I'm braggin

I have said this before: Bombay has never disappointed me when it comes to finding records. There are some fantastic people (read collectors) here who are more than willing to sell if they have a spare copy (a chap gave me Woodstock 1969 triple album, because he had three copies!!). 2003-04 was the time when I bought shit loads of awesome records, which I took back to Delhi. A third of those (and some of my favourites) are still lying there.

Apart from these collectors, Chor Bazaar is another fantastic place to buy used records and compact discs. And the biggest plus is that the sellers (like any other flea market) have absolutely no clue what they are selling. I have heard stories that some old-timers have found rare stuff like Neil Young’s On the Beach there. Leave alone veterans, I too have picked up some awesome stuff like Black Sabbath’s s/t debut album and Vol. 4, Velvet Underground’s Loaded and Live 1969, Miles Davis’ Live at Fillmore. And you generally get British or American pressings.

Since I had not been there in nearly six months, I decided to drop in. I went there last Friday expecting no great surprises. Because half yearly visits don’t yield results. You need to check that place out every Friday. But I guess it was supposed to be my day, and look what I got- two Japanese pressings, which are supposed to be the best and pretty hard to come by. But others are those regular British pressings.

Dylan’s Greatest Hits: Japanese pressing (have the Indian copy but this is something special)

Prince: Purple Rain- Japanese pressing with separate lyrics sheet (this has not sunk in yet)

Dylan: Highway 61 & Planet Waves (common British pressings, although Planet Waves is plain mediocre picked it just because I did not have the album on vinyl)

Neil Young: After the Gold Rush (my second copy and a much better one with a gatefold) Amazing b/w inside photo. At 24", this can easily be framed and preserved as a wall hanging.