I was reading a post on Song, By Toad about the Manic Street Preachers, and how that blogger first heard them on the listening post at a record store. That got me thinking about a similar experience I had with Frank Black’s self-titled solo album – I was a student in Aberdeen at the time and the Virgin store had not long opened there, complete with listening posts. The Pixies weren’t really on my radar other than being a band that got played a lot in the student union so I didn’t make the connection until much later, it was the album cover that caught my attention. over the years I’ve gotten interested in a lot of music purely because the cover art intrigued me (with varying degrees of success… “In The Court Of The Crimson King” by King Crimson is at the opposite end of the spectrum, it has a fantastic cover but I absolutely detest the music!) – and this is one of the things I’ll miss if downloads ever become the sole medium for music to be sold. Anyway, here’s what did it for me that day:

Not knowing what to expect I put the headphones on and hit play, and was blown away. I listened through about half of the album there and then before I got self-conscious about hogging the facility – not long enough to get to what ended up being my favourite track, Two Spaces, which I finally got to hear on the top deck of the number 20 bus going back to my flat.

Frank Black – Two Spaces

I hadn’t listened to this in years until the other night, and I was very pleased to find out that this album has stood the test of time, it sounds as good to me now as it did standing in Virgin Records back in 1994. And it has successfully defeated the forces of inflation! On Amazon it’s available for about half the price I paid for it back then so click here to add it to your collection.