes to come.
P.S.
Come see Michael and me (and Bemsha and James Banbury) spinning and talking records today inside Shimokitazawa Station at Talking Gorilla from 4-9pm for “Top 5 Records – HEROES!”
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