Recs with Merritt presents vinyl highlights for the upcoming Record Store Day: Black Friday 2023

Records with Merritt is Marion Merritt’s vinyl store in Westport [1614 Westport Rd] with partner Ann Stewart. As a staple in our community for nearly a decade, we’ve partnered with Merritt for a monthly column, where the tastemaker shares her picks for the best wax releases to look forward to grabbing, divided by release date.

Here’s Marion Merritt’s rundown of the most exciting offerings for the upcoming Record Store Day: Black Friday 2023 on Nov. 24.

In 2007, a group of dedicated vinyl enthusiasts, whose goals were to bring unique products and exposure to the emerging independent record stores and the renewed interest in vinyl records, started Record Store Day.

The official Record Store Day party is held on a Saturday in April. In order to help the Independent Record Stores have those rare, limited and specialized vinyl releases throughout the Holiday shopping season, Record Store Day added a Black Friday event. This year’s event will be on Friday, November 24, 2023.

For the Record Store Day new shopper, we highly recommend visiting www.recordstoreday.com for the list of Black Friday releases, including the detailed descriptions and quantities available of the product. Now you are ready for the fun of Record Store Day: the Hunt, the interacting with other vinyl enthusiasts, the rush of getting your hands on one of 500 copies of that rare release.

Black Friday Record Store Day releases cover all the different musical genres with either re-issues, long out-of-print and “lost” recordings. Below are a few gems that caught Records with Merritt’s eyes and ears.

Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band: ‘Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller)’ 45th anniversary deluxe edition of the classic 1978 album from Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band. This limited edition 2LP vinyl set features the original album recut from the original master tapes at Bernie Grundman Mastering plus an additional LP with twelve previously unreleased demos, rough mixes and alternate versions from the Shiny Beast-era.

De La Soul: ‘3 Feet High And Rising’ Boxed Set  3 Feet High and Rising is the debut studio album by hip hop trio de la Soul and was released on March 3, 1989. It marked the first of three full-length collaborations with producer Prince Paul, which would become the critical and commercial peak of both parties. 3 Feet High & Rising was chosen by the Library of Congress to be added to the National Recording Registry for it’s cultural significance and general excellence. 7″ box set; 12 7″, 42 gram, custom colored 7″ in custom printed jackets in a 7″ box w/ a 7″ pinup and 1 double sided 7″ slipmat.

Dexter Gordon: ‘A Day In Copenhagen’ Dexter Gordon was one of the major forces on the tenor saxophone from the mid-1940’s until his death in 1990. The popularity of mainstream jazz was on the decline in the States during the 1960’s. The Vietnam war and racial turmoil were in high gear, and many of the music’s top-flight musicians, including Gordon, migrated to Europe in order both to escape and to make a living playing jazz. Gordon eventually settled in Copenhagen, Denmark. During this period, he usually played and recorded backed by a piano trio, but this 1969 recording is different. The usual quartet has been expanded with some of those premiere jazz ‘refugees’, each a major voice on his instrument, assembled for the session. One of the great modern jazz trombonists, Slide Hampton is also a composer/arranger of note. The album was a collaborative venture between Gordon and Hampton, and three of the compositions and all of the arrangements on the album are his. The classy Jamaican trumpeter Dizzy Reese completes the front line. The rhythm section includes two jazz giants who were Gordon’s constant companions at Copenhagen’s famous Club Montmartre, fellow American expatriate pianist Kenny Drew and the great Danish bassist N.-H. Örsted-Peterson. Gordon was cited by both Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane as a major influence on their playing, and is acknowledged as a jazz icon

Flaming Lips: ‘Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots – Live at the Paradise Lounge, Boston Oct. 27, 2002’ Three months after the release of their classic album “Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots”, The Flaming Lips played a small show at The Paradise Lounge in Boston for the local alternative radio station WBOS. The small crowd of competition winners and invited fans were treated to a 40 minute set that included “Do You Realize?” & “Fight Test”, plus a covers of Pink Floyd’s “Lucifer Sam and Beck’s “The Golden Age”. One feature of this show were the song intros by Wayne Coyne. This is the first release on vinyl.

Joni Mitchell: ‘Court and Spark (Demos)’  ‘Court and Spark’ is Joni Mitchell’s most commercially successful album of her career. This LP features the never-before-heard demos from the iconic album, including “Help Me” and “Raised On Robbery.”

Various Artists Black Jazz Records: ‘The Complete Singles’ On the heels of it’s overwhelmingly successful reissue campaign of the 20 albums recorded for the legendarily collectible Black Jazz label, Real Gone Music returns with a 2-LP set that includes the extraordinarily rare singles that were cut for the label. This 15-track set serves as both a Black Jazz “Best Of” and a collector bonanza, as the set includes several unique single edits. The gatefold jacket features liner notes by Pat Thomas.

Various Artists ‘Light in The Attic & Friends’ For more than 20 years, acclaimed reissue label Light in the Attic Records has shined a spotlight on some of music’s most unique – and often forgotten – voices. But reviving these long-out-of-print recordings is only half of the process. “We believe that an essential component of archival work, aside from simply honoring the music, is to seek ways in which to bring fresh perspectives, context, and reverence to the original artists and their work,” says LITA founder, Matt Sullivan. Thus, LITA’s acclaimed cover series was born, in which contemporary acts pay homage to their favorite LITA artists and songs. Spanning more than a decade, 20 of these inspired cover songs will be available together for the very first time, exclusively for Black Friday (November 24) on the 2xLP Light in the Attic & Friends. From Charles Bradley & The Menahan Street Band covering Detroit singer-songwriter Sixto Rodriguez and Mac DeMarco performing a song by Japanese icon Haruomi Hosono, to Iggy Pop & Zig Zags honoring funk queen Betty Davis, and Ethan & Maya Hawke covering country great Willie Nelson, these performances bridge the gap between generations, languages, and musical traditions.

Asteroid City Original Soundtrack: The soundtrack to Wes Anderson’s latest film “Asteroid City” features “You Can’t Wake Up If You Don’t Fall Asleep” by Jarvis Cocker and “Dear Alien (Who Art In Heaven)” by the Asteroid City Cast with six original score tracks by Oscar-winning composer Alexandre Desplat.

Various Artists: “Written In Their Soul Written In Their Soul – The Hits: The Stax Songwriter Demos’  Highlights from the critically acclaimed boxset Written In Their Soul – The Hits: The Stax Songwriter Demos released in June 2023. Featuring 13 original demos of hit singles such as “6345789 (Soulsville, USA),” “If You’re Ready (Come Go With Me),” “Woman To Woman,” and “Respect Yourself.”

Wendy O. Williams: ‘Maggots: The Record’ The fourth studio album by American rock singer Wendy O. Williams and her band Plasmatics. It is often credited as being the first “Thrash Metal Opera.” This comes largely because of the album follows the rock opera formula done in a form of thrash metal. Every other track on the album is spoken-word and is used to describe various scenes between songs.

Records with Merritt will open at 7am for the Record Store Day Black Friday. We will have coffee and breakfast treats. And if we don’t have what’s on your wish list, we will help you find it!