Tracking & Hunting Stories by request (Dan)

Heavy Metal Hunting, record Q's & trivia, collector stuff. Rare or not, it all goes here.
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doomedplanet
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Post by doomedplanet »

Yeah the price had been very high since I can remember for this killer piece of wax.
Unfortunately I didn't hear Dark until the mid-90's and my musical life is lesser as a result, but I might not have like them when I was young. Then again I might have. What an album packed with emotion, the guitar on it is perfect.
I've got the Akarma original reissue too, but i also really like this version that has the paste on photos on the cover. The cover photos are on a glossy photo paper stock and are crystal clear, I'm not sure where this one came from and I don't see a photo of it on popsike, just a different earlier reissue is shown.
I also really like the "Artefacts From The Black Museum" lp too and I also had to get 2 Kissing spell cds and the "Anonymous Days" cd from 1996 (I need to hear that again, I don't remember it being as good)
XCEL wrote:No Rob i dont have it , that would be far out of my league as far as spending for records is concerned, i have the old re and the very first akarma run re ,although i was among the first to know about the existence of the lp back in the 80's by a pen writing friend and collector,after we know who stepped down that london basement store and discovered what would be the biggest discovery of all time progressive hard rockwise .
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Sgt. Kuntz
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Post by Sgt. Kuntz »

Alright, you made me curious about DARK and i have to say, cool sound for sure. Not usually my cup of tea, but i think i could grow into it.

I just wonder, if you have similar options if you collect original psych LPs. I mean as a metal collector if you need something desperately and don't want to wait forever you can always drop a mail to half a dozen dealers that you knwo and see who has a mint copy up for sale for you. I can’t imagine that this also applies to the psych rock scene, not with prices like 7000 Pound Sterling!!
Where were you in '79 when the dam began to burst


http://www.musik-sammler.de/sammlung/ptrz80
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doomedplanet
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Post by doomedplanet »

Hah, I've remembered a great story, I think for some guys they already heard this story, or at least part of it.

Anyway back in the 90's someone told me about Villain "Only Time Will Tell" lp, it was either Doug D. or Joe P., I forget. Only some of the hardcore collectors knew it the time, i wasn't one of them. Finally the cover was described to me over the phone, I think it must have been on the weekend, and I said "You know I think I know where to get a copy of that". So after the call ended I got in the car and drove to this store in Redwood City that had some metal but the owner of the shop was a real dick, so I tried really hard not to buy from him. He loved to insult you in your dealings, his standard pricing was $10 for domestic records and $12-$14 for imports, no matter the album, unless it was a record he knew about from a price guide, they the sky was the limit. But he knew nothing about metal. So sure enough there was a Villain and I got it for $7 + tax because it was scratched. Took it home, listened to it and didn't like it much at the moment, so I called Joe P and traded it for Salem's Wych "Betrayer of Kings"
Well I told a few folks what I traded it for, they all groaned that I made a poor trade but I took the stance that well Salem's Wych is a better album musically, I didn't care since the record wasn't mint, and it was cheap.

Now the real story begins. I found out that I made a mistake trading this lp. Because from this point on, I wanted the record back, another copy was nowhere to be found. I made it a point over the next few years, that every shop I went to, I always immediately went to the "V" section to try and find a copy, but no luck anywhere. I went to every little shop that I knew had only junk, just in case. This became my story, every one I knew at the time, I grumbled about not finding another copy.

Well then one week I get 2 guests at my place from Germany, Andi P. and Ralf R., they were on the west cost record shopping. I told them my story of hunting everywhere for Villain in every shop with no luck. Well first thing on Saturday morning we begin the rounds of hitting some shops on the Peninsula, the first one I take them to is Vinyl Solution in San Mateo, CA. (the shop is still around and you can see a photo of the owner on the net.) Anyway this shop always had metal, but random stock, he never made it a point of stocking a lot of metal, but sometimes you could turn up great records for only $3-4 here, but most times it was always the same records every time, so after awhile it became a chore to go there, I knew usually I would be a bit disappointed.
Well I walk in, head for the "V"'s and there is Villain for $4, mint- copy. I repress my excitement and show it to Andi and Ralf. Well the owner, who I always talked to, comes around to say hello and he looks at my find, he says "Yeah I always used to get in stuff like this but not too often these days" I plain faced say yeah I was hunting for a clean copy of it for awhile...
we dig for awhile and both Andi and Ralf turn up a few cool items too, then we get in the car and both of them were pretty surprised that I was able to keep my cool, haha.

Well later word gets around that I made this nice find, I get a call from Joe P. and he tries to get me to trade the album to him. he offers me $1000 in trade for it (anyone that ever traded with Joe, well the trades were NEVER fun) but he doesn't have any of the records I really wanted to trade for, like Iron Cross or Militia. so i just say "I'm firm, no, I looked for one for years, find me something I REALLY want and I'll trade it. Until then forget it. Now I have it and I'm keeping it." He was pissed you could tell. Of course I still have the album.

The really funny final bit of the story is Joe P. twists the story around and starts telling people that I offered him this lp for $1000 but he refused the trade and was pissed...
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Sgt. Kuntz
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Post by Sgt. Kuntz »

That is a great story. Yeah, maybe Andi is like a talisman or something, at least that is what i thought when he told me how he and a friend of him found a copy of PARADOXX. In a shop in Japan, of all places!!

But more stories please, this thread is pure gold.
Where were you in '79 when the dam began to burst


http://www.musik-sammler.de/sammlung/ptrz80
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doomedplanet
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Post by doomedplanet »

I think there is a bit of truth in that statement. Andi got a Rellik mlp at the Redwood City shop for $10 within an hour of me getting the Villain. He got help from the store owners wife buy telling her he collects local records and she helped him dig out a couple of things. The other thing about this Redwood City shop is that the owner was older but his wife was this really attractive and friendly mid 20's black woman. I'm not especially interested in most black women but she was nice to look at and knew records, haha.
Sgt. Kuntz wrote:That is a great story. Yeah, maybe Andi is like a talisman or something,
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Dirty Rocker
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Post by Dirty Rocker »

Haha, great story! I never traded with Joe but was close a couple of times years ago when he had a Widow LP on his list. I read about him to find out if he was reliable or not, guess what.. I passed.

I have a short story I could tell.
I think i was 14 years old, in search of sacrifice - street fighter 7". I found a guy here in Sweden who had it. I sent him an email telling him I really needed that single etc and when I got an answer a day later from him he just told me sold it recently for big bucks. I got curious and asked him how much he got for it since I knew it was among the rarest Swedish metal singles that you could get hold of.. Well he sold it for approximately 80 euros if memory serves me right. I got disappointed since it was a very good price, then asked him if he had any other Swedish singles for sale and he sent me a small list of maybe 10 titles, just a couple of them were Swedish rubbish and the rest was nothing I knew about. Then we stopped mailing each other.

Then 5 years later I listened to the Australian speed metal band Enticer for the first time and their single "reaper of the earth" and thought it was pretty sweet so I had my eyes open for it the coming months when I suddenly had a feeling I had seen this single somewhere.. I start digging through my emails and found this very old email from the sacrifice-dude and saw the small list of 10 singles and there it was! I emailed him again asking if he had still had this single, he did! I received the package some days later and opened it. There it was, complete with the light blue sleeve all in EX condition. That made my day. It set me back less than 10 euros including shipping. :lol:
THE DAWN OF THE MEGA-METAL
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XCEL
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Post by XCEL »

Absolutely great, Rob i am sure a.p has got a lot of bargain lps throught he u.s visits but on the bottomline this is what its all about, i try to refrain from the countless bargains stories i have as it could be showy or cocky which i really dont like, you didnt tell me whether you know the dark story or not,-by the way i too have all the lps you mentioned-what about wicked lady? Cheers
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doomedplanet
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Post by doomedplanet »

Don't know the Dark story, sorry missed that part. Oh sure Wicked Lady "Blow your mind" lp is cool, not as good as Dark of course. I never did find out, did that lp come out in the 70's or is there only the lp from1995?

Oh, anyone thinking the above Villain story is bragging, it really didn't cost me $4 in real money. It was years of getting up early on a weekend, driving to some small town I had never been to before trying to dig in junk shops, thrift stores, record stores and never finding it. This was also during a time where I worked 60+ hours a week so free time was precious and I was usually exhausted. I guess I spent $400-$500 probably on gas/food just on these hunts. Of course I found some records during the search but not the one I was on the 'quest' for.

I'll never forget the misery of one of those searches. I got up really early to go up to a shop, I think in Antioch or Pittsburgh, CA. Both of these towns are suburbs and miserable. I saw there was a record store I hadn't heard of in the phone book, so thought I should check it out. I get there and it is a big open room, part of a warehouse. Fucking huge quantity of vinyl in bins and underneath, easily 200,000 lps and just as many 7". I looked through all the 'rock' records and by the time I was leaving the tips of my fingers were rubbed raw and skin torn up with some blood flowing. I didn't buy a single record that day. I did tell the owner at the end my phone # and told him the record I wanted and would pay $100 for it. He looked at me surprised and said, "oh when people usually come in and are searching for some specific record they only want to pay $10 or less for it." I just shrugged my shoulders and of course never heard from him.
XCEL wrote:Absolutely great, Rob i am sure a.p has got a lot of bargain lps throught he u.s visits but on the bottomline this is what its all about, i try to refrain from the countless bargains stories i have as it could be showy or cocky which i really dont like, you didnt tell me whether you know the dark story or not,-by the way i too have all the lps you mentioned-what about wicked lady? Cheers
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great_knuthulhu
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Post by great_knuthulhu »

Sgt. Kuntz wrote:I just wonder, if you have similar options if you collect original psych LPs. I mean as a metal collector if you need something desperately and don't want to wait forever you can always drop a mail to half a dozen dealers that you knwo and see who has a mint copy up for sale for you. I can’t imagine that this also applies to the psych rock scene, not with prices like 7000 Pound Sterling!!
The same thing does apply, but with a super rarity, like that Dark album, it's of course less likely to find a copy soon. What happens however, is that when you contact a few dealers, word will spread that you are in the market for that album and that you will probably be willing to pay the going rate for it. That will alert those who have copies and they might decide to part with it to help fund a new house or something.

I remember that album going for around £2000 in the late 90s, probably after reissues had alerted more people to it.
I know I ain't doing much,
doing nothing means a lot to me.
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XCEL
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Post by XCEL »

How correct , nice addition to our discussion , any stories?
perishinflames
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Post by perishinflames »

great_knuthulhu wrote:they might decide to part with it to help fund a new house or something.
Am I the only one who is deeply disturbed by this? :lol:
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Yakish
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Post by Yakish »

doomedplanet wrote: I get there and it is a big open room, part of a warehouse. Fucking huge quantity of vinyl in bins and underneath, easily 200,000 lps and just as many 7". I looked through all the 'rock' records and by the time I was leaving the tips of my fingers were rubbed raw and skin torn up with some blood flowing. I didn't buy a single record that day.
I just imagined how this picture was looked. I love to read stories like this, it reminds me how i swarmed in late 90's in pile of pirate audio casettes, because there wasn't any other sources with metal music for sale.
Image
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great_knuthulhu
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Post by great_knuthulhu »

perishinflames wrote:
great_knuthulhu wrote:they might decide to part with it to help fund a new house or something.
Am I the only one who is deeply disturbed by this? :lol:
I'm very sorry if that thought is distressing to you - I must not have thought it through before posting :wink:
I know I ain't doing much,
doing nothing means a lot to me.
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XCEL
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Post by XCEL »

Since no other member seems to be willing to write any more stories,here's an unbelievable one from the glorious past travelling years abroad.It was november 2003 and i have just arrived to the airport back to athens after a great buying trip to the usa,midwest mostly but with also a short visit to ny for the wfmu fair and local stores, as always i had about 500 lps with me in boxes and in my suitcases but also a plastic bag with some rarities like joe step,2 rods,hammeron,tyrants reign,and some psych rarities, this bag i had with me on the plane all the time,and while we were getting our stuff from the belt at the baggage claim i say to my friend john to watch the bag while i am putting the boxes on the carriage cart, everything is ok,we get on our cars and leave the airport, i notice later in the day that the bag is not with me and i take for granted that john has taken it with him,until 2 days later that we speak on the phone and tell him with the most natural tone in the world that i would pass by his place some day to pick my bag, and then he goes "what bag?", as you realise i nearly fainted and instantly call the airport and ask the lost and found department about a bag and after 3 minutes that seemed 3 years the clerk says calmly "yes sir we do have a bag with the contents you mentioned" ,in no time i flew to the airport and picked the bag, what a story that was, how would someone feel if he found hammeron in the local sunday flea market?i wonder, wow!!!!!
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