This was my sixth trip to McComb, I stopped in the day before the job to drop off my heavy equipment and noticed a thrift store and made a note to stop in when the drop was complete. I was not disappointed.
I found a total of four Eng records – two of which I had – and made away with the remainder. One was ‘My Love’ (one of the greatest Eng covers) and the other was his final album for Epic (it’s pretty bad, and I am a hardcore fan). There was many, many 45s….since I don’t care for those that much I half heartedly went through them just to pass the time.
I’d estimate I actually went through about 33% and in that time I found four Eng 7″, two of which were jukebox 45s aka minialbums (5-6 songs on 33rpm). I am working on collecting these – one of them (Engelbert Humperdinck) I already have , with the picture sleeve. The other (The Last Waltz) I don’t have but I wasn’t keen on buying it as a naked platter. Both however were interesting really old looking blue Parrot labels I’ve never seen before. I went back to make sure the other two LPs I left behind (The Last Waltz and Release Me) weren’t mono (neither was) then moved on. I left the four Eng 45s separate from the rest in the hopes that another rabid collector will find them and be grateful for my work. 
I came across a copy of Ray Price ‘For the Good Times‘ and was very tempted to buy it – I have a dub and I enjoy it, and I seem to come across this often. I decided not to in the end but before I rendered that decision, I checked the vinyl to make sure it was intact and not wrecked. There was inexplicably a second Ray Price LP in the same jacket! Bizarre!
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| I found a couple LPs with these ‘notes’ on them. The previous owner used masking tape and wrote down which songs were good/bad….pretty weird. |
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| Came across this gem, autographed and all! |
As I went to leave, I mentioned to the proprietor that whomever she obtained this collection of records from had taste similar to my own, and I commend him/her. She told me it was her neighbor, who lives nearby. She said this person gives her records on consignment and periodically comes in to swap them out with new ones. Vaguely interested in this process, I commented as much. Then she added something like ‘oh, he has lots of records….I’d say about a million’. I wasn’t sure how to react. Was she serious? Before I could say anything (not sure I was even going to) she went on to say that he had an entire building on his property filled to the brim with records, and that said structure also contained an elevator. With that, I no longer cared if it was an exaggeration, a lie, whatever. I asked if she would pass on my name and number, because I’d like to check this place out.
Well what do you know…a few days after I got home I got a call……I returned this voicemail and we had a long discussion in excess of 15 minutes. Suffice to say, when I head back out this way, I’ll be calling my friend Terry up and trying to see his Castle of Records! And when I do – I will share it here.
