Back in April, Ray Brandes introduced us to a novel Spanish debt-collection practice and intiated a conversation about the spiritual and physical debts we owe each other. (For me, this whole blog has been a way to express gratitude to all of you for shaping me and helping me realize potential I couldn’t have foreseen.)
I’d like to get a little more mundane, perhaps, and think about the actual objects we pooled and traded. Money wasn’t equally distributed among us, we know, but it seems everybody managed to contribute something to the economy: sharing cigarettes, giving cool boots or a coat to a friend, making a cassette that got handed around, maybe going in on ownership of a vehicle or an amp …
Unlike a straight-up purchase, there’s a social connection and a story behind every trade or gift we made. I’d like to hear some more of them!
N.b.: Please mind the house rules against implicating others in past activities that may embarrass them now. Some of the “stuff” that got shared is certainly contraband and necessarily outside the scope of this thread.
Oh! Bonus question: Do you still have any objects that you got from those exchanges?
Considering the crazy money we’re hearing about collectors paying for old crap, I kind of regret that moving from SF divested me of 90 percent of the worn-out stuff I’d kept for sentimental reasons.
Deep in my closet is a pair of very chewed suede Beatle boots from TJ that Eric Sloan gave me. They’re unsalvageable, but I like to know they’re back there.
I left my vinyl in SF with Fleminger; I mentioned elsewhere that it includes a precious-to-me copy of Lou Reed’s “Coney Island Baby” that Lou Damian gave me in 1984 in exchange for a dinner in TJ.
I gave John Stees a cheap but surprisingly playable electric guitar in early 1987 as I left San Diego; 20 years later, he mailed it back to me for my kids to enjoy. I was very touched and have gotten pleasure from playing it. (The sanded-off spot reflects an ill-advised and abortive plan to refinish it.)
I remember when my first high-school band went in on a PA system. It was a major financial and emotional investment for us at the time, and it was enormous. I don’t remember if I asked them to buy me out of my share when they kicked me out, but becoming part-owner of something that formidable kind of made me take this band stuff seriously. So even if I ate the investment, agreeing to invest was an important commitment I can’t regret.
that’s it? people still have their souls etc?
no wonder we’re all here…..what a boring lot!!!
i’m sorry…i forgot that we were keeping it to the mundane.
I have in the back of a bathroom drawer a tin bracelet (of the kind much worn by female students of Point Loma High School, circa 1984-5) that came to me because my brother Nick said to Lori, who was dating Dirk at the time, “Hey, Lori, Do you know what a lamprey is? Do you want to see my impression of one?” When Lori said she had no idea what a lamprey was, he replied that he could show her but he would need the bracelet. Then he inserted the bracelet into his mouth and impersonated- -NAY! became- -that fish. My brother’s impressions, by the way, are generally very strong. Those with the opportunity to do so should request his “dog-eating-something hot.” Lori refused the bracelet thereafter (as you would), and somehow it came to me. After disinfecting it (as you would), I actually wore it for years in college. I haven’t done anything with it in decades, but (like Matthew said) I like to know it’s there or at least think that it is, gently reminding me of Nick, Lori, and--weirdly--Dirk. I doubt if any of them would remember any of this…
I also have some records I got swapping with Jason Seibert when we were too young (like 10-13) to have much money. He knew so much more than I did and had much more interesting taste, but I got some cool stuff via my dad’s job at the Evening Tribune. I have Jason’s NON 45 as I’ve noted on another thread. I think he got promos of the Jam and Generation X debuts that nobody at the Trib bothered to review…
Matthew, believe it or not, I still have a copy of Mexico City Blues that you loaned me sometime in the mid 80s!
And speaking of Jason Seibert, I have my copy of the first Modern Lovers album that he gave me in 1982. It’s a “cut out”… where the record company would clip the corner off albums that weren’t selling and discount them.
I’ve got Denny’s napkins where Sergio and Joe Palmer and I drew exquisite corpses (the old Surrealist game where each person draws a section without looking at the others).
Books, records, drawings … Social media was a lot more tactile back then.
Now I share links with my friends! Not the same level of touch. 🙂
I didn’t start keeping stuff until I learned that it had value.
In those early days I moved around a lot. I wince at the collections of albums, photos, vintage clothes and books I left behind in each great escape.
Lou Damien gave me his extra copy of Days of Future Passed.
Somebody gave me an Alice in Wonderland water colour set.
I think it was Danny Koenig.
Tom gave me a Dunhill brand cigarette holder.
I was given poems, songs and serenades.
Cups of Topsy’s coffee.
A zippo lighter.
chicken pie dinners… guest list priviledges.
Too many of the unmentionables to mention.
Bedroom invites. Stink eyes and petty gossip.
Charlene kicked me down many collectible carnaby street ensembles from the back room at Life’s Little Pleasures.
It’s all just stories now.
Where did it all go?
>>”I didn’t start keeping stuff until I learned that it had value.”
THAT pretty much says it all! Wheres my Injections Jaguar guitar, or my Injections leather coat, (which was a very old Police jacket, probably SDPD).
The 8 tracks are gone, the cassettes are gone, the record collection is somewhere in So Carolina, but safe.
All the memorabilia is gone…saw no point in keeping anything. NOW, thanks to CHE we have the chance to hear old recordings, see old flyers, hear old anecdotes…priceless.
Paul Howland and I traded alot of records,originally they were just to listen and return,but somehow they became semi-permanent trades.I say semi-permanent because neither one of us is dead and we may trade back at anytime.We actually swapped Grant Green records,my Green Street for his Sunday Mornin’,he loaned me his Charlie Parker/Miles Davis record which I may still have,the amusing Miles Davis “you’re under arrest”,which I returned but now have my own copy of.He loaned me a Henry Cow record and a record by a band called Melon and a Ryuichi Sakamoto tape which I may still have also.Although he did’nt loan me anything by them,i believe he told me about Can as early as 84 or so,which inspired me to buy a record by them,followed by buying everything I could find by them,which turned into somewhat of an obsession for krautrock in general during the mid thru late 80’s.I scored some original Amon Duul and Hawkwind records at the Arcade records downtown.Paul also loanede me the Bernard Wright record ‘Nard which I also later had my own copy of.Haboglabotribin!Paul was definitely one person who was largely responsible for considerably widening my musical taste and knowledge.I loaned him some Melvins records and I can’t remember what else,for some reason it’s easier for me to remember what I borrowed than what I loaned.Paul,if you’re reading this and I have anything you want back,there is no statute of limitations on our trades/loans,so just let me know…
Pat Works and I never exchanged records,but there was this one magical night(for me anyway)when I became a James Brown fan.One night after work at Sbarro’s,Pat invited me over to drink some beers and hang out.Well,we had a few,and Pat broke out his 45 collection,what I remember most was James Brown,although I’m sure he played some others as well.That Florida street pad was a real cool hangout,sloping floors and all.I’m pretty sure I met a few of you there for the first time.
That reminds me,Paul,I think I still have your copy of The Payback.I think it only appropriate that I should give that one back!
Benedictus.Been a dick to us…
little tiny bits of ourselves….part of our souls in all that stuff…in all those exchanges.
treasures worthy of defending that tell a million stories….yet sometimes even better when we let go.
i recall, sometimes we’d simply trade each other….girlfriends, band-mates….equipment and furniture in exchanges which would or wouldn’t haunt us later.
i’ll often marvel touching old things at second-hand stores and wonder about who once owned this marvelous book or shirt?
an immaculate collection of nat king cole maybe.
sometimes i’m sorry for not bringing something home with me….but rarely.
i still have my linton kwesi johnson autograph…..and captain sensible’s of course.
my first wife ran off with iggy’s and roxy music’s…the ink on bowie’s has faded into the paper but the paper itself still has years to go.
no one stole my modern lovers LP.
my daughter turned 30 today…she still gets annoyed whenever i sell any of my 700 records or so….not to mention my singles.
good chance they’ll be hers one day.
i’m just not that motivated though i hear my injections single might be worth digging up sometime soon.
>>”my daughter turned 30 today” WOW! My daughter is 4…guess I have a long road ahead!!
>>”i hear my injections single might be worth digging up sometime soon.”
Yeah, if you do I’LL buy it!!
i used to get rid of everything
ha
still do
drives my wife crazy
once traded 5 ray charles singles
to eric bacher for
pair of boots
pat works paid my way to
long beach blues festival
cuz my auntie let us stay at
her house up there
chris mathis gave me
something last week
and i still got it on the mantle
Ummmmmm … Wow. Wow.
A colleague just sent me this. Phew. Read it when you’re near tissues.
PS: He took pity on me and sent me a happier coda. But … Wow.
Double WOW!! In the future I’ll avoid links. Wow!
>>In the future I’ll avoid links. Wow!
Bruce: I warned you!
i thought it was beautiful…sad, but beautiful…