Japan Record Shopping, Part 3: Back to Tokyo

By Steven Frost

After our rest in the mountains of Hakone I was excited to explore metropolitan Tokyo. When we arrived in Shibuya and got settled in I merely Google-mapped Disk Union and assumed following the search results would lead me to the correct destination. Along the way I came across the jazz bar Dug, a name I knew from separate recordings by Albert Manglesdorff and Mal Waldron. Unfortunately it was Dug in name only, with drinks and a cover charge, but no live music. A few blocks passed Dug, unlike so many of my other searches in Japan, I actually found the store on the first try, located in the heart of Shibuya with no trouble at all. Disk Union Shibuya is a multi- story affair with each floor dedicated to a different genre of music. The stairwell leading to F4, jazz and blues, certainly filled me with a sense of expectation.

Disk Union Shibuya was compact, but brimming with some great albums and surprises. It was also really crowded. All of us know the feeling of waiting for another person to flip through a row of albums while we wait, and that of someone waiting for us to do the same. Perhaps its nicer to have a store to ourselves without other customers? I think for the health of our hobby and the general health of human civilization more people listening to music is a positive thing. Once again Disk Union came through with a great selection, a friendly staff and a clean, well-organized store. They also have a nice listening station where you can preview records, or listen to vintage LP’s to make sure they are not damaged. The collectible wall had some nice items too. If you look closely at the photos you’ll see the price tag- description includes the artist name, label, grade, description (flat edge, laminated cover, RVG, ear, deep groove, etc.) and an explanation of any faults. All these LP’s are graded B/B+, and would make most collectors I know feel very happy. You can see the prices as well to get a sense of the Japanese market. 10000 yen is approximately 92 USD.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When I finished my exploration of the 4^thfloor, made a few purchases and went back downstairs I discovered a second jazz new arrivals bin (two jazz new arrivals bins, have I reached nirvana?) with some interesting items. I must havewalked out of Shibuya with 10 or so LP’s. I potentially could have bought more if not for the logistical constraints of lugging records around the world.

One LP I found really intrigued me and I thought some JC readers might find interesting. It is a copy of Blue Mitchell, Out of the Blue, with a European flipback cover. The Japanese license came not from Riverside, but from Fontana. This is something I had not seen before. I recollect I paid about seven bucks for it. It sounds quite good too with the nice reverb and high frequency extension I associate with early pressings that often seems to be missing from later reissues. Some of the early Riverside titles in stereo sound disappointing, but this one is quite nice.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As I was wrapping up my visit to Disk Union Shibuya I realized that I was actually still not at THE Disk Union Jazz store, but merely another fantastic branch of this chain. So it was back to Google maps and another adventure. I made my pilgrimage to Disk Union Jazz in a light rain the next day. The neighborhood was a really peaceful one and I passed Disk Union Heavy Metal (presumably not very quiet) along my journey. The street block Disk Union Jazz is on is nearly all musical instrument stores. Disk Union Jazz is on the second floor, but has a well-marked entrance at street level.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The store has a wide selection of new and used books, magazines, new and used LP’s, and CD’s. I noticed they had the new Blue Note Review box for sale with a personally signed postcard from Don Was. I started with the new arrivals and went through the ordinary stacks (which like many other stores felt well perused), before bracing myself to look at the collectors’ items. I found a really beautiful original pressing of Teo Macero with the Prestige Jazz Quartet (I’m a big Mal Waldron and Teddy Charles fan), an original pressing of Bob Cooper’s Coop! on Contemporary and an original Swedish pressing of So Far by The Eje Thelin Quintet with a nice flipback cover. The Thelin was interesting because Disk Union actually had two copies. The more expensive and higher graded Thelin actually sounded terrible, like it had been played with a trashed needle, whereas the lower graded copy with a few light hairlines played beautifully. I felt very lucky with this discovery.

Disk Union had so many great, rare and obscure records in beautiful condition I can’t name them all. Notably, there is a high proportion of jazz from all over Europe as well as the States. Here are a couple of photos to give you a sense of what a special place it is.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are certainly a number of other great Tokyo record stores, but my time was limited and I also wanted to enjoy all the other things unique to this amazing country. With regard to records, I learned that the Japanese seem to be conservative record graders and take really good care of their belongings. CD’s are still everywhere and a number of people seemed to be buying them. I understand the temptation to moan that so many great records are in Japan instead of their countries of origin, but this is a result of Japanese music lovers having a generally higher level of appreciation and connoisseurship for these things than the people inhabiting the places where the items originally came from. Sometimes having a degree of separation gives you a greater level of appreciation for it. I imagine a lot of the inventory in Japan’s record stores probably reached Japan some time ago and is being recirculated as individuals sell off collections or older people pass away. That said, I ran into two guys who worked for Disk Union Tokyo at a record fair in Birmingham, AL last spring and apparently they crisscross the U.S. travelling to record stores and record fairs with a rental truck. When they reach Los Angeles everything is loaded in a container and shipped to Japan.

I thought I would be able to score a good deal on a Japanese phono cartridge in Japan. That illusion was shattered by visits to a couple of different hi-fi shops where prices were equal to or higher than in the States.

Everyone I ran into in Japan was effusively polite and what really struck me was that the Japanese people were not just polite and considerate to me as a guest, they were also very respectful of one another. I found this strong civil society, personal discipline and consideration for public morality to be what I enjoyed most about travelling around there. If you take time to research reasonable accommodations you can travel pretty inexpensively. A Japanese rail pass gets you unlimited high speed train trips while you are there and also works on many subway lines in Tokyo and Osaka. The trains and buses run flawlessly and are always on time. The subway trains are spotless too . . . if you can imagine that.