B-Sides in the Bins #32 – Mad City Music – Madison, WI 9/27/08

The Tortoise show at Snake on the Lake started at 3PM in Madison, but Erik, Shawn and I weren’t interested in all of the opening acts, so we decided to hit a record store before meeting up with Tom, our taper friend. We stopped at Mad City Music which I’ve been to a couple of times. The first time Erik and I went there it was for a small Camper Van Beethoven in-store which was really cool.

This was a pretty fruitful trip in that I picked up some amazingly pristine copies of Tom Petty albums. Like freakishly mint, really. No ringwear or sleeve wear of any sort. They looked like they just shipped from the plant and were taken out of the cellophane! In addition to the four records, I bought plastic sleeves for them.

Tom Petty is one of my long-time favorite artists. Of course, this means that I need to keep an eye out for other Tom Petty vinyl… Two of the records were upgrades. I gave the replaced copies to Erik.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers – Damn the Torpedoes (LP, MCA 5105, 1979)($3.00) The third album. First Top-40 record for the band, includes “Refugee” and “Don’t Do Me Like That.”

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers – Hard Promises (LP, Backstreet BSR 5160, 1981)($3.00) This was an upgrade for me. First record to hit Top-10 for Petty.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers – Long After Dark (LP, Backstreet BSR 5360, 1982)($3.00) First record with the late Howie Epstein on bass. The record was an attempt to repeat the formula of success by using Jimmy Iovine as producer. Sadly, it would not pan out. “You Got Lucky” was an MTV favorite, though.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers – Southern Accents (LP, MCA 5486, 1985)($4.00) Another upgrade for me. Rae got me my first copy for my birthday in 2006– that one was a corner-cut cutout record. The vinyl was immaculate, though. This was really the record that started my interest in Tom Petty, and probably the song “Rebel.” I started listening to this about the same time I got into the Del Fuegos, which would make sense. Lots of radio and video airplay for this one– “Rebel” and “Don’t Come Round Here No More.” Three songs were co-written with Dave Stewart of the Eurythmics.

What I didn’t buy: Carried to Dust by Calexico on used CD (I got this one on vinyl through Amazon), and two Dumptruck albums For the Country, and Positively Dumptruck on vinyl, and a Love Tractor LP on DBRecs. Jethro Tull’s Crest of a Knave (the album they won a Grammy in 1989 for Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance against Metallica!). If I get back to Mad City and the Dumptruck records are there, I will buy them. Based on the price stickers they’ve been there for a couple of years.