Another One Bites The Dust.

Church Street CDs, Church Street Barrows, Manchester, originally uploaded by mithering.

I've had some interesting stuff from this place over the years, mainly obscure and out of print VHS tapes and the odd morsel of indie or punk vinyl. Episodes of Spectreman, Godzilla films, even an uncut copy of John Waters' Female Trouble. The vinyl was more of a problem - seven inch singles were often adrift of their sleeves and given a burnishing by the grit of Church Street. A single by The Pop Rivets, Billy Childish's first band, and much desired, had to be abandoned as it was so scratched the sound of an egg frying would have dominated. On a positive note, I did pick up the one and only single put out by Kevin Rowlands' punk band, The Killjoys, and then moved it further up the food chain via an eBay transaction with an enthusiastic fan in Japan.

It was never a place for spectacular finds like Rare Records (Damn the IRA and their shitty fucking bomb) or Paramount Books during the time when they were buying in amazing stuff and selling it at a pound an LP (Scott Engel's 'Scott 4', Big Black's 'Sound of Impact' and Neil Young's 'After The Goldrush' on vinyl in the same day made Lester Sands a happy boy), but it was there and it was steady, and there was always the chance that something might turn up.

Now, it's set to close. I don't think it's a Recession Thing, more that the bloke who runs it is getting on and I don't think there's the money in crap porn DVDs there used to be.