A Shame Indeed

I was primed and enthused to hear Patti Austin’s lovely voice and Quincy Jones’s expert production and all the best personnel the 80s had to offer. Yet in my ears Fats Domino was instead asking: Ain’t that a shame? Yes, Fats. It really was.

The wrong record was in the sleeve. Instead of Patti Austin it was the soundtrack of the film American Graffiti. I do not dislike most the songs on the soundtrack, but in this pursuit of finding great albums such a collection of boomer dude faves is not of interest to me. Only when a soundtrack contains music that can’t be found in an artist’s own album will I consider having it in my collection (Ex: “Axel F” on the Beverly Hills Cop OST).

This kind of mixup happens with used records, especially those purchased at Hard Off, where the employees have understandably widely varying levels of music savvy or interest. And it is possible to confirm that the disc in the sleeve is indeed what is advertised, but the rule at Hard Off is to do any opening and checking at the counter under staff supervision. This is to prevent bad people from switching expensive records into cheaply priced sleeves. Which all makes sense. But I don’t have the stamina or attention span to do that after searching out all the records I want to buy. It would also help me to find scratches on the records that I do want, but again, nah. So I imagine this won’t be the last time. I will celebrate this despair, this sense of betrayal and defeat, as another aspect in the broad emotional milieu of hunting used records.