For The Record

A big feature of this leg of our trip has been my visits to some of the finest record shops Japan has to offer. Now for some of you what follows will be about as interesting as watching paint dry but for my fellow geeks and afficianados here is a summary of my digging exploits.

In Kyoto, I started off at Japonica and Jet Set, which whilst impressive were a bit pricey and not necessarily the kind of 2nd hand fare I was after. I had originally said I was staying well clear of records on this trip but was implored to check out some of the shops over here, with the promise of amazing finds. My remit was to only purchase records which I couldn't get at home and some Japanese Manga soundtracks were on the shopping list after a chat with a good friend from The Natural Curriculum.

On my last day in Kyoto I went to Bootsy's, which was well more what I was after. Row upon row of second hand vinyl waiting to be scowered.

I feel I was pretty restrained here and only indulged in a Japanese copy of a 10" by the Chosen Gospel Singers and a 7" by Laura Lee entitled "If You Can Beat Me Rockin, You Can Have My Chair" (whose B side is equally if not more impressive). I couldn't find a song on YouTube from the Chosen Gospel Singers record but here is a great one from a little later on, which features Lou Rawls on vocals.

Now I know some of you will say that I could clearly be buying Soul 7"s at home and you would be completely correct with that statement, however in my defence, a lot of shops I have been to have had a great selection of Soul 45s at pretty cheap prices which brings me conveniently on to my next stop which was back in Tokyo. To be precise it was the Shinjuku branch of a big chain called Disk Union.

This branch specialised in Soul and Funk so again I headed straight for the 45s and had a good rifle through. And once again I found a couple of top 45s for a fiver a pop which can't be argued with. One was "We're Gonna run Out Of Time" by Hersey Taylor and the other was "Why Don't You Call On Me" by Jackie Moore which I can't find audio samples of on this here internet machine.

The Shibuya branch of Disk Union was the one I had been told about and the one I was most looking forward to but on my way there I stumbled accross 3 other shops where I didn't buy anything apart from a cheap CD of rare Reggae compiled by the shops owner Double-H.

Jammers Reggae Record Shop

Face Records

Oldies But Goodies

When I finally got to Disk Union Shibuya it was fair to say I was like the Pig in the proverbial Muck in amongst all the rare and immaculately kept records. The challenge now was to not get too giddy and blow my travel funds so badly I would be catching the next flight home. In some ways I was lucky and my decision was made for me, as it seemed the previously untouched resource of old Japanese soundtracks and Manga Vinyls I had been promised had been mined quite heavily by previous shoppers. This is not to say that I didn't find some gems, the majority of which you can see below.

Now I am in Malaysia, the records are in the post home and my fingers will remain dustless until I hit Bombay next year for the raw Bollywood records. Til next time, ta ta.