Vinyl demand - again

It’s hard to comprehend that, over the last year or so, I’ve only been inside a record shop twice. I say “in” as I’ve done plenty of record shopping, it’s just that it’s been mostly via a browser. The two occasions in which I have crossed a physical threshold have been, respectively, for a private, rule-of-six-compliant gathering (when it was legal to do so), the other for a proper splurge, during last September’s Record Store Day ‘drop’, at the splendid Creekside Vinyl in Faversham. On that occasion, it was a blessed reminder of the pleasure of rummaging through the racks of a well-curated music shop. 

Nothing wrong with Amazon, of course (and without mail order, life would have been extremely dull over the last 15 months), but there is, really, nothing to beat the admittedly fetishistic tactility of bringing home fresh vinyl. Traditionally it’s been depicted as the preserve of punters of a certain gender and, indeed, age group: when I lived in Paris I regularly spent Saturday afternoons in Gibert Joseph on Boulevard Saint-Michel, gorging on new vinyl releases amid a predominantly male, middle-aged clientele. But according to figures released this week, ahead of the first of two Record Store Day drops this summer, record buyers - and I mean of the mostly black, 12-inch variety - are getting significantly younger. 

A Record Store Day survey of more than 140 participating independent record shops recently revealed a “considerable rise” in the number of younger people buying vinyl. This doesn’t come as a great surprise: for the last two Christmases, both my step-daughters - 20 and 16 respectively - have asked for vinyl - a right old mix including The Vaccines, The Smiths, Rex Orange County, The 1975, Royal Blood, Arctic Monkeys and Lana Del Rey. Their age is one thing, their gender is another - 60% of record store owners reported in the survey a growing number of women coming in to buy vinyl. 

“Record shops have had a history of being fairly male dominated spaces,” said Ashlie Green from David’s Music in Letchworth. “But the High Fidelity-esque days are definitely over as more and more women are enjoying vinyl. Not only are there more women behind the counter but the spaces themselves are much more welcoming to all people of all ages.” Green sees Record Store Day is a great way to open up shops to a more diverse clientele. “That list of releases is so eclectic and brings in music lovers from every background for what is normally a big party!”.

Jack LeFeuvre of Dundee’s Le Freak Records has also noted the trend towards younger vinyl buyers. “Nearly every artist will release a special vinyl edition as part of their album campaign and that is something that many music fans don’t want to miss out on.” LeFeuvre even thinks that younger consumers are driving a digital backlash: “If you love an artist there’s nothing more exciting than being able to hold the artwork, read the liner notes and enjoy the experience of listening to an album from start to finish. When we first opened we were always asked if it was a fad but it’s popularity has only continued to rise and proved the naysayers wrong”.

There’s no escaping the fact that streaming and digital music formats are here to stay, but the figures show that vinyl continues to grow, year on year. When then first Record Store Day took place in 2007, the UK was selling only 75,000 vinyl albums. Last year that number stood at more than five million, representing over £110 million in value. It’s something this year’s Record Store Day ‘ambassador’ Noel Gallager wants to see continue, and not just for his own sales (well, a bit): “I think if we can keep record shops open for as long as possible, we owe it to the young people of this country,” he says, plugging a compilation (Back The Way We Came: Vol 1) of his solo career so far, which is amongst today’s releases. “I’ll be getting involved,” Gallager says. “I’ve got something unique coming out. Hopefully the fans will like it and they’ll keep the flame burning for your local record shop.”

Record Store Day may be a momentary occasion - even if spread over the first drop today and a second on 17 July - but there’s no doubt that they stimulate interest in shopping for music in a traditional record shop (and, in these COVID-impacted times, locally, too). The challenge will be, as last year, getting the footfall amid continuing social distancing requirements. In pre-pandemic times, Record Store Day would be marked by packed shops and queues snaking around the block from dawn. 

Picture: Twitter/Banquet Records

This year’s drops will require shops to be somewhat limited, despite ‘general’ retailing being allowed to open up, but not everyone will be able to even do that. My local shop, Banquet Records in Kingston-upon-Thames, has reluctantly reverted to last year’s online model due to our borough having a surge of coronavirus infections (and, indeed, the highest infection rate in London). It’s not ideal, and last year’s online experience was fraught by technical issues caused by high demand for releases - great for business, but like trying to book an Ocado slot during the first weeks of lockdown last year. 

Once inside a shop - whether physically or virtually - this year’s drops offer something for everyone, with 340 special editions in the first one, including releases from Fontaines D.C., the Beastie Boys, Lady Gaga and Wolf Alice, and a further 200 in July, including the likes of Small Faces, The Clash and St. Vincent. The full list of releases for both drops can be found here. As for me, I’ve got my eye on a green vinyl 12-inch single of Ian Dury & The Blockheads’ Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick, Steven Wilson’s 40th anniversary remix of Ultravox’s Vienna, new coloured pressings of Marc Bolan & T. Rex’s Star King and Mark Lanegan’s Here Comes That Weird Chill, and a couple of live albums by The Police. 

If, however, push comes to shove, and I can have only one album from this first round, it’ll be The Truth by Prince. Originally only available as part of the Crystal Ball CD box-set, Record Store Day sees the first ever vinyl release of what has generally been described as one of the Purple One’s lost gems. Much of his work has been defined by relentless funk with a rock and pop edge, but on this recording Prince applied his bluesier instincts, with a more organic, acoustic sound that many felt, when it originally appeared in 1998, provided a fascinating insight into the late genius’s songwriting skills. 

The Truth also whets the appetite for the release, at the end of July, of Welcome 2 America, an apparently “lost” studio album recorded in 2010 and then shelved. Five years after Prince’s death, it will be a point of curiosity, especially amongst fans, but also from sceptics who feel that such posthumous releases were held back to begin with for a good reason. We shall see. Certainly won’t stop me buying it, however. Because that’s how we record buyers roll.

Brighton rock: Royal Blood’s Typhoons

If ever there was an example of FOMO, it was the Twitter post earlier this week by friends of mine moseying around ‘The Lanes’ of Brighton. Because not only has my recent unplanned hospital sojourn curtailed most aspects of normal life (coming on top of the curtailment we’ve all been through these last 14 months), it prevented me from doing exactly what my friends did, and walking through the front doors of shops and cafes in Brighton’s gentle Georgian backstreets. Actually, it was the sight of them browsing in one of southern England’s best record shops that set off my FOMO big time. 

This was the second positive thing to come out of the delightful Sussex seaside town this week, the other being the release of Typhoons, the third album from the Brighton-based Royal Blood, and one which takes their formula into somewhat new territory without straying too far from the overdriven-bass funk-rock of their self-titled 2014 debut and its 2017 follow-up How Did We Get So Dark?. 

It’s a shift that sees Mike Kerr and Ben Thatcher switch on the glitterball and have a crack at applying their trademark sound to the dance floor. This isn’t, evidently, a continuation of last year’s pandemic-reaction mini disco revival by Kylie, Dua Lipa, Charli XCX and others, but in part the result of the duo wishing to give their music a bit more colour, and in part, Kerr getting giving up drink and recreational drugs. “My life had become unmanageable,” he said in a Facebook post, reflecting on two years of sobriety. “Had I not done this, this album would not exist along with lots of other things I dread to think about. I came out of the dark and into the light and this is exactly what this album represents. No matter how bad the storm, all things must pass.” 

Perhaps Typhoons’ exuberance can be put down to the moment of clarity Kerr reached, setting out with Thatcher to tapping their shared love of Goldfrapp and Daft Punk, making a “a very confident and joyous leap forwards” in the process. Nowhere is this more apparent than the single Boilermaker, co-produced by Josh Homme and Paul Epworth which, during pre-lockdown live previews proved to be an instant crowd pleaser. Actually, now I know the Homme connection, the more I recognise the familiarity with Queens Of The Stone Age’s groovier moments. Critics in search of a label with this album will probably have to go round the houses trying to find one. Opener (and the album’s first single) Trouble’s Coming sets the tone with something that could be likened to a heavier version of The Power Station, while Limbo - seemingly a confession by Kerr on wondering how he managed to wake up each morning after caning it the night before - takes some of the rock’n’boogie of Zeppelin’s Dancing Days in its dance floor swagger. 

If there was one valid criticism of Royal Blood’s first two albums it was that they remained fairly fixed in their formula. Like Ben Folds eschewing traditional rock guitar for heavily distorted piano, Kerr had done the same with the bass, cleverly reinventing the instrument (or, perhaps, showing a player like Flea what a bass guitar could really do) to drive the band’s sound, not as its rhythmic foundation but as its melodic heartbeat. Not that Typhoons is a single-track road: there are hints to pysch-rock, Motown string sections, the universal disco reference point of Chic and, yes, the aforementioned Daft Punk. And there is also the closing track, All We Have Is Now, which is more piano ballad than anything else, with the ivory-tinkling underscoring the most personal, reflective lyrics on the album: “If nothing lasts forever/And no one makes it out alive/I wanna spend our lives together/While we have the time”.

Typhoons might be mostly Kerr’s personal look back over his recent journey, but together with Thatcher they’ve produced an album that captures the mood we all should be feeling right now. I, if I wasn’t under medical instructions to remain immobile for a few weeks, would be cutting a rug to it. But, perhaps more importantly, it’s a statement of just how far the Brighton duo have moved on, continuing to reinvent the rock genre in the way that they were wowing festival crowds before The Great Plague came along, but also throwing off whatever baggage - intensely personal or creatively - that might have impeded them in the past.