Big Dreams

Finding a variant of a a record you love and still need is great. Finding a variant of a record you love and still need at a reasonable price (single digit price tag in this case!) is awesome. Finding a variant of a record you love and still need at a reasonable price in combination with domestic shipping and no customs fees attacheis the best. 

 

Big Kids rule, listen to Hoop Dreams.  

2nd Press on Clear Red w/ Black Streaks on Topshelf /300

Big Kids

A while ago a very good friend of mine tagged me in a post on Facebook in which he‘d posted a bunch of emo bands. One of the bands he‘d chose was Big Kids. He tagged me because I was the one who introduced him to the band. As a matter of fact, I recently turned on one of my bandmates to the band when we were on a long drive a couple of weeks ago. Two people in roughly ten years, not bad, but also not great. I‘ve been a longtime proponent time proponent of the band and Hoop Dreams easily makes my all-time top 5 of emo/indie records, but I feel like I‘m one of only a few people who are really into that record and that’s exactly why I‘ll never get tired of singing its praises. 

After my friend had tagged me, I started looking on Discogs what other versions of Hoop Dreams are out there. Looking turned into putting a pink copy into my shopping basket and after I admitted to myself that I was just kidding myself by pretending not wanting to buy it, I clicked on ‘Place order and buy now‘. There‘s only a few variants out there (good old 2000s…) and all of them are cheap, at least until you factor in shipping from the States ($8.75 for the record turns into $56 total…). So that keeps me from buying more copies right now. However, this great looking pink copy was available from a seller in Europe and for less than 10€ I couldn‘t say no. 

1st Press on Pink Marble on Topshelf /250

The Bend In The Collection

The main reason why I hit up Marcus in the first place was that I‘d found a copy of a Dangers LP I didn‘t have yet. There was a seller in the UK that sold the clear/purple version of Danger‘s The Bend In The Break for a reasonable price. What‘s more important, there was a copy for sale to begin with because for some reason that particular variant doesn‘t pop up very often. I bought the black and green copies when the record was released back in 2016 and a couple of years ago I also managed to acquire a test press, but for some reason that clear-purple split eluded me for the longest time. Anyway, I finally got one and for a brief moment I thought that this collection was complete, but then I learned that there is a record release variant out of 30. It never ends. 

Family picture time. 

Test Press #6/20
Clear/Purple Halves /101
Green /415
Black /1518

The Bend In The Break

I saved the best for last. I was waiting for this record to happen for a really long time and as with every Dangers release, this LP had to grow on me. There were always songs on every record that immediately got me me, but the LPs as a whole always took a while to fully convince me. Great songs and the overall packaging is done really well. Thick booklet with the lyrics and some great pics by Al, the singer. Love the artwork, too. This is my pick for Record of the Year. Best for last. It proves right again.