|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Here I go again... Memories, misty and watercoloured. I'd make the loooooong bus trip down from Scotland once a year or so from about the late-70s to early-80s. I remember finding the shop for the first time and just staring in the window at all the goods on display. I think my mouth was open. Then when I went in I would flick through all the racks and go "Oh Jeez!" at every third title, and stick it under my arm. When I had about 20 under each arm, one of the staff wandered over and told me to put them all back, because I'd never have enough money for it all! He was right. So I had to go back through them all and select the ten or so LPs that I really really "needed" (and that came to about 250 pounds) - I remember FEAR IS THE KEY, BARBARELLA (with its scuffed cover), CLEOPATRA, SCORPIO..., then a night in the hotel just looking at them, then the loooooong bus journey back up tae the land o' the eejits and finally the "putting them on the turntable" ritual. I wonder if the Georges Delerue story was told to all customers. Either that or I just missed Timmer, because I was also told that I had "just missed Georges Delerue". Then the member of staff (forgive me for I know not his name) did something very funny and strange - he said "Lovely little man - he's a little hunchback, you know", and he put one shoulder up and tottered into the back shop... Did they have a mail-order service? I remember getting type-written catalogues from some place and sending off for DESTINATION MOON, MASTER OF THE WORLD and things like that, but I can't remember if it was from 58 Dean Street.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: |
May 26, 2011 - 5:49 AM
|
|
|
By: |
Nils
(Member)
|
I also have memories of 58 Dean Street Records - though they're not entirely fond, unfortunately. Back in 1984 my interest in film music was starting to get serious, and on my first ever visit to London I really looked forward to visiting some dedicated soundtrack shops. No such shops existed (or exist) in Norway, but from reading film magazines (and looking through the Yellow pages in the hotel room!) I knew there were some in London. In addition to 58 Dean Street, I also found Dress Circle (who now specialize in original cast recordings, as I understand) and another smaller one whose name I can't remember. I was ecstatic when I entered the shop at 58 Dean Street. Rows upon rows of - just soundtracks! entire sections devoted to my faourite composers, Goldsmith and Williams! I couldn't believe it. So, after a good while just looking through the bins and considering what to buy, I picked five LPs (CAPRICORN ONE, THE SWARM, THE SAND PEBBLES, THE TOWERING INFERNO and SUPERGIRL) - a pretty big deal for me then. I realized I didn't have enough money with me, so I asked at the counter if they could keep the LPs there while I went to the post office to make a withdrawal. The guy at the desk grudgingly approved. However, when I got back, he had removed one of the LPs (SUPERGIRL) from the stack before putting them in a bag. So, paid for five LPs, got only four. Unfortunately I didn't discover it until some time after I left the shop, and didn't have the courage (or age) to go back and confront him with it. Later I realized that this wasn't his only dishonest behaviour towards me. I remember they had a copy of the Italian pressing of THE FURY, and when I asked if they had a U.S. or U.K. pressing, he said, "No,no ,no - this is the ONLY release of that score that exists!". Yeah, right... Also, when he asked where I was from and I replied, "Norway", he said, "Oh, we sell LOTS to Norway!". Yeah, right... So, not an ideal "first contact" with soundtrack shops for a young film music fan. Being young and naive, this incident actually haunted me for a while. But my adventures in film music could only get better after that! And my visits to Dress Circle and the other shop during the same trip went without hitch, and I returned home with lots of great soundtracks.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Hi Nils Dress Circle was the name of the new shop in covent garden that split from That's Entertainment in Drury Lane - mentioned above by other posters. This was when the owners Johnny and Patrick split the business to take it in different directions - Patrick set up the musical/shows shop and - as I understand it, Johnny went down the route of record label and producing albums.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: |
May 26, 2011 - 7:36 AM
|
|
|
By: |
Thor
(Member)
|
I've never even heard OF this place! Probably because I'm a 33-year-old dude from Norway, and my first trip to London was with my family in 1990 or thereabouts. I was 13 years old, and only BARELY conscious of film music, at least a couple of years before my interest really took off. So even if the store was still around at the time, I wouldn't have known about it. But of course, I've been to London a few times after that, most recently last year during the Morricone concert. Does this store still exist in one form or other? Perhaps moved somewhere else? Changed owners? Bought up by some chain? Turned into something else altogether? As Nils says, no such soundtrack specialty store has ever existed in Norway. The closest is regular used record stores, where they sell everything from old books to comics to CD's to films to whathaveyou. Most of these have had big problems in the last few years, for a variety of reasons (internet shopping, a couple of huge multimedia chain stores that manage to keep prices low etc.), and some have vanished altogether.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Derek would've loved you Thor. You wouldn't have got back to the fjords alive!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
He died.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
You guys wax nostalgic about yesteryear,......................... Well we would wouldn't we, the thrread is titled '58 Dean Street Memories'
|
|
|
|
|
Double post, sorry.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: |
May 26, 2011 - 8:53 AM
|
|
|
By: |
Timmer
(Member)
|
Oh. Sorry to hear that. I assume the place went on, though? Yes Thor,it continued to be run by the Masheter brothers Martin & Philip (2 of my best friends) until rising rent prices forced them to move the business up the road slightly to Bloomsbury. It continued there until once again,the high rent prices of Central London forced them to give up the business in the early 2000's. Their business is now Internet based but now only sells film poster,stills & memorabilia. I can't remember the last time I visited when it was still in business, I think it may have been in 2001 for the Morricone concert at the Barbican ( Philip....or was it Martin? left it too late to get a ticket ), I do remember going back on a different, later date, and finding the premises vacated, it's incredibly sad to see the end of such a speciality outlet and one that had at one time been my only lifeline to the wider world of soundtracks.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Yeah, cinemascope, so much better to be leafing through soundtracks you couldn't afford to have Derek take the piss out of you from behind the counter so all the shop could hear him!! (Just kidding mate!) Actually he was deliciously rude to people - in a sort of permanently-annoyed Basil Fawlty-type way but delivered in a camp voice. He was quite witty so it never bothered me. The visits were always entertaining - especially when he was slaughtering some other poor sod further up the record racks from me!!!!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I still have my old Goldsmith Society "Apollo" newsletter that contained Derek Braeger's obituary, which observed he was "surely to be missed by s/t collectors everywhere for his enterprise and enthusiasm (if not for his telephone manner)".
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|