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Last week I wrote about an interesting collection call, and somewhere in there I noted that while I often have fun on these trips, it can go sideways just as often. That happened earlier this week. Sometime last week, we got a message via Sorry State’s Facebook page about an interesting-looking collection. The person sent videos of themselves flipping through the records and they seemed like good titles in good condition, and they said they were flexible on price and mainly concerned with getting the records out of their house rather than getting a ton of money for them. All that sounded great to me. As we were talking, they mentioned they were on this island called Ocracoke on North Carolina’s Outer Banks, which happens to be my and my wife’s favorite beach. Ocracoke isn’t easy to get to—there’s no bridge, so you have to reach the island by ferry—and, assuming I wouldn’t be willing to make the trip, they offered to ship the records to me. They also mentioned me paying a deposit before they shipped the records, which was a bit of a red flag. I told them I didn’t think it was a good idea to send money to a stranger, but that since my wife and I like Ocracoke so much, I’d be willing to drive out there and pick up the records. They said they were fine with that, but then I was on the road for a few days and wasn’t able to reply to any of their messages. They pinged me on Saturday and asked what was up, and I told them I was ready to schedule a time to come out to the island.
While all this was going on, I couldn’t shake the feeling there was something fishy going on. Asking me to make a payment up front was a red flag, but the flip videos of the records seemed legit. So far the evidence was inconclusive, so I investigated further. The Facebook profile that was sending these messages was locked and had no public information aside from a couple of photos that were so pixelated you couldn’t really distinguish the person’s features. I tried searching for the person’s (very common-sounding) name along with keywords like “Ocracoke,” but couldn’t turn up any solid information. The whole thing seemed weird, and I kept telling other folks the whole story in the hope they’d have some kind of insight about whether or not I should trust this person.
Then, on Sunday afternoon, they wrote me again to ask if I could come pick up the records on Monday. Along with the message, they sent a photo of the records boxed up in their kitchen, ready to go. I told them that should be fine, but I needed to check my calendar and talk to my wife to make sure I could get away, and that I’d message them back shortly. I messaged them back about an hour later confirming I could come. I waited through the afternoon and into the evening for a reply, checking my messages constantly, but never heard anything back. Of course my wife Jet wanted to come with me and sneak in some beach time, so she was bugging me to figure out what we were going to do. I wanted to wait for their reply, but a ferry to the island and a place to stay the night (it’s too long of a trip to make it there and back to Raleigh in a day) had to be booked ahead of time. I showed Jet our conversation and she also wasn’t really sure what to make of the whole thing, but she really wanted to go to the beach and she said the worst case scenario was that we would end up at our favorite beach with nothing to do. So I booked the trip and messaged the person to tell them I was coming.
We got up at 6AM Monday morning in order to drive across the state and catch the 10AM ferry we’d booked. Literally as we are driving onto the ferry, the person writes back and says they can’t meet today after all. I told them I’d be on the island until 2PM on Tuesday, and if they could find 30 minutes for me to look at their records and load them up, I’d be available at any time. They didn’t write back the entire time we were on the island. This morning (Wednesday) I finally got a reply saying they could ship the records if I paid them $500 up front. Ugh. Now it’s their turn not to get a reply.
So, the worst case scenario came to pass, and obviously it wasn’t bad. Jet and I got to spend a little bit of time on the beach and eat some good food, and our dog Patti had an absolute blast. I’m way behind on work now, but I’ll live. I just have a lot of stuff I need to get done before my actual planned beach vacation next week.
As Jet and I were driving home, she asked me to pick what to listen to next, and browsing her Spotify, I came across Solid Space’s Space Museum, which I hadn’t listened to in some time. Space Museum originally came out on cassette in 1982, but I first heard about it in 2012, when Sorry State carried a vinyl bootleg of the tape. As I remember, that bootleg was distributed mostly within the punk/hardcore world and a bunch of minimal synth heads must have missed out on it, because it wasn’t long before the bootleg was selling for hundreds of dollars on Discogs. Thankfully the mighty Dark Entries gave Space Museum the official reissue it deserved in 2017. I try to keep that in stock as much as possible, but it looks like we’re sold out right now. As for me, I decided to keep my bootleg rather than upgrading to the official reissue. It sounds great and works just fine for me.
While we were listening to Space Museum, Jet asked what this style of music is called. I told her I usually hear Solid Space called minimal synth, but that never quite made sense to me because the synth isn’t really at the center of the arrangements. The music is minimal and there is synthesizer, but the synths are generally there more as background texture, with the vocals and guitars holding down most of the melody. It definitely wouldn’t be the same without the synths, but if you’re expecting pure bleep bloop, you might be disappointed. If you love great post-punk pop songs, though, Space Museumis absolutely brilliant. Every song is different from the last, but all of them are equally brilliant. Give it a listen if you haven’t heard it before.
Until next week, watch out for the scammers…