[78-L] Dumpster Diving in London

[Michael Biel]

  You gotta see this.  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-10930145

  Note that "THEY PLAN TO REFILL THE SKIP ALL WEEK"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is a wonderful story with a great twist of irony in the video.  One 
British collector raves that this is like Christmas, but then an 
American collector remarks that the great records are not to be found 
here.  BUT, then comes a young British lass, obviously too young to 
remember when this record came out, holding up the find that is 
especially exciting for her because it contains the stars of the Goon 
Show, Peter Sellers, Spike Milligan, and Harry Seacombe.  In case you do 
not recognize it -- the only other copy of this record I have ever seen 
is the one I own, which friends mailed me from England when it was new 
-- it is "How To Win An Election (or not lose by much)"  Philips AL 3464 
(A10779L) written by Leslie Bricusse, and recorded in 1964 with Sellers 
doing his parts in the U.S. and mailing the tape to England.  Also in 
her hand is "That Was the Week That Was" produced on Parlophone by 
George Martin in between the first several Beatles albums.  I can't see 
if her copy is mono or stereo, but stereo copies were unobtainable in 
England because they were all sent to the U.S. with Odeon labels pasted 
over them.  I hadn't known it was available in the U.S. and my friends 
in England even tried a special order of the stereo but had to send me a 
mono.  I found my stereo copy several years later when The Record Hunter 
on 5th Ave were selling out the remainders of all of the Odeon 
paste-overs from Capitol Of The World.  I think that those two albums 
would fetch perhaps $50 U.S. each on Ebay.  What ELSE is in the pile she 
is holding???!!!!


Ironically a friend on Facebook yesterday linked an article about some 
swimming pools NYC has manufactured out of dumpsters and are placing 
them on city streets -- including Park Ave just South of Grand Central 
Terminal  -- and I replied that this gives new meaning to dumpster 
diving.  Then another friend said that she hated shopping and I remarked 
that I love to shop for books and records but not cars.  Now comes THIS!

Actually Leah and I have a reputation around ARSC of not feeling that 
dumpster diving is beneath our dignity when it comes to records.  And I 
know of collections of Old Time Radio that were found in dumpsters.  
Some irreplaceable Columbia matrix file cards were likewise retrieved 
from an early form of dumpster.

Back in the mid-60s I was in the middle of a mob scene at Bambergers 
Paramus NJ when they advertised an open-reel pre-recorded tape sale at 
$1 each for Saturday.  There was a mob of men at the doors when it 
opened at 10 AM and 600 tapes were gone in less than ten minutes.  I 
would dive in and grab an armful and toss back the ones I didn't want 
and go in for another armful.  It was a stereotypical mob scene like in 
Filiene's basement.  There was a similar but smaller mob at Sam Goody's 
Paramus one day in the mid-70s when they put out a browser table which 
had the entire Victor Vintage series cut-outs at $1.69 each.   That one 
I lucked into because the cut-out and the sale were both unannounced.

The records here bring to mind two things.  A few summers ago  
Footlights in NYC sold out its store stock at prices that eventually 
reached down to 50 cents in a store which specialized in rare shows and 
personalities.  Leah and I went back there maybe ten times that Summer 
and got perhaps a thousand LPs.  Some 50 cent records had original price 
tags of over $25 as they started to bring out their back-room stock.  
The other occasion these types of records seen in the dumpster brings to 
mind is the classical section in this years Archive of American Music 
sale in NYC.  Since they do not collect classical, all classical was 
priced at 50 cents.  Ironically, many of them had stickers from my 
favorite NYC store, Acadamy. for 10 or 25 cents!  I should have gotten 
them there, and many times I have.  Actually, one time Acadamy had five 
sealed boxes of 75 or so classical LPs by the door that were free.  So 
the next morning I took my car into the city and took the boxes.  The 
Archive sale this year had sealed boxes of about 100 classical LPs each 
by the door that were $5 a box.  As we were getting close to 200 records 
and LaserDiscs already I didn't partake of any of the 5 buck boxes.

  Then of course there are the occasional library sales we have had at 
ARSC and the Belfer sales in Syracuse.  78 sales tend to be a little 
more reserved because of the fragility of the items,   Leah and I have 
developed a teamwork approach at these massive competitive sales, and it 
certainly helps me to have someone young and nimble to help grab and 
guard, and having a second set of eyes on the lookout has been very 
advantageous because she has found some great stuff I would have missed.

Mike Biel mbiel at mbiel.com