Apr 8, 2025
Wilma - Wilma (1985)
seen from United States
seen from Russia
seen from Germany
seen from Yemen
seen from United States
seen from China
seen from France
seen from Canada
seen from Croatia
seen from Singapore
seen from Croatia
seen from Chile
seen from Russia
seen from Belarus
seen from Germany
seen from Australia
seen from United Arab Emirates
seen from United States
seen from Poland
seen from Sweden
Wilma - Wilma (1985)
Business card for New York City record store Hideout Records, acquired circa 1991.
After In Your Ear Records, Hideout Records is the retail establishment that probably ranks second in influence on my musical journey and record collection.
No, I wasn’t an employee at Hideout. I was something better: a next-door neighbor. That’s right, this record store was located literally steps away from the front door of my New York City apartment building. I passed the descending staircase to its basement location at least twice every single day, as it was directly in the path of my route to the West 4th street subway station and all points north and east.
Not only was Hideout Records situated in the most convenient location possible, behind the counter was an outwardly-circumspect, yet friendly and musically omnivorous clerk named Michael Carlucci. I was a bit in awe when I learned he was a guitarist in New Jersey jangle-pop band Winter Hours. Their music was played somewhat regularly by the alternative rock station I listed to in high school, WFNX. And I’d even seen them live, opening for Jack Frost (Grant McLennan of The Go-Betweens and Steve Kilbey of The Church) on their lone U.S. tour.
Perhaps not surprisingly, Mike’s knowledge and interests intersected with mine in a number of ways: UK post-punk, New Zealand indie and classic power pop. He was the one to set aside for me classic 7″es by Liliput (“Split / Die Matrosen“), The Go-Betweens (”Hammer the Hammer”) and The Chills (”Pink Frost”). Plus the two “Oddities” cassettes by The Clean, a scarce promo-only Big Star 7″... the list goes on. My record collection in indebted to the man for sure.
Mike went on to buy the store from the previous owner not long after I became a customer, renaming the place Subterranean Records. I’d stop by to browse and chat even after I moved out of that great apartment (a huge West Village studio with separate kitchen in an elevator building for $800/month!).
As best I can tell from online sleuthing, Subterranean Records closed sometime in 2008. But the real tragedy is that Mike passed away from a heart attack in 2015 at age 58. An ending far too soon from a true tri-state rock ‘n’ rock character and musical mentor.
Flipper “Sex Bomb” 1981. Subterranean Records. 7″ single b/w “Brainwash” on red vinyl. A couple of weeks ago I heard that Moby was selling his record collection (Moby: “I would rather you have them then me, because if you have them, you’ll play them, you’ll love them...the money will go to the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. So everybody wins. Well, except me, because now I don’t have any records.”) and I thought it would be hilarious to have a record once owned by Moby. (I should note I’m not a huge Moby fan though he does have a few songs I like.) I headed to his online record store to check out what was available. I got on about 20 minutes after it went live, found a few things but as I was browsing, items I had selected were disappearing from my cart. By the time I checked out I ended up with only his Flipper 45 and one other album and his inventory was way way down.
I have no idea where Moby picked up Flipper’s “Sex Bomb” so the chewed up condition of the sleeve could be a result of regular wear-and-tear at a used record shop or he has a shitty storage system.
Flipper was a fairly niche punk/experimental band but if any of their songs could be considered a hit, “Sex Bomb” was it. “In 1982, they were the toast of rock critics across the country with their post-hardcore punk masterpiece "Sex Bomb." Clocking in at over seven minutes, possessing one riff played over and over (and sloppier and sloppier), with vocalist Will Shatter screaming rather than singing (total lyrics: ‘She's a sex bomb/My baby/yeah’), it was a remarkable record: loud, proud, defiantly obnoxious, and relentlessly dumb. But in it's own gleeful and intentionally moronic way it was (and remains) a perfect record.” (Allmusic) It’s sludgy, chaotic, screamy and catchy as hell. The B-side, “Brainwash,” is lo-fi and hardcore punk fast with lots of long pauses and the only lyrics are choppy unfinished sentences that each finish with the line “Nevermind. Forget it. You wouldn’t understand anyway.” Very weird but very cool.
Kathleen Yearwood - Little Misery Birds (1996)
Longshoremen - Walk the Plank (1986)