Audiowood

I'm writing a story for my school paper about how vinyl has enjoyed a bit of a resurgence in the last few years. My interviews for the story have led me to talk to music critics, record store owners, audiophiles, producers, and engineers alike. After chatting with these folks I've made the decision to invest in a record player and start buying vinyl. At the recommendation of one of my interviewees, Patrick McNamara of Insound, I'm going to get the ION iPTUSB Turntable (picture above), which has a USB port for archiving vinyl on my computer. I'm super excited to buy it and I'm getting some new records so that I can start my collection off right.

While writing this story, I spent an obscene amount of time looking for interesting record players online. Probably the coolest players I found are by Audiowood. These turntables are constructed out of sturdy, aesthetically gorgeous chunks of tree. The table in the image above was built from redwood, and there are also tables created from reclaimed maple and slabs of walnut tree. I think my favorite one is called "Barky" (pictured below).


Learn more about Audiowood HERE.

Joe's Record Paradise

When my parents used to travel a lot, they would buy a record from each country/city they visited. Over their years of travel they amassed a fair amount of Indian and South American vinyl. It got to take up too much space though, so today my mom had me go through and pick out what I wanted to keep so that she could sell the rest. After I scoured for cool cover art and interesting music, we took the box of records to a store I'd never been to called Joe's Record Paradise.

When I used to play indoor soccer, I would pass this shop, but because of its small and poster-covered exterior and strip-mall location, I never thought anything of it. Turns out I was missing out. Inside the sticker-littered doors is a vinyl mecca. Rows of LPs, ranging from soul to blues to reggae to punk to rock line the floors and walls. There's also a fine CD collection. The vinyl is all pretty inexpensive. While my mom chatted with the man who was flipping though her albums for what he wanted to buy, I thumbed through the store's supply.

I ended up with a Johnny Cash album for $1.50, Talking Heads's Remain In Light for $8.00, and Joni Mitchell's Clouds for $4.50.

The man who had been helping us, Johnson, recommended we take the records he didn't buy a few doors down to a thirft store called the Wagging Tail (it supports the Humane Society), which we did. At this store, there was a nice vinyl selection with each record $1 a piece. I didn't pick anything out, but in the CD section I found Son Volt's Trace and The Replacements's Don't Tell a Soul.

I also got two hours of highway driving in! Overall a very productive day. Unfortunately, I now have to finish writing a research paper...