Road Trip Update #1 – The Kosherican and The soul of Soul Strut
Day 1: We started by loading the car full of everything we would need to showcase some of the great vinyl collectors we planned to meet along our cross country route, travelling first to Philly.
We travelled from Brooklyn through thunder, lightning and rain to reach Fishtown (Philadelphia, PA) where we stepped into the vibrant, story filled and eclectic home of Aaron “The Koshrican” Levinson.
During the hours that followed he shared his passion for collecting not only by playing us his favorite songs but through funny and history rich stories. He shared some of his most prized gems with us including some foot stomping Funk, beautiful African Salsa and a few once in a lifetime rare finds.
He played each song on a shrine like set up topped by Mitchell “Transcriptor” Turntable (featured in Kubrick’s “A Clockwork Orange”), including an archival cartridge typicaly used by the library of congress. We took down notes as fast as possible so we wouldn’t miss a single detail from the digging and collecting stories he told us about.
It turns out however that Aaron is not only a collector but a creator. He told us about his reaction to finding one of his own creations, a mixtape of his favorite Parliament songs, made into a bootleg LP compilation in a record store years after making the tape.
We finished the day by filming Aaron next to his piano while he described how it will soon be turned into a unique record storage cabinet. All in all an amazing and not long enough visit with a collector we hope to meet again with. Even after hours with the Kosherican we felt like we had barely scratched the surface…
Day 2: After driving through the city streets of Brooklyn and Philly it was a change of scene to meet our next collector, Raj of the legendary Soul Strut website. In the green rolling hills of Perkasie, PA, he and his beautiful family opened up their amazing converted barn home and we began to snap shots as Raj pulled out some of his super valuable $1 bin finds to play for us.
He also shared some records he was turned onto thanks to his long activity at Soustrut. In the background of the pictures we captured you can see the makings of a classic “man cave”- countless guitars, a sparkle green drum kit, vintage amps, lots of space and two dogs!
A short drive to Allentown, PA puts us at Double Decker Records where we hide our 3rd giveaway. Jamie the owner and Ray, welcomed us to the store for some Jazz, Funk and Disco digging.
Next Stop – Pittsburgh, PA
and Lily is still drinking coffee!!!
Already looking forward to the next post…
Good start !
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I use soul strut all the time and raj is a great dude with mad knowledge…nice to see him get represented