Who doesn't like 5 cent records?

Here are my TOP 3 record finds from my last trip to the country. All from the same garage sale in a big box of records marked '5 cents each'. Naturally, we were like bees to a honeypot.

Number 1:  Buddy Holly masquerading as country folk trio The Browns

 

 I didn't actually know who The Browns were but the woman's face caught my eye and then I saw the inscription... 'Buddy Holly / Everyday'. Looking inside I found just that - Buddy Holly's first 7" single Everyday backed with Peggy Sue (1958, CK-3601). Both sides of that little record got plenty of rotation that weekend I can tell you. It was in excellent condition. Pity it didn't have its original sleeve - but the music is awesome. The pared down simplicity of the recording is awesome - you really feel like he's standing next to you playing.

Number 2: The Beatles - Hey Jude / Revolution 45rpm
on Apple label suitably found in a brown paper lunch bag! (A-8493).

One of eight million copies sold in 1968!
It gives me great pleasure imagining Revolution blasting out of the
family stereo in that sleepy old town where this was found.
Fittingly, John Lennon considered Buddy Holly an early influence.

Number 3: Eartha Kitt - Lovin' Spree / Under the Bridges of Paris (1953) 78rpm

 

Back from the country

The last few months have been a little disjointed as I've been back and forth to the country. The first trip was basically visiting my parents to a) spend more time with them and b) try and help my Dad relinquish some of his hording.

Not long after getting back to the city I heard that my uncle had passed away so it was back to the country for the funeral, check in with my Dad (it was his oldest and last surviving brother) and help him get down on paper the eulogy he'd been asked to deliver. It was good to be there with him, to support him in some way, and share with him his thoughts and feelings.

Helping writing the eulogy meant digging into my stoic father's memory. Aside from the usual anecdotes and factual chronology of my uncle's life there was a sudden detour. My father suddenly started crying like a small boy as he recalled a stream of events from his Depression years childhood - experiences of poverty, shame, and the small injustices dealt by life. Like so many of the pains we carry they were simple stories but sharp little memories nonetheless - ones that burr the mind and for my father, stowed deeply away and not spoken of for seventy odd years. Though I want to share these stories I think I'll wait a little while. I don't know if I have the ability to convey them with the sparse potency they deserve nor if they will be meaningful to anyone other than me and my father. Another time perhaps. But they did go a long way to explaining his eccentricities and enigmatic ways. Not to mention his incessant hording. They also brought a sharp reminder to me of what it meant emotionally to live through those long years of struggle.

I've always admired my father's ability to just get on with life in the face of adversity and I think so few of us realise that this kind of strength - I know my father isn't the only one - was forged with a great deal of quiet pain that had no place for expression- everyone was in the same boat, you were no more special, your burden no greater than any one else - so deal with it.

This can make you stronger, it can make you more generous, it can also make you a little bitter, sometimes a little meaner, a little isolated.

I'd heard Depression years stories from my Mum and Dad growing up but they were always the funny ones, or ones we at least would laugh at - like when they said their clothes were made out of flour sacks, they had no shoes or had to walk four miles to school - a hah hah hah yeah right! It's only as an adult that you realise these were understated truths. The bigger picture begins to fill out - a picture that is a lot sharper, sadder, tougher than any of our fanciful ideas of the "good old days". Sure, people like my parents are the biggest perpetrators of these fantasies but they of all people are entitled to a little spin.

Over the past years I've witnessed my father getting older and older, more frail and fragile. I've often said how reversed our respective roles become with time as our aging parents become more like children and we drift into caretaker roles. I never felt more like mothering my poor old dad then hearing his sad little childhood stories and wanted to kiss those bad memories away.

On the upside, those lean Depression years have made my Dad the best thrifting partner a girl could ask for. The day after his brother's funeral we hit the op-shops and garage sales for some therapy and were humbly rewarded.

I'll post pics of some of our finds shortly but in the meantime here's some pics of the scale-model of Sydney Central Station that I checked out there before my 5 1/2 hr train journey into country New South Wales.

 

 

Sway

He fell in love with actresses who were elegant and strong, brought down in the end by loneliness or jealousy or age, but always wittier and dressed with more flair than their rivals

  - 'Sway' - Zachary Lazar (p62 on Kenneth Anger)

Unidentified Vintage Object (UVO)

Can anyone shed any light on this rather strange beautiful-ugly flower candlestick I found? There are no makers marks. The glazing is quite wonderfully done. It looks and feels earlier than 1950s, to hazard an inexpert guess I'd even say it could be Edwardian - they kind of have that Art Nouveau flourish with their organic form but really I have no idea.
I've never seen anything like it. Have you?

'Welcome to Pine Point' and small town memories

This look at memory, identity, the effects of time and change and how communities are built, destroyed an yet sustained is truly amazing - an interactive photo album, funny and moving. Click on the image below to be taken to the National Film Board of Canada's website where you can watch, interact with, and think on The Goggles' Welcome to Pine Point while you enjoy the awesome soundtrack by The Besnard Lakes.

Welcome to Pine Point

'Memory is funny. 

Specific and vague.

Visceral and unreliable.

Truth and Fiction.

From the moment an event occurs it is simplified and purified in memory. 

We shave off the rough edges and what happened becomes a story or even, over time, a legend.

If we're not careful though, we grind it down to raw superlatives with none of the banalities or compications that make truth feel true.

So often memory depends on who we need to be at the moment of remembrance.

Sometimes it's better to believe that we accomplished the impossible' - The Goggles

Mission impossible: Melbourne in a day [the vintage shopping scene]

A short round up of CBD vintage shopping

Anonymous Posh really stole my heart. It's a little shop with a lot of soul. Its selection of vintage dresses, blouses, bathing suits is just that, select. You get the sense that every piece in the store was chosen, chosen to be there not just because it's old, retro, vintage but because the person who put it there really sensed its beauty, fell in love with it a little themselves and hope you will too. Oh, and the staff were incredibly friendly and personable too. I will definitely be going back and buying here on my return trip.

 

Anonymous Posh

Shop 43 Royal Arcade, Melbourne  

T. (03) 9650 4263

 Just a few shops up from Anonymous Posh in the Royal Arcade is Hunter Gatherer whose shop fit-out and overall aesthetic is hands-down the most refined and highly styled. After visiting the store I later read that it operates as a shopfront for the Brotherhood of St Lawrence!? Is that true? Damn spanking funkiest glitzy hipster opshop operation I've ever seen going on - if it is! Great range, excellent condition stock but I didn't find anything I fell I immediately fell in love with...this trip. Oh, except for the seventies tea-set (pictured below). If only the neon came with it. Am now thinking I need neon in my kitchen.

 

 

 

Hunter Gatherer

Shop 51 Royal Arcade, 335 Bourke Street Mall, Melbourne

T. (03) 9650 1843

Meanwhile in the Cathedral Arcade.... 

...I found Harry Wragg alongside a number of other small hip boutiques. Harry Wragg was also on trend with its youthful mix of vintage, new, and upcycled/reconstructed vintage garments and accessories. I actually found the new garments here much more stunning than the vintage and only wish I was younger and thinner so I could wear them. I can't stop being old but I can lose a few kilos so I might be tempted to try something on next time round. If not, I will definitely pick up one of the stylin' necklaces or spied (but thoughtlessly forgot to photograph, sorry).

Harry Wragg

Shop 7 Cathedral Arcade, 
37 Swanston St (cnr Flinders Ln) Melbourne

Up the stairs I entered the trojan horse of Retrostar Vintage Clothing whose unremarkable grunge entrance opens up to reveal a megaplex of vintage and vintage styled clothing and accessories. The shop excels in range with over two huge rooms of merchandise that you could easily spend over half a day going goggling over. A fun relaxed place to browse with a steady flow of shoppers, mostly Gen Y. While they do stock true vintage I did find the older pieces weren't in great condition and some could have done with a clean. But there are definitely hidden gems amongst the racks if you have the patience and like the thrill of the chase (I do). The sixties style red and black dress with tuxedo ruffle front and black suede shoes both caught my eye (pictured below), but were sadly not my size. 

 

 

What struck me here was the racks and racks and racks of remodelled 70s, 80s, 90s dresses skirts and even leather jackets that had been uniformly restructured to suit current looks, for example 100s of dresses cut to mid-thigh with elasticated waist inserted. Looking at the labels many of the garments are from China so I wonder if what we are looking at here are upcycled recycled Chinese garments made new in China?? Not that there's anything wrong with that. I just think it's an interesting phenomena, a sign of the times and our appetite for vintage if it is now being imported, remodelled from the East. I'm not 100% sure what the process is I'm witnessing is here anyway, just speculating really.

I know for one thing, the more recycled clothing the better.

What do you think?

Retrostar Vintage Clothing

1st floor, 37 Swanston St (cnr Flinders Ln), Melbourne

T. (03) 9663 1223 

Heading back out on the city streets and we find Out of the Closet (or OTC). Of the six shops featured in this post OTC would have to win the award for best shopping soundtrack and perhaps alongside Retrostar Vintage Clothing, best unisex vintage shopping experience. While the OTC (Flinders St) shopping experience suffers a little in the ambience department thanks to its below street level location, they do work the dark underground vibe to its best advantage, creating a subterranean Ali Baba cave of vintage gems. Vintage lamps illuminate the cavern and once your eyes adjust you can easily relax into the rock band basement apartment atmosphere. The relaxed glow over the merchandise and surrounding band and cult movie posters that plaster the walls lets you know this place is a little bit country and a lot rock'n'roll. 

On the day I visited the vintage dress selection was a little sparse on the ground for my liking but well organised, realistically priced, and varied enough to suit a wide range of tastes. Couldn't have been too bad as I saw two pieces I would have readily purchased if I'd had the cashola. An orange-green striped silk mod dress as well as a two-way striped cotton skirt in purple and navy ($40) - both of which would have been perfect for summer (see below). Importantly for guys, the store appeared to stock an excellent range of menswear. I just wish they'd use a younger hotter image of Mick Jagger in their mural.

Gotta love the Bubba Ho-tep poster!

 

 

Out of the Closet

238b Flinders St Melbourne

T. (03) 9639 0980

Speed Boy Girl was a cute little shop which according to their shopfront signs was days away from closing when I visited. Their vintage stock seemed to favour more of a Vince Noir electro feel (not that you could tell from the dress hanging in the door - see below). An ecclectic mix that seemed to favour a bold blend of 'proper' vintage with pop - I'm talking spandex and spangled. May they rest in peace or succeed in their new venture if they have moved to a new store.

Speed Boy Girl

5 Degraves St, Melbourne 

(Now closed I take it or moved elsewhere?)

SHAG The place is almost too cool for school. Shag succeeds in blending classic vintage with unique pieces from the 70s, 80s, 90s like no other. Glamorous, fun, cutting edge and sophisticated. Top notch, top of the line, worthily priced. A busy shop with good reason. I'll be back. Did I mention it was cool?

Carmen Jones of Sydney makes an appearance in Melbourne. 

One of my all time favourite vintage labels. 

Do you have a Carmen Jones in your wardrobe? 

Show and tell please.

Shag

Centre Way Arcade, 259 Collins St, Melbourne

T. (03) 9663 8166

 All in all a monster window shopping day for all