So we received a few vinyl titles on Sundazed: Dylan, Love, Paul Butterfield, The Byrds. $21.99 each. We have access to their full catalog and will bring in more over the coming weeks and months.

We also received one copy of Jacaszek's Treny. If you're not familiar with the title, and I imagine that's most people, it's a unique oddity. Released in 2008 on CD, it only recently got a very limited release on vinyl. Rather than fail at describing it myself, here are some things others have said about it that I found on the Google: "one of the most affecting and beautiful records I’ve heard, of any genre" (17dots); "surely one of the most impressive, mystical and astonishing albums of the year - we just cannot imagine that anyone listening to it will fail to be utterly bowled over and taken in" (boomkat); "Simply put, vocalist Maja Sieminska, violinist Stefan Wesolowski, cellist Ania Smiszek-Wesolowska, and arranger/producer Michal Jacaszek have created a tour de force, and most likely my pick for album of the year" (Coke Machine Glow), "a modern classical marvel that immediately jumps to the top of my favorites for this year" (mog.com).

As with most of the non-mainstream vinyl titles I've been bringing into the store, I'm a big fan of this record, and recommend it to any music lover. I think anyone into modern / 20th century classical, ambient, or electronic music will love the record, or at the very least find it a worthwhile purchase. $25.

The album is best appreciated as a whole, but here's a video of the band performing one of the album tracks live.

So we've got stock on Nadja's Radiance of Shadows, Touched, and Truth Becomes Death.

Each is a 2XLP limited to 750 copies. Though Nadja's a Toronto-based band, they're now living in Berlin and the vinyl editions of these records (gorgeously packaged) were put out by Belgian label Conspiracy Records, so not only are they limited, they're imports. The artwork on each includes embossed outersleeves with cut-out and heavy full colour innersleeves with pictures by Seldon Hunt.

Pitchfork gives Radiance of Shadows an 8.2 outta 10 and says it's Nadja's "best album to date" and I have to say I agree. This is not weak praise as the duo has released some terrific stuff. Pitchfork continues, saying it's "a series of warm-ups, cool-downs, and sprints that turn those sounds into a dramatic marathon through steep hills. A vortex of instability ... exhausting."

Of Touched, Pitchfork says: "as strident as it is meticulous, its Swans sense of purpose and volume attached to an almost symphonic use of motion. Even when things are still, there's an intense undercurrent just below the surface. That's as true in classical music as it is in some of the best noise, and on the explosive Touched, Nadja bridges its taste for both." They give it a 7.9.

Truth Becomes Death gets a 7.5: "Heavy and abstract, Nadja plow the increasingly popular territory being laid out between slow metal and staticy ambiance."

We only brought in a couple of each of the albums so if you want them, act now. We can't get more stock on these. Both Touched and Truth Becomes Death are out of print so you can't get them thru the label. Radiance of Shadows is still in print as it's a recent pressing. However, it's 16 Euro, which is about $25, but then there's shipping... we're selling each for $24.99.

We've been replenishing the CD and DVD stock pretty well since the sale and two days ago we received 10 or so new Blu-Ray titles.

Yesterday we received a large shipment of vinyl as well. Click the title to read a review:

Nirvana's Smells Like Teen Spirit (180g)
Bonnie Prince Billy's Beware
Jim O'Rourke's Eureka
Metric's new album, Fantasies
Husker Du's New Day Rising
James Blackshaw's The Glass Bead Game (comes with CD - hear an mp3)
Bill Callahan's Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle (beautiful record, by the way)
Betty Davis' first two LPs: Betty Davis and They Say That I'm Different
James Carr's You Got My Mind Messed Up and A Man Needs a Woman
Sonny Rollins' The Bridge (180g)
Wilco's latest, Wilco
Stars of the Lid's Avec Laudenum
Black Flag's Damaged
Fennesz's Black Sea
Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells
Leonard Cohen's early catalog (Songs Of, Songs From a Room, Songs of Love and Hate, Live Songs, and New Skin for the Old Ceremony), all 180g
Jay Reatard's Blood Visions and Matador Singles '08

Fans of The Smiths may have heard that their first four albums have all been re-released on 180g vinyl in limited runs of 1000 copies world-wide. Vortex brought in stock of all the titles. I called around to the other major shops in town and could only find one other store that managed to receive some... and at our price of $39.99 each, we're $6 cheaper per record than they are.

Speaking of prices... we've been told that there's a store downtown who advertises that it's a "fact" that they have the cheapest vinyl in town. I compared 35 of the titles we've brought in, chosen at random, and we were cheaper on 34 of them, most by $2 per and some as high as $5. The only one we weren't cheaper on our prices were matched. (Incidentally, I called that store yesterday and at that point they hadn't gotten any of these Smiths titles--the clerk didn't even to seem to be aware of their existence.) So, I won't say we're the cheapest in town as I haven't been to every store to check, but I will say that I'm certain we're cheaper than every store that I have checked.

Back to The Smiths... obviously because of the small print run, we will not be getting any more stock on these so you should pop in now.

A few other vinyl arrivals to report:

Bibio's Ambivalence Avenue is is getting rave reviews and is now available.

Earth's Radio Live LP is in. 180g vinyl. Limited to 3000 copies.

We recieved two Mono LPs: Gone and Hymn to the Immortal Wind. The latter is the Japanese band's latest album, and it's a 2xLP. Here's an MP3 of the track Ashes in the Snow.

Gone's full title is Gone: A Collection of EP's 2000-2007 and that's exactly what it is: Mono's super-rare EPs collected onto three LPS. Allmusic calls the compilation "incredibly majestic ... cinematically lush ... gorgeous".

We also received restock of Explosions in the Sky's first two TR releases: Those Who Tell the Truth... (MP3) and The Earth is Not a Cold Dark Place (MP3) and restock of Dinosaur Jr's latest, Farm (MP3), all of which sold out soon after we got them last time.

Note: All new vinyl will be 10% off during our annual summer sale!