Friends, roamers, record-hunters…
Welcome to Issue 02 of You Dig?, your monthly low-down on all that’s cool from the Dust & Grooves HQ and the incredible vinyl community around us.
This month’s lovely cover art comes from London-based artist and illustrator Zoë Baxter, who’s been digging for records since she was twelve. Zoë also DJs as Lucky Cat Zoë, regularly spinning East Asian sounds, vintage soul and reggae at cool vinyl bars like Spiritland, and also for Resonance FM. She’s featured in Dust and Grooves Vol 2, plus there’s a full interview coming soon on the website.
Eilon’s been hella busy in the month that Dust and Grooves Vol 2 and Portables finally get out into the wild. Have you ordered yours yet? If not, they’re going fast! Get the inside track on everything launch-related going down in this month’s Editorial Notes, from the equally industrious Fiona.
Moving onto Dust & Grooves Curates, the real meat of You Dig?, and we’ve got a treat for you in this issue. Yale Evelev, co-owner of Luaka Bop, shares a bunch of super-cool recs from his personal shelves (which he once ironically called “the largest collection of records that nobody’s interested in”). Based on the music we’ve dug into off the back of Yale’s picks, we couldn’t disagree more. But judge for yourself below. Taking over guest curator duties next month will be: Mafalda Daniel.
And that’s it! Two issues into You Dig? and we hope you’re, well… digging it.
Got anything you’d like to see more or less of? Drop us a line.
Rich Headland
Resident Editor
Vinyl Quotes
“My favorite DJs are diverse; my favorite kinds of sets are diverse. All of my sets have new and old music in them. I feel like I’m building bridges between the past and present.”
–Melissa Dueñas
Dust & Grooves Curates
by Yale Evelev
I’m Yale Evelev.
In 1990 (!) David Byrne hired me to run a record label he started called Luaka Bop. (We sort of knew each other – I had my own record label called ICON and had worked at the Brooklyn Academy of Music; I had sent David some records I put out and booked him at BAM.) In 2003, he had had enough of having a record label and backed away, sharing ownership with me but becoming non-involved. I was afraid when I was a music-loving kid that working with music would ruin it for me, but it’s the opposite. The fact that I am involved with music every day is one of my life’s joys. It was/is also a joy working at a label where the focus is on a well-known performer (David).
I used to think labels were important, but I don’t feel that way anymore. Only the music and musicians who make it are important
Arthur Jafa: Not All Good, Not All Bad
Heroes and Villains: Long-form interviews that caught my eye
Artist and filmmaker Arthur Jafa talks about things I don’t even know I’m thinking about, in this fascinating interview from 2019.
From the Discogs ‘Dollar Bin’
Economy Class. Amazing finds from the $1 bin
I have enough records really, so if I’m at home in NYC I just want the very specific record I want… I have swapped the dollar bin for Discogs. I might actually be buying dollar-bin records, just unfortunately paying more than a dollar for them!
Hey! I realize I’m listening to a dollar-bin record at this very moment–Major Lance’s The Major’s Back. And now that I’m rummaging around my stacks, here’s a couple more dollar albums; David Ruffin, Me ’n Rock ’n Roll Are Here To Stay, Chakachas Jungle Fever, Barbara Acklin Love Makes A Woman, People’s Choice Boogie Down U.S.A.
The Label Boss’ Favorite Labels
Hello, I Love You: Labels we dig
Even though I no longer think labels are as important as they were, there are some I am still impressed by. Peanut Butter Wolf’s label, Stones Throw, to me has this incredibly diverse catalog of people making music now, like Jerry Paper. Super props to PBW.
Scottie and David of International Anthem have managed, through incredible hard work, to highlight a slew of artists all making interesting music. Every record seems to be worth your time–that’s a crazy level of quality.
Euen Fryer is just one guy, but the amount of re-issues on his label, Athens of the North, is incredible. Plus leftfield artists making music that sounds nothing like the records he reissues.
Visceral Vintage Kit
Listen to This. Mixtapes and aural pleasures
I don’t listen to mixtapes, I don’t listen to much that isn’t an album. But one thing I am interested in is sound reproduction–and in particular the era of sound reproduction that uses tubes, idler wheel turntables and horn speakers. To me that stuff creates a visceral connection to the music recorded. Here’s how it started. One day our belt-drive Rega turntable gave up the ghost at the office. I remembered an interview where Egon had talked about his Thorens 124 turntable. So intriguing! But too expensive for me, so I found there was a cheaper alternative, a Thorens 135. This was the lower-level, home version. I found one on ebay. When it came in I set it up, put on a Bohannon record and both Eric Welles Nystrom and I here in the office went “Woah!” The richness of the sound! So crazy. This sent me on a quest for all sorts of vintage equipment…
Three folks that still seem to be making this sort of old-school hi-fi (some of it ridiculously expensive, so just something to listen to), are Jeff Jackson, Devon Turnbull at Ojas, and Jonathan Weiss at OMA.
[Rich] Ahhh man, you’re sending me down an expensive vintage vinyl rabbit hole… I’m gonna push you on a mixtape to check out too–there’s gotta be something?
[Yale] Again I don’t really listen to many mixes, however my son Cole played this really nice one in the car when we were going to visit my mom. He got this from a friend of his in Australia, Jackson Fester, who makes wonderful music as Cousin.
The Inexorable March of Microculture
Dig Deeper. Get lost in music.
The only Substack I subscribe to is Ted Gioia’s, and this post on the battle between macroculture and microculture is the shit. Ted is someone who makes you think about where we are even if you don’t always agree with him. My whole life has been a battle between the macroculture and the microculture, only I never thought of it that way until he writes here about how the microculture is having a moment. Or at least an opening. Yay!
Embracing Cosmic Chaos
Books Are Magic. Music books that are not Dust & Grooves.
Cosmic Scholar: The Life and Times of Harry Smith The great John Szwed takes a deep dive into Harry Smith, the eccentric Beat tastemaker and polymath who is, in some way, like all the people reading this newsletter but (much) more so.
Easily Slip into Another World: A Life in Music I’ve been reading a lot about the era when I moved to NYC, the 1970s. Certainly Henry Threadgill’s book is that. He points out that it was a time when artists from all disciplines moved to New York, worked with, and influenced each other.
A Strange Celestial Road: My Time in the Sun Ra Arkestra Ahmed Abdullah (with Louis Reyes Rivera) writes brilliantly about being in Sun Ra’s band… where else can you get the inside scoop on that?
The Gospel According to Luaka Bop
Plug Me In, Scotty! Props to the DG community and beyond.
We’ve been releasing some albums from two gospel groups at Luaka Bop these days – The Staples Jr Singers and, coming up, Annie and the Caldwells. The groups are both from Mississippi and still actively touring, though their sound is not particularly current. The Staples Jrs are kind of soul-blues-gospel circa 1970s and Annie & the Caldwells are more disco-gospel circa 1980s. If you go down to Mississippi there are signs from a blues trail around, but really a blues trail is a tourist construct, not really that active a musical style. Gospel on the other hand… It has been fun to learn about a new-to-us world.
Also, we released a box set of the seminal Pharoah Sanders album Pharoah. We had talked with Pharoah about playing the music on this album live and then he passed. So we’ve put together a constantly shifting group of musicians to play the epic track of the album, “Harvest Time”. Led by music director Joshua Abrams and always including the ghostly legendary guitar player on the original album Tisziji Munoz. We have done shows at many of the important jazz festivals in Europe, and will be doing more this fall and next year. Each show is different as the personal changes – some are out like the Fire Music of the late 60s and some are calm.
In My Bag for Random Nights
We Love Lists. Top 5 records on my deck this month
Funnily enough though I don’t really ever have a record bag, I do at the moment. I only play records publicly for random events, so I am really entertaining myself when I do. I will say I have given a lot of thought to the way DJs move (dance?) when they’re playing records (as I don’t really), and I realize that it’s part of the performance… Your public enjoyment of the records you’re playing as a way to tip the listener/watchers what they should be feeling.
Paul Bley – “Mr Joy”
Gun Morgan – “I Love You, Africa”
Ennio Morricone – “Two Mules For Sister Sara”
Bebeto – Os Grandes Sucessos
Joe Pass – Better Days
Everything Old is New
New Releases. Catching my eye right now.
To me, there are no longer old records and new records. Everything these days exists concurrently. But here are some new(ish) records I’m enjoying.
Jerry Paper – Free Time (Stones Throw, 2022)
Son Los Grillos – Garden of Clouds(Discos Monterey, 2017)
Chuck Senrick – Dreamin’ (private press, 1977, re: Numero Group, 2023)
Clairo – Charm (Clairo, 2024)
Mmm with Emerson Kitamura – Chasing Giants (Bubblingnotes, 2019)
Get Out!
Put your phone down and feed your soul with live events
I don’t really go out. So I asked Cole and he said Mansions (Queens), Night Moves(Brooklyn), Nowadays (Brooklyn), Jimmy’s Corner (Manhattan). [DG team: The ‘Mister Sunday’ sessions at Nowadays this month include tasty takeovers from Soul Summit and Theo Parrish.]
Other picks from the DG crew:
London: Decisive Sounds x Late Night Essentials x Kooky Ken 6th October at Corsica Studios. A full-fat line-up for this night at the legendary venue, with standouts being Bowyer & Picasso, and Sam Bangura.
Amsterdam: It’s ADE: Amsterdam Dance Event later in the month (16-20 October). It’s unmissable, with US legends like Carl Craig, Louie Vega and Moodymann doing battle with Europe’s best dance DJs across various venues. DJ Dave Clarke also shows his photography chops at the Leica Gallery.
Recovery Sunday
Let’s kill more time and reassure ourselves with high-brow viral scrolling
OK, Instagram is what TV used to be for me (just more so)–a complete and enjoyable waste of time. Here are some people not talking about themselves:
Rob Martinez reviews local restaurants (that look pretty good) and meets the cooks.
Vik Muiz is an artist, who has an artist’s Instagram vision.
Thejazzestate I’m not going to go look for videos of people I’m familiar with, but that doesn’t mean I’m not interested in seeing them.
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Our Cover Artwork
It’s The Warm Sound, It Can’t Be Topped by Zoë Baxter
This month’s lovely cover art comes from London-based artist and illustrator Zoë Baxter.
We would like to thank Yale once again for his fantastic recommendations and his unbeatable attitude to life. Love you, Yale! ❤️
Next month, we are super pleased to have our dear friend Mafalda as our guest editor for You Dig? It’s gonna be sunny!
Be Our Next Cover Artist!
Friends, we’re calling all music-loving visual artists for our brand-new newsletter, You Dig? For every copy, we feature a different artist for the cover art—could this be you? We know that we’re a talented community, so we would love to see submissions to be included in the next issue. Contact us for more info on the submission process here.
Dust & Grooves Memberships and Support
By now, we’re sure you can see how much love goes into Dust & Grooves. It’s a pure passion project, and Eilon has worked super hard to keep it an independent endeavor—always completely ad-free. This has been going for over a decade, and in that time Dust & Grooves has seen the building of a genuinely great community that celebrates record collecting, and one that has a huge love of music. We absolutely love to see it, and it means a lot to us.
We’re going to kindly ask that you consider to continue this support by looking at becoming a paid member, or make a one-time donation. There are some real groovy benefits to this and discounts on a range of merch, lovely!
Your support means we can preserve the culture we all cherish.
Dust & Grooves Books
Order Now.
Dust & Grooves Vol. 2
Further Adventures in Record Collecting – First Limited Edition
Renowned photographer and publisher Eilon Paz returns after the successful release of Dust & Grooves: Adventures In Record Collecting. For Volume Two, Paz highlights the planet’s biggest proponents of vinyl collecting, bridging stunning images with extensive interviews, revealing the motives and backstories behind the global vinyl community. Ten years after the first release, with vinyl sales skyrocketing and a booming popularity among Gen-Zs, Volume Two digs deeper than its predecessor, underscoring gorgeous collections from astute everyday enthusiasts to venerated DJs, musicians, and producers. Veteran journalist and editor David Ma handles the editorial end to this sequel, making Volume Two a cultural leader in the field, expertly accentuating the world’s unifying devotion to vinyl.
Tailor made for lovers of world-class photography, novice and expert collectors, and music obsessives alike.
Foreword by Prince Paul
Includes interviews with A-Trak, DaM Funk, Quantic, DJ Spinna, Kid Koala, Don Letts, Andy Votel, Mayer Hawthorne and more.
First limited edition of 4000 copies.
Ships locally from 5 main warehouses. US, Canada, Europe (Belgium), UK and Australia.
Portables
A Visual & Historical Exploration of 222 Vintage Portable Turntables
A 470-page hardcover book featuring highly detailed photos and comprehensive research on 222 portable vinyl record players, sourced from the collections of Paola Puente, Kalle Aldis Laar, Eric Cohen, Bas Bogerd and Mark Cruz.
Once considered little more than a children’s plaything or a grade school accessory, the portable record player has gained newfound respect in recent years. Whatever they may lack in high-end audio fidelity, battery-powered turntables more than make up for it with their convenience and ease of use. Just ask any crate digger: a cult favorite portable like the Columbia GP-3 or the Audio-Technica Sound Burger (or even the Fisher-Price Big Bird model) can be an absolutely essential companion on an all-day vinyl hunt.
Portables features lavish, detailed photos of 222 portable turntables from around the world, including rare record players from Japan, the UK, Germany and the Soviet Union as well as the USA, and ranging in vintage from the 1920s to the early twenty-first century. They’re all gorgeously captured here by photographer Eilon Paz, with accompanying commentary from music historian Dan Epstein.
Whether you’re a hardcore turntable collector, an aficionado of cool vintage audio gear, a student of industrial design, or a vinyl lover curious about the wild world of portable record players, Portables will make your head spin—and will soon have you scouring thrift stores, antique malls, and even your grandma’s attic for the portable record player of your dreams.
Dust & Grooves: Vol. 1 & 2
Deluxe Limited Box Set
A deluxe slipcase box set of Dust & Grooves Vol. 1 (10th Anniversary Edition) & Vol. 2.
Includes:
4mm cardboard slipcase with foil stamping and blind deboss
The Dust & Grooves Sleeveface Poster
