Coffee Is For Closers

My success with talking customers into buying my employee pick of the week has taken a nose-dive since I put that rockabilly customer into Wanda Jackson CD about... gah, a whole month ago? Almost got one of our regular Dancetria-types to purchase Faithless, but no go. Haven't had a lick o' luck since then, even using guilt tactics when I had Mahalia Jackson and The Meters up there, two artists from New Orleans encouraging people (with signs, even!) to donate to the American Red Cross. And last week I had Frances The Mute by The Mars Volta up there (you old school readers may remember how I was soooo into that album earlier this spring), an album that I was been successful in pawning off in the past -- apparently except for the week that it was actually up as my pick, dag nabbit.

Confidence in my abilities has been thoroughly shot. Whatever happened to my seductive powers of persuasion? Well, in peddling what I know, that is. Dude, people suck. I KNOW WHAT THEY NEED! I ALONE! I-I-I-I-I!!! And I know that this week they will be needing...

Basehead Plays With Toys.

What, Melissa? You honestly expect to pitch an out of print 13-year-old acoustic hip-hop album from some unheard-of cat in Washington DC?

Well, miraculously, I've done it before. Once the album came in used about a year or so ago, and I put it up on the feature rack with a handwritten note saying:

Acoustic hip-hip

from Washington DC

native Mike Ivey

Excellent!!

And taped it to the cover. And believe it or not, that's all it took. I sold it that same hour.

So what do I do this time? Tack on the same note exactly the way it was originally worded. Then target all the potential Beck fans or indie hip-hops nerds. Hit the good folks who bitch about our lack of local talent in the store (D.C. isn't exactly local but I consider it close enough). And emphasize that this mother is completely out of print. In fact I am especially proud myself to own the original Emigre version that came out before the record was picked up by Imago. The Emigre version has, in my opinion, much funnier music clips for the track "Not Over You", about Mike's friend trying to find something snappy on the radio to cheer up the heartbroken Ivey. Song after song of of sad soul ballads on every station, and Mike is getting angrier and angrier with his friend ("Hey, it's not my fault you gotta get lovesick during the Quiet Storm!" his buddy protests).



Basehead's Plays With Toys was probably my favorite album of 1992. They (or rather he, being that Mike Ivey [above far right] is the sole creator of the group) were also probably the very first act that Joe ever booked on his own, since Mike had left his home phone number in the liner notes of the Emigre version of the album. Joe just rang him up and asked if he would play Crossroads (the little kinderpunk dive where he DJed at the time), and Mike was like "Of course!" And, to quote Vonnegut, so it goes. Mike played a few more gigs for us after that and we got to talk at length several times, with Ivey being extremely personable and down to earth (and very good looking... hubba hubba!). I even have two videos that he did that were actually shown on MTV's 120 Minutes years ago for the tracks "2000 BC" and "Not Over You". Nice to see he got a little push there, for what it was worth at the time.

So is it likely I'll be able to sell our last ever copy of Plays With Toys before it finally gets recalled into oblivion? I sorta feel like I owe it to Mike. Not sure why, exactly. But... there it is.