My husband recently began a vinyl collection, complete with new turntable. He's got a very specific taste in music, his current collection ranges from Fleetwood Mac to Tuck and Patti to Japanese 70s rock band Happy End). Thankfully his taste has a musical theatre crossover, so he's encouraging my interest in collecting some of my favorite OBCs as well as some that never made the digital. (I love my CD collection and I'm never getting rid of it so there).
The fun thing about this new hobby is the great "find." Today we opened a sealed Merrily We Roll Along OBC and I couldn't help getting chills. Here's this historic album that has a fairly big cult following but you can still find a mint copy from 1981 and we just opened it up today. Wild.
Besides this Merrily (which we listened to tonight) my greatest find was a few weeks back at a Rasputin in Pleasant Hill. I haven't allowed myself much in-person shopping during the pandemic but I had a few minutes before I had to pick up daughter #1 and daughter # 2 was with grandparents so I stopped in just to see what they had. I started fingering through the "Broadway A-G" and I found an Applause!
Side not about Applause: The regional theatre I basically grew up at did Applause when I was a fairly impressionable youth and it starred my hero and mentor as Margo Channing. It was my first real exposure to a real 70's aesthetic and I loved it. From the bright colors to the wild orchestrations I was hooked. Basically, I had an unhealthy obsession with the show from the time I was 13? Lauren Bacall, Len Cariou, a song called "Fasten Your Seatbelts" what's not to love? So I was excited to find it.
I took the vinyl gingerly out of the sleeve and noticed that I didn't think it looked too bad? My husband is already very discerning and I knew that if it wasn't good enough he wouldn't even let me play it on his fancy dancy turntable. Optimistically I put it back in the sleeve and held it in my lap as I continued my search. I saw some interesting titles and then happened on another Applause! Now I had to take this one out and look at it. It appeared to be cleaner than the first? I took it instead. Flip flip flip. A third Applause appears. What?! Pleasant Hill Rasputin for the win. This one had a gatefold and I almost just took it because of that, but then when I looked at the "media" (as the pros call it) it didn't look quite as nice as Applause #2. I should mention, these are all marked $1.95. A voice in my head said "just buy all three, $6 for 3 copies of Applause" but then I imagined the face of the poor employee checking me out and how I only had my half my masked face to explain what crazy thing I was doing... So I settled with copy #2. I also picked up a copy of Salad Days just because I liked the cover art...and it was also $1.95.
I get home and a few days go by till we can sit down and listen to my Applause find. Turned out it was a fantastic copy. Sound is incredible. Probably barely played. I was pretty pleased with myself and I now fancy myself a first rate collector.
It occurs to me that I set out to write one blog post and wrote another one completely...so stay tuned for part two of this exciting saga. Where I share my favorite Applause song as well as a list of my favorite songs from my favorite genre of musical theatre number: the Jazz Waltz.
Pins... to be continued.
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