Last Sunday after a glorious afternoon filled with whimsy, brunch and mimosas, I made my way to the record store to do a little digging in the crates. The wife had left me momentarily to go thrift store shopping and my initial intent was to hit up a sports bar to watch some NBA basketball while I waited. But lo and behold the record store caught my eye, and I simply could not pass up the opportunity to build on my collection.

Usually when I walk into a record store, I like to block off 30-45 minutes of time to look at each and every record to make sure I'm not missing on any hidden gems. But this particular record store had copious amounts of heavy metal and alternative records, which isn't bad music at all, but I'd prefer my vinyl to be old soul music. I know that sounds weird, but I equate vinyl with my father's collection, and he had jazz, smooth jazz and lots of R&B. Now I certainly have made some exceptions (Sting and the Police come to mind) but for the most part I stay in my narrow lane. I digress...

All of the R&B-ish records were in the first three rows of records, and I was able to whip through them in about 15 minutes and I made three choice:

1) Around the World in a Day - Prince

2) The Manhattans - Greatest Hits

3) Migration - Creative Source

I almost bought an Isley Brothers album too, but I couldn't remember whether I already had it in my collection, so I didn't want to chance it. (**sidebar** I really need my whole collection on some type of organized list so I can reference it whenever I go to the record store. Perhaps I'll make my son do that on a rainy/snowy day ***sidebar off***). I took my three records and walked up the cashier so I could meet back up with the wife.

When I got to the counter, the guy behind the desk said it was unofficial store policy that all the patrons tell a story behind each of the albums they wanted to purchase. I'm sure some folks resent having to take an extra step before spending their money, but this request was right up my alley. In fact, there was a time in this here blog, when all I did his pick records out of my newly-acquired-from-my-dad collection and tell back stories behind them from my point of view. Not only that, when I picked out the three aforementioned records, I had specific memories and thoughts in my mind. Allow to share:

Prince - Around the World in a Day

First and foremost, this was Prince's first album after the giant Purple Rain, so similar to Michael Jackson's Bad album, expectations and stakes were sky high. Michael chose to make an album with the intent of topping Thriller, and he fell woefully short--even though Bad is a great album (except for Just Good Friends). Prince decided to take a sharp left turn and make an album that was nothing like Purple Rain and he succeeded. My favorite song on the album is "Condition of the Heart and my favorite lyric in that song--a lyric which used to drive my main man Sabin crazy with in college--was, "I'm blinded by the daisies in your yard"



Besides it being a great album, my dad used to play "Around The World In A Day" every time he took my brother and me to soccer practice/games. He played it front to back over and over again, and I thank him for that.


The Manhattans - Greatest Hits

Whenever my parents were feeling amorous, which meant my brother and I had to go bed insanely early so we wouldn't hear them being disgusting--the evening would begin with my father playing The Manhattans. He would cue them up and playfully sing to me and my brother, and then turn his attention to my mother. He'd sing, they'd dance and my little 8-10 year old eyes wanted no parts of the sight. But clearly it made an impact because I am still a big fan of the group to this day. Years later I dated a cousin of Gerald Alston (the lead singer), but that was nearly as beneficial as it should have been.

My favorite songs on that album are "I'll Never Find", which reminds me of sitting on a beach with clear skies and an adult beverage and "Don't Take Your Love", which in the last 18 seconds, features some of the most fantastic levels of begging you've ever heard:




Migration - Creative Source

I'm sure this is a fantastic album, but I bought it for one song which contains a five second passage, which was sampled in one of my favorite rap songs ever. The Creative Source song is called "I Just Can't See Myself Without You", the section that was sampled comes around the 2:10 mark:



Just in case you were unable to figure it out, the song is by Freeway, Jay-Z and Beanie, and it is called "What We Do". I challenge you to listen to this song without nodding your head in violent fashion:



Anyway, the dudes at the record store we impressed by the detail in my stories and they "let" me buy the records sans incident. I appreciated their level of snobbery and it reminded me of a scene out of my favorite movie High Fidelity: