The Null Device

Second-hand Top 50

Pitchfork's list of the 50 most common CDs in secondhand shops, each bagged with Tanya Headon-esque exactitude. The words "shoegaze", "grunge" and references to Dawson's Creek/90210 and aging yuppies disposing of their Lollapalooza merchandise upon moving to the suburbs come up repeatedly. (via VM)

Though I think they were entirely unfair to Lush's Lovelife (a good record, even if it is somewhat more mainstream than Split; tell me that Runaway or Olympia aren't good songs, and 500 (Shake Baby Shake) doesn't have a classic pop appeal).

There are 4 comments on "Second-hand Top 50":

Posted by: dj http://deejbah.livejournal.com Tue Oct 7 06:02:35 2003

i agree, i thought it was a bit harsh on 'Lovelife'. Don't own any of the CDs listed.

Posted by: Graham http://grudnuk.com/ Tue Oct 7 08:51:55 2003

And as for #1 pick Monster, feh. Anything that scared the "Shiny Happy People" away from R.E.M. was fine by me. (Although their last two albums really missed Bill Berry's editorial input.)

Posted by: gjw http://the-fix.org Tue Oct 7 10:46:37 2003

I admit to owning about 20% of the albums featured. Being too broke to pay the big bucks, I usually end up heading straight for the 2nd hand CDs, and, of course, never finding "Darklands", have to buy "Honey's Dead" instead.

Does the ranking indicate the frequency of occurrence in the racks, or the authors opinions of the albums? If the former, the Damnbuilders should be at #1 - I don't think I've ever seen a 2nd-hand store without it.

Posted by: acb http://dev.null.org Tue Oct 7 14:19:48 2003

When I was in London last year, every secondhand shop seemed to have a copy of The Lollies' _Taste_. Odd, because it's quite a decent album (think Lush meets Chicks On Speed or something). I guess the public didn't get it.