what are the most ubiquitous used cheap/dollar records where you live?

always a fun thing to know if you are me! it's interesting. wish there were more people from tokyo here...

i'm guessing dan fogelberg haunts the racks across this blighted nation. the leader of the dollar bin band. and his punk friends Loggins/Messina.

ah, but western mass...david bromberg, you were loved! not by me, but by a whole lot of other people.

the queen of our kingdom, you ask? none other than joan armatrading. her ladies in waiting? the roches.

the pair that stirs the cauldron below the castle? the mcgarrigle sisters. SO MANY MCGARRIGLE SISTERS. i'm pretty sure the town of Northampton paid for rufus and martha's orthodontal work.

as far as site-specific artists, Robin Lane & The Chartbusters up the wazoo. and lots of beantown stuff. tons of Orpheus records. The Atlantics. if you need any Clean Living records let me know. i'm fond of 'Hamp faves The Elevators. their records float around the valley like fall leaves.

Flying Fish Records should have had an outlet store here.

From my admittedly limited research, Nicolette Larson seems to be the queen of Minnesota dollar bins. I only know her from singing back-up on a Neil Young album, I'm guessing she was local to here.

There were a couple of Hare Krishna-related LPs in the UK (or maybe just London) that to this day clog up the racks of charity shops. I forget the titles, Tom D probably knows. They must have given away tens of thousands of the things!

Oh yeah, Golden Avatar was one of them.

extremely worn copies of rapper's delight.

Lotsa Streisand @ northern Illinois/Chicagoland stores. Find a lot folks hiding their pick up later picks amongst these.

can I get a hand for Linda Ronstadt?

i will shout out linda ronstadt. especially that one. you know the one... with the purple and the pink.

Quite a bit of Streisand, Armatrading and Ronstadt here too, but Nana Mouskouri and Kamahl [Malaysian-Australian crooner] seemingly shifted so many units in the 60s/70s they could be our most reliable dollar-bin staples for quite some time yet.

I feel like Rod Stewart's records circa 1974-1981 are a ludicrously common sight too. And Boz Scaggs' Silk Degrees.

Interesting to see The Roches mentioned. It feels like a rare and auspicious day when I see cheap Roches here lol.

Gordon Bok!

i'd post more names, but .... are thrift store records included here? to me, those are different and inferior to records you'd find in the dollar bin at a reputable record store

oh I was totally thinking thrifts. our actual dollar bins are mostly 3rd-tier punk/indie bands

thrift stores near me are all about Judy Collins, Mantovani, Ferrante & Teicher, Enoch Light

i think dollar bin stuff tends to be more eclectic and harder to pin down these days. seems like younger people are willing to pay much more for various ubiquitous disco and '80s LPs

"our actual dollar bins are mostly 3rd-tier punk/indie bands"

wait, who?

thrift stores probably - in the u.s. - have most of the usual suspects everywhere. christmas records. andy williams. etc.

scott I will do some research and report back, that was my impression last time I looked!

Melissa Manchester. Rita Coolidge. Pablo Cruise (not getting enough bump from the yacht rock reappraisal). “___” Sings Jewish Favorites/Irish Folk Songs/Italian Songs/Broadway Hits”

Scott, I once brought you some of my in-laws old 78s and you told me you see the exact same ones at every flea market.

How many of these used bin staples were printed? At what point will they cease to exist because they've all been put into a landfill?

I have never perused a UK charity shop CD rack and not found:

Toploader - Onka’s Big Moka
Robbie Williams - I’ve Been Expecting You
Eva Cassidy - Songbird
Westlife - Coast to Coast

3rd-tier punk/indie bands

Pablo Cruise records are marginal and all, but self-released/vanity LPs (and bless em, honestly! no shade!) that creep their way into shops do wind up in dollar bins eventually after sitting in the bins unsold at five or ten bucks. I often marvel at these like, thick slabs of dope swirly vinyl with incredibly satisfying tip-on jackets from completely unknown DIY entities. Local artists from elsewhere. I think about how it probably cost them like 8 dollars just to manufacture this single copy I can then buy for 99 cents. But also Love Will Find A Way is on this other one.

Going to a lot of thrift stores in small town western Canada it's a lot of:

James Last
Crystal Gayle
The Moms & Dads
Roger Whittaker
The Pointer Sisters (Particularly Energy and Break Out)

I was once at a thrift store that had like 20 copies of Andy Williams' Moon River And Other Great Movie Themes. I really should have taken a picture of that.

Steve Forbert cast a spell on New Jersey apparently

Also lots of Southside Johnny and the asbury jukes but that is to be expected

My Fair Lady tbh

From my admittedly limited research, Nicolette Larson seems to be the queen of Minnesota dollar bins. I only know her from singing back-up on a Neil Young album, I'm guessing she was local to here.

Well worth hearing her version of Lotta Love if you dont know it, off the album 'Nicolette':

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmkTbgiWqmg

repping for any and all nicolette versions of "lotta love." very much an alltimer and no brainer bargain bin grab.

In Sydney, Australia, where I was a keen CD rack scourer for a few years, the first 3 Gomez albums were unbelievably common - particularly Liquid Skin - I think they toured here a lot? Anyway it is weird and gross.

I don’t know if it is ubiquitous but in terms of locally specific dollar bin vinyl, this LP by US-born singer Chelsea Brown is common enough that I regularly pass over cheap copies. I think in the early days of global vinyl selling there was some attempt to big it up as a lost Australian boogie/disco classic, but I remember thinking it was not great! Maybe I should revisit.

I had no idea Chelsea Brown had a singing career. Like most Americans probably, I associate her with her sketch comedy work on the Laugh-In show in the '60s.

...and her go-go dancing, naturally

I go blank on this and I can't think of any answer other than Breakfast in America. As for Canadian or Torontonian records, all I can suggest are really beaten-up copies of After the Gold Rush?
I was once browsing the dollar record stacks at the long-gone Peter Dunn's Vinyl Museum, and there were a couple of crate-diggers who made a point of announcing out loud, "Ladies and gentlemen...Burton Cummings!", presumably each time they encountered one of his lovely LP covers.

LOL, emsworth OTM about the weird abundance of Gomez CDs in Aus.

I saw TWO Salvation Army CD racks today, oddly enough, both of which featured Madonna's Bedtime Stories, reminding me that pretty much everything between that and MDNA has featured heavily in charity stores near me since the '10s. Likewise turn-of-the-century Kylie Minogue. I'm guessing these are largely proportionate to the truckloads of copies shipped.

thrift shop CDs are a bounty for any 90s doof-pop lover. so many Fuel and Smashmouth and Sugar Ray and Counting Crows CDs.

I mentioned on some other thread re: CDs, multiple copies of Natalie Merchant’s Tigerlily and Ophelia, tons of Enya, and yeah latter day Madonna and U2 in abundance.

i think we are all ignoring the Monster in the room though...

https://i.discogs.com/9X7g_8l_ceFIBkPCRuUp9dykEs9fGwf5PeXZ5hZ0WbQ/rs:fit/g:sm/q:90/h:592/w:600/czM6Ly9kaXNjb2dz/LWRhdGFiYXNlLWlt/YWdlcy9SLTE0MTEy/NDUtMTM1Mjc2MjEw/OS0zOTMwLmpwZWc.jpeg

michael stipe will never be able to lecture me about the environment as long as there are 4576574737373 copies of that thing littering the landscape.

completely worthless on cd. $100+ on original vinyl.

Streisand - GUILTY

No Parlez by Paul Young is so ubiquitous in UK charity shops that it has had a Twitter account devoted to sightings of it in the wild: https://twitter.com/noparlezclub

“come back and stay” is such a jam

always wondered how come Paul Young ended up covering that song, Jack Lee of the Nerves did it originally but it wasn't widely released afaik. in fact looking at the credits for No Parlez, there are 3 Jack Lee covers on it!

Where are the djs brave enough to play his version of love will tear us apart at the end of their set?

(i would fyi)

Quite a bit of background to No Parlez explained here:
https://nobilliards.blogspot.com/2014/03/paul-young-no-parlez.html

Jack Lee's original version doesn't hold a candle to the Paul Young cover (same story with the original of Hanging on the Telephone).

I cashed out my Monster vinyl a while back for like $70

ooh
I remember buying vinyls of Monster, Blowout Comb, and Whip Smart on one trip to the store in '95 or whenever that was...all long gone of course

i am constantly amazed by how many steeleye span records i've found at record fairs over the years. might be because i'm always searching the S section for sparklehorse and the very similarly named steely dan

"All Around my Hat" is a banger

I'm guessing these aren't cheap copies of "Ten Man Mop, or Mr. Reservoir Butler Rides Again", i.e. the good stuff?

for some reason i can't remember anything about the ones i keep seeing, but i remember the cover usually being vaguely yellowish, so maybe parcel of rogues?

they are everywhere here. verging on $1. same with renaissance.

and pentangle. so many pentangle records.

and john renbourn solo. you could visit a couple of stores in the valley here and have a stellar renbourn collection for peanuts.

kottke and bromberg though. just...too many. sooooo many.

but where is the love for robbie basho, massachusetts? where, i ask you! fahey not uncommon. sandy bull not uncommon. but i never get basho records. tons of pearls before swine and rapp solo though. which is nice.

Renbourn and Iain Matthews are two of the greatest artists whose records I still find for cheap ... and they're mostly all killer! I just grabbed a double LP live thing w/ Renbourn and Stefan Grossman from the mid-80s and it rules. five bucks!

should note here that my brother started a blog recently covering this very topic (though he occasionally strays from actual dollar bin records): https://dollarbin.tumblr.com/

Frank Mills. Might be a canadian thing thoough

we get a ton of records by folkie Bill Staines. he was from New Hampshire. and we've got you covered for Jean Redpath.

You're not allowed to operate a record store in Philly without a copy of Robert Hazard's ep in the dollar bin. They will come by and check.

that is so true. and maybe a Vels record and a Pretty Poison single.

and for dollar Philly noise you can't beat that Sink Manhattan LP. the poor train hopper's Crash Worship. or maybe the even poorer emaciated pit bull owner's Missing Foundation.

Oh god, yeah that Vels record is everywhere. I've never even heard it, I feel like I should grab one just to know what it sounds like after having flipped by it so many times.

its good!

any record by The Reds is still one of the best Philly bargains. they are cheap everywhere and so good.

lololol I used to own that Sink Manhattan record.

I like the Reds a lot. never seen any of their records over here though :(

nobody really wants them here. its sad. same with urban verbs. their two records are awesome. can't give them away. unwanted major label east coast new wave punk we have loved.

but where is the love for robbie basho, massachusetts? where, i ask you! fahey not uncommon. sandy bull not uncommon. but i never get basho records. tons of pearls before swine and rapp solo though. which is nice.

― scott seward, Thursday, November 2, 2023 10:25 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Well Basho didn't sell like those guys at the time, right?

i guess not. but peter lang did? cuz his aren't hard to find. who knows.

Yeah, Reds and A's always connected in my mind and always found in the dollar bins here, both great debut albums. Hooters still commanding around $4-$5 though.

I like the first Vels record a lot. Kinda early Madonna meets Tom Tom Club.

i always liked that early pretty poison EP when they were goth and before they took over the freestyle world.

https://i.discogs.com/Ozp_Dqm0swiUiiLgT5HSER2_wUI8QWfM0j0wABFF0Qc/rs:fit/g:sm/q:90/h:600/w:600/czM6Ly9kaXNjb2dz/LWRhdGFiYXNlLWlt/YWdlcy9SLTgyNjYz/Mi0xNjI5OTk0NzAx/LTk5MzQuanBlZw.jpeg

also Little Gentlemen were good for budget Philly goth. a friend of mine played on their Ultravox cover on one album. not to mention the legendary Executive Slacks. their records must still be cheap in Philly.

where is the love for Ruin?

I used to work as a telemarketer as a summer job, and one of my fellow cold-callers was the guitarist from Pretty Poison (I see he didn't play on the goth EP... but i did notice that when they went on American Bandstand, he was the only band member who was already friendly with Dick Clark)

i guess not. but peter lang did? cuz his aren't hard to find. who knows.

― scott seward, Thursday, November 2, 2023 11:52 AM (four hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

Poor neglected Lang is always pretty cheap because he's not sought after for some reason, but aside from that I'm not seeing him as often in the wild as the others

for all the online jokes re Paul Young/No Parlez, it's not a cd you see too often.
a few years back i found it and was chuffed to bits.
however it turned out to be the standard vinyl edition as opposed to the cassette version with extended versions which i was used to as that was the version i bought.
thankfully last year i found the proper cd edition with the extended versions.
but it's not that common.
and yeah, that MC write up is spot on.