He's the Nancy to my Lee, Part 2

In preparation for Mr. Mark’s departure, we decided to go on one final road trip together in search of records. Several months ago, my good friend Brittany returned from a road trip telling tales of a "the coolest record store" she had ever been to, in Llano Texas of all places. Llano is a quaint small town populated almost entirely by old women and dudes with mustaches. It houses local businesses with names like Things N’ Such, and Chicken Bones. In the middle of downtown Llano, right behind the Burger Bar, you’ll find R.A.T.S., which stands for Records and Things Strange.

R.A.T.S. resides within a brick building that’s a 116 years old, and was at one time a bar and even more recently, a slaughterhouse. The rooms seem to endlessly sprawl from doorway to doorway, revealing a different surprise around every corner. The doorways themselves are nearly 10 feet tall and saddled with 8 inch thick doors, and the ceilings are metal and rusty.

As you navigate the labyrinth of antiques and pop culture oddities, you’ll find rooms with old board games in them like Murder to Go, rooms filled with old issues of Playboy and sports memorabilia, not to mention the room with the ugly concert t-shirts (Wynonna Judd, the Cranberries, etc.) and the "Last Action Hero" standee.







The air conditioning situation leaves a lot to be desired, unless you’re standing in the turntable/VCR (an excellent pairing by the way) room which contains the store’s only A/C unit.

The store is ran by a man in his late 50’s/early 60’s who used to run a store in Arlington called Crazy Wax. After a lifetime of collecting records, he moved to Llano to retire and opted to sell off his collection piece by piece rather than online, citing "I’m a collector, not a dealer," although he will sell the occasional record individually over the phone or online.

When Mr. Mark & I walked inside, we saw the owner sitting behind his desk in the corner. After a polite greeting, we slowly entered the room directly across from the front door. The immense scope of the wall-to-wall vinyl that inhabited the room was somewhat awe-inspiring at first; four levels of shelving wrapped clear around the entire room, with two double-sided/multi-shelved rows running down the middle. Every section of the room was packed with white boxes, alphabetized and categorized, each box with about 50 records in it, most of them in sleeves and almost all of them in near perfect condition.





The owner came in and gave us a tour of the room; upfront, boxes and boxes of the big hitters (Beatles, Rolling Stones, Dylan, Beach Boys, etc.), behind them, thousands of 45’s. On the row across from them, there was Rock A-Z, & Vocal A-Z. On the backside that row was the 50’s/60’s Rock A-Z. From the left side of the room, wrapping around the walls clockwise: Folk, World Music, Soundtracks, Industrial/Dance/R & B, several more sets of Rock A-Z, Soul, Jazz, and a lone box labeled New Wave. If I had to estimate, I would guess that there’s between 25 and 40 thousand records in that room.

Over the next couple of hours I pulled down, opened, searched, and lifted dozens and dozens of boxes, finding classics like David Bowie’s "Low," The Kinks "Village Green Preservation Society," & Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazelwood’s "Nancy & Lee."




I also found the 1977 debut album by 50’s-Pop-influenced Punk Rocker Mink Deville & the 1974 record "Mirrors" by Piano-Pop extraordinare Emitt Rhodes. The Emitt Rhodes record was sealed (I should say, is still sealed). It’s traveled 34 years to get to me, and I have no plans to open it.



After over 2 hours of searching, Mr. Mark had yet to leave the 45’s section behind. I, on the other hand, wandered through the rest of the building, looking at antiques and perusing the dismal Cd selection. There was also a small VHS collection at the far end of the main room. As I stood there debating whether I should buy a copy of "Black Fist," I felt Mr. Mark tap me on the shoulder and direct my attention towards the doorway that was literally right next to me. As I stared through the doorway, my eyes opened wider & my jaw rested agape as I realized that there was in fact...AN ENTIRE SECOND ROOM!!!







The second room was about half Country and half Rock, and within I found a perfect copy of Lou Reed’s "Berlin." When it came time to check out, I took my records to the front and the owner would examine them and quote me a price: $6 a piece for everything except the Emitt Rhodes, which was $12 due to it being sealed. With all of the records I had selected in front of him, the owner kept going on about "interesting life of Emitt Rhodes" which I thought was interesting in itself.

The store only accepts cash, and since I didn’t quite have enough on me at the time, I had to walk 5 minutes down the road to an ATM. While I was at the gas station getting money, I used the pay phone (because Rats exists in a universe where cell phones do not work) to make a long distance call to my friend Heather, who collects Burl Ives records.

When I told her that he had 40 Burl Ives records, she told me to only get the ones that were in good condition. When I told her that they were all in good condition, she started naming the records that she already owned and I started texting the title into my cell phone’s notepad. In the end the notepad looked exactly like this:

"Lollypop, weamerican, verstal, wayfarhng strange, truf love, cheer gal fal, animal folk"

When I returned to Rats with my cash in hand, the owner gave me the Mink Deville record for free since I "spent a lot money on gas to get down" there. I also spent an additional $20 on Burl Ives records. When it was all said and done, Mr. Mark only walked away with a few select 45’s, but he also left with a once in a lifetime experience. Afterward, we went to the Burger Bar and enjoyed a fine lunch.



Our initial trip to Rats occurred on May 23rd, and this past Friday, June 13th, I returned with some friends for my second visit. Planning only to spend about $40, I in actuality spent about $75. Granted, I bought more records this time around, but my average cost per record went up from $6 to $9. Here’s my score:


--Lou Reed "Sally Can’t Dance" $8

--Lou Reed "Coney Island Baby" $10

--Iggy Pop "Zombie Birdhouse" $10

--David Bowie "The Rise & Fall of Ziggy Stardust" $10

--Capt. Beefheart "Doc At the Radar Station" $12

--The Shangri Las "20 Greatest Hits" $7

--Peter Ivers "S/T" $8

--Wreckless Eric $10

Memorable moments from this outing include:

--Heather finding the soundtrack to Skatetown USA, and 14 Burl Ives records.

--Sonja finding "Riot on the Sunset Strip" by the Standells, which was the Weird Wednesday movie 2 nights prior.






Rats Records is located at:

608 Public Square
Llano, Texas

Official Website:
http://crazywax.com/

Store hours:
Thurs-Sat 9-5
(call or email to comfirm)
Store (325) 247-4296
Home (325) 247-2018
crazywax2@verizon.net


--Popkoff

He's the Nancy to my Lee, Part 1

In 1998 I got a job at Showplace Lanes because working at a bowling alley was Homer Simpson’s dream job. I met a guy there who managed the alley’s Concession stand named Mark Mendoza. He asked me what kind of music I listened to and I said "you know, rock music." Then he asked me "what kind," and I didn’t know how to answer. I had never really thought about it before he asked me.

As our friendship progressed he would make mix tapes for me with bands on them that I had never heard of before like the Cocteau Twins and My Bloody Valentine. I had no frame of reference for that kind of music until he gave me those tapes, and even then, I didn’t really understand it. The more I listened to the tapes though, the more my musical taste expanded. When I tried to make mix tapes for him, I would try to find bands that he hadn’t heard of also, but I quickly realized that it was going to be difficult to do so. It seemed that no matter what I put on them, he would have already heard it. A short time after that, I begin researching and buying Cds with one purpose and one purpose only: to impress Mark Mendoza. You might even say that my initial interest in record shopping was fueled almost entirely by spite. Ten years after the fact though, my music collection is massive and I owe it all to him.

Today I said goodbye to my friend Mark, as he embarked on trip to Denver to begin a new stage of his life. Even though I’ve had well over a year to prepare for today, it still feels unreal to me. No more afternoon lunches, record store days, or walks around the neighborhood.

These days feel like the season finale of my life. There’s a feeling of change in the air as some people leave and others return, some friendships are beginning while others are ending. Whose to say what will happen when my life returns in the Fall?

The only thing I know for sure is that Austin got a little less rad today.

Much Love and Much Respect to Mr. Mark

--Popkoff