Another trip to used kids records and I picked about 20 albums.  Favs include The Call – Reconing and The Alarm-  Strength.

I’ve also started assembling the bits i’ll need to build a record cleaner.  I found a nice compact shop vac at good will.  More to follow.”

FACT:  The first and most important thing to do when playing a vinyl record is to clean it first!!!  This applies to brand new, unplayed ones, as well as vintage refugees previously played at fried chicken and barbecue bashes!!!

FACT:  Audiophile dealers and companies sell acceptable cleaning solutions at rediculously inflated prices!!!

FACT:  You can make the best vinyl record cleaner in your home for under $1.00 a gallon!!!

FACT:  A vacuum, semi-automatic record cleaning machine is indispensible and should be used by all serious record collectors and vinyl junkies!!!

My basic record cleaning recipes use just 3 ingredients: 1- distilled or reverse osmosis purified water, 2- grocery store, household cleaner, and 3- isopropyl alcohol.  They are available in all grocery stores and most convenience stores nationwide.  The household cleaner is basically the common ALL-PURPOSE cleaner/disinfectant sold in grocery stores under a propriatory store brand or national brand name (ie. LYSOL).  The active ingedient should be listed as alkyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium chloride and will range in concentration fro 0.1 to 1 %.  These come in many designer colors and scents which seem to change like the weather or seasons!!! The isopropyl alcohol is commonly available at 70 and 95 % concentrations.

The basic all-purpose recipe I use is a 5 % dilution of the house hold cleaner with distilled water. That is, 5 parts cleaner mixed with 95 parts water. The easiest way to make this is to buy a gallon of water, remove 8 ounces, then add 8 ounces of cleaner to the bottle and mix. This will make a 6 % solution which will work just fine.  The concentration can  vary a percent either way for excellent results.

I also make this cleaner with an addition of isopropyl alcohol to 2%.  I use this for brand new, very clean lps and to clean off any oily or greasy records.  I use 95% or absolute isopropyl alcohol and dilute it to around 2% with my basic recipe of diluted household cleaner (the recipe above). When using 70% dilute it to 3%.  The easiest way to make it is to add 2 or 3 parts isopropy alcohol to 100 parts of the all purpose recipe above. 

I  use these cleaners all the time and have had superb results with them for many years.  They are safe, easy and inexpensive to make. I clean all used records with both, using a squirt bottle, a LAST applicator pad, and a VPI vacuum cleaning machine. 

I clean the record first with the all-purpose solution (no alcohol) by placing the record on a raised circular support covered with an old turntable pad.  I apply a zig-zag line of cleaner over the record’s surface and wet the LAST pad. I spread the cleaner around the record by hand with the grooves and rub down the groove a few times in a counter clockwise direction. The record is then very wet and evenly covered with cleaner.  I then vacuum clean it on the VPI machine to remove the liquid.  For used and older records I usually clean the record again using the alcohol containing cleaner in the same way.  It may seem overly time consuming to clean all your records this way but it is well worth the effort. 

FINAL FACT:  You will get the maximum listening pleasure from your records and will keep your needles clean and last for a longer time!

Walked to meet Mona after work, I stopped by Used Kids and found some 80s favs in the dollar bin.

I’ve been looking for “new” newwave found a great resource. 

http://www.nwoutpost.com/default.asp

http://www.80s.com/default.html

http://www.electricdreamsclub.com/

http://www.newwavecity.com/

Excert:

New Wave’s older siblings, Punk and Power Pop, surfaced during the latter half of the 70’s and helped ignite what was to become one of the biggest musical explosions of the last 20 years, certainly in terms of creativity and diversity. Disco and early electropop pioneers—namely Giorgio Moroder and Kraftwerk—made their mark on new wave as well. While disco revolutionized dance music, widespread backlash forced it into the underground by the dawn of the eighties, leaving new wave to keep dance music afloat and the airwaves and club scene bristling with unheard of energy.

New wave proved to be breathtaking in its scope—it was hard to perceive where it began and ended, both chronologically and musically. I would venture that new wave music occupied the era from 1978 to 1986, after which there was a notable decline offset by movements such as Industrial and Acid House (both seeds of Techno) and the great rise in college indie rock (alternative rock). Musically, new wave should not be pigeonholed or written off simply as “skinny ties,” synthesizer geeks, new romantics, and pretentious, fashion-as-content bands. Certainly at the core of most new wave *was* an infectious dance beat or D.I.Y. energy, and more mainstream artists like Joe Jackson, Greg Kihn and rock veterans like David Bowie and The Kinks brushed the fringes of this musical tapestry. Movements like the more guitar-driven Power Pop often seemed to mesh virtually indistinguishably.

Movements and styles such as Synthpop (Depeche Mode, Yazoo, Human League, Soft Cell) and New Romantic (Ultravox, Visage, Classix Nouveaux, Spoons, Peter Godwin, early Talk Talk) were, to many, the defining styles of new wave. Gary Numan’s “Cars,” Soft Cell’s stark electronic take on “Tainted Love,” and The Human League’s “Don’t You Want Me” helped push this new futuristic synthesizer-driven sound into the US mainstream. New romanticism, on the other hand, never managed much of an impression in the US—it remained very much a European (and Canadian) movement. Despite the general inadequacy of pigeonholing, there were the other requisite, defining styles from the era: Goth (Siouxsie & The Banshees, The Cure, Specimen, Bauhaus), Postpunk (The Chills, Gang of Four, The Sound, Joy Division, Comsat Angels), Ska (Madness, The Specials, The English Beat, The Untouchables, Bad Manners), Rockabilly (Dave Edmunds, Stray Cats, Polecats, The Cramps), and Power Pop (The Vapors, The Producers, 20/20, The Records). And still that’s only scratching the surface. Even Top 40 radio itself was fresher than it ever could hope to be. Hardly the same can be said today. 

Left with about 20 records amazing what you find in the dollar bin! Guy at the counter was very helpful and recommended two sites for old records