Oldfield vinyl

Last July Warner Music announced it was set to release some new 180g vinyl editions of 4 of Mike Oldfield's albums. I pre-ordered them, bought a new stylus and waited patiently. 9 months later they have finally arrived.

Better late than never? Mike Oldfield 180g vinyl

Despite there being absolutely no mention of why their release was delayed, I have keenly anticipated these discs. "Voyager" and "Tubular Bells III" have never been released on vinyl and the other two command high second hand prices due to their rarity.

Personally I also prayed these new editions wouldn't be as bad as the recent 180g pressing of Oldfield's Virgin era albums such as "Crises". These discs were not cut well and certainly weren't pressed to the highest standard. These Warner era albums were keenly anticipated. So what is the verdict?

Well, my favourite Oldfield album has always been "Songs of Distant Earth" and so I placed this on the platter first. Disappointingly none of the discs have a picture inner, just a plain black polythene lined jacket. But this shouldn't detract from the music

The sound is rich and clean but there is some annoying surface noise at the start of each side. Next was "Tubular Bells 2" which has some annoying noise throughout and doesn't seem to quite hit the mark in the same way.

I still hate Record Store Day.....

So I still hate Record Store Day. More than ever in fact.

This year I changed tactic slightly. Rather than pretend I wasn't interested and just turn up in the afternoon, I decided to go and look in the morning. However, I vowed I was not going to queue.

There are two independent stores in my local city centre: at 9.30 one store had a queue about 400 yards long and the second shop was so deserted I assumed they weren't participating in the eBay enhancing festival of greed. Just to be sure I asked in the second store if they had any record store day releases available.

"Ask me for what you want and I'll tell you," said the weary guy behind the counter. Only then did I notice the sure signs of a Record Store day battle: barrier ropes being stowed away, leaflets strune on the floor and notices about queue jumping and the maximum number of purchases (in bold font).

"Errr do you have Erasure 'Violet Flame Remixes?'" I enquired as casually as possible.
"Ohhhhh no. That sold out." Damn, "Any others?"
"Hmmmmm Blancmange or Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark?" I said out of hope rather than any expectation.
"Yeah got one left of each of those."
"Brilliant, I'll take them both please. How much is that?" I asked tentatively, not quite able to believe my luck.
"Errrr that will will be £31 please"
"Sorry, I thought you said £31. I only wanted the one 12" singe and the 10" single."
"Yeah mate. £31"

At this point I shouted, "Are you f**king kidding me?" I also grabbed the nearest passing record company executive (or Record Store Day representative) and screamed in their face: "Do you think I'm made of money you miserable bastard? What kind of gig is this? You thieving asshole! Talk about taking advantage! Do I have to pull my pants down and bend over too? I hate you and this whole sham of a day." I probably headbutted them too. Hard.

Either that or I just handed over my bank card and thanked them for my public mugging. I forget which.

Either way I ended up with 2 of the 3 releases Record Store Day 'made me' want. Not bad to say I never queued for even 1 minute. The 3rd? Well, I forked out double the original price for a copy from one of the army eBay scalpers.

So f**k you Record Store Day. Just call it the "National queueing for records championship" in future. Because really, really that's all it is.

POSTSCRIPT: Ironically all of the releases I mentioned above have since been made available on the artists websites. So I need not have even bothered visiting my local independent retailers after all.