Record Shop Story #9: Sound Vinyl, Crystal Palace
This south London shop owned by artist and musician Mark Hill is a celebration of all things analogue and pre-loved
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‘This shop used to sell flooring, like the stuff covering the back wall,’ says Mark Hill, owner of Sound Vinyl.
‘In fact, when I moved in here a couple of years ago, it actually said “Luxury Vinyl Tiles” up there. I spent about four seconds un-Velcroing the word “tiles”… and thinking to myself, this place must’ve been destined to be a record shop.’
‘Now everyone seems to think the shop’s called “Luxury Vinyl”… and I don’t do much to stop that really,’ he drily remarks.
This, in microcosm, seems to capture Mark’s manifesto for life – reuse and recycle what you find, and have some fun along the way.
The sign outside of Sound Vinyl is just as ambiguous. The erstwhile flooring shop’s somewhat pretentious name, Cavendish de Vere, has since been bastardised into ‘Cave disc ere’. The words float awkwardly, like a typographer’s fever dream, over a shimmering line of long-forgotten LaserDiscs. The window below is emblazoned with the word ‘Vinyl’ in black and yellow hazard tape. It’s certainly eye-catching.
‘At some point I’ll re-do the sign,’ says Mark – but it’s more a note to self than an attempt to convince me it’s happening anytime soon.
Sound Vinyl and found objects
Sound Vinyl may have moved into this particular shop a couple of years ago, but Mark has been selling records in Crystal Palace for about 15 years.
‘Before this, I used to have a basement under the antiques shop down the road,’ says Mark. ‘I started out buying and selling various objects… then at one point I realised that every second item was a record. So I switched it all that way.’
But his background as a trader of curiosities, and as an artist, runs through the shop’s quirky and chaotic aesthetic. ‘As an artist, I’ve always worked with found objects and slightly broken things, and the look of the shop really reflects that.’
Aside from all the records, there are old bits of hi-fi equipment, ghetto blasters, a random wah-wah pedal, tapes, books and various boxes up on shelves. There are some cool found signs and mirrors, and a large portrait of late actor Sir John Gielgud over the door to the back office. ‘He provides the security,’ says Mark. The whole place is a glorious mish-mash of Bohemiam creativity.
What’s in the bag, man?
The shop’s slightly wild look can feel a little overwhelming initially, as can the sheer volume of records packed into the space. At waist height, there are racks that are organised loosely into the usual genre categories, as well as a section for new arrivals (of used stock).
But down below there are more racks and large grocery bags full of yet more stock. I ask what’s in them. Mark explains that a lot of these have just come in and are still awaiting pricing and racking (not sure where though!). So if you want to get a jump on the stock that other people may not have already picked over, head to the grocery bags down below.
The shop caters for most tastes – rock, pop, soul, dance, hip-hop, punk, jazz and more (including a fair selection of 45s). There are soundtracks and spoken word records for sample hunters, and a little bit of classical too – although Mark sends a lot of that to a fellow dealer who specialises in classical records.
The only thing Sound Vinyl doesn’t really cover is country. ‘I mean, there’s a whole box of Johnny Cash records, because he’s a classic artist that tends to fit in most people’s record collection somewhere. But otherwise I don’t really buy country.’
Mark’s longevity in the business means he has a good network of used record suppliers – from house clearances, buying up interesting collections, and trade-ins from regular customers. He aims to buy quality, clean vinyl, and I dug up plenty of interesting nuggets around the store. The jazz section was particularly varied, and included more classic jazz than I’d expected. For a tenner, I left with a pristine copy of a Henry ‘Red’ Allen at the Newport Jazz Festival on Verve, which sounds terrific.
The usual caveats apply to checking condition, as they do in any second-hand shop - and while there aren’t turntables for personal listening, you can ask Mark to play potential purchases on the shop decks.
One top tip is that some of the most interesting records will often be found by the decks, as Mark has probably been playing them. ‘For ages, when I set up the shop, I was keeping all the best records for myself,’ he admits. ‘But I realised that's a pretty poor business model.’ Even so, the records by the decks are the ones he doesn’t really want to part with…
Hooked on music in ‘the Republic’ of Yorkshire
I ask Mark what got him hooked on music in the first place. Without hesitation, he shoots back, ‘Being a teenager in Sheffield and The Human League.’
‘My mates and I used to follow The Human League, The Clash and Killing Joke. It was really easy for us to see bands for free back then. I was a very young punk, about 14, and we’d just go and hang around outside the gig venue and annoy the bouncers until they let us in after the band had started.’
‘All the bands used to go Sheffield, Wakefield and Leeds on consecutive nights. And being the Republic of South Yorkshire’, he jokes, ‘the bus fare used to be literally two pence. So we’d just jump on a bus and see them as often as we could.’
These days, Mark is good mates with The Orb’s Alex Paterson, who famously roadied for Killing Joke before striking out on his own musical endeavours. Alex regularly DJs at the nearby Book and Record Bar in West Norwood (as also mentioned in my interview with Strictly Kev), as does Mark occasionally.
‘Alex actually lent me these speakers’, Mark says, gesturing to the unusually shaped blue B&W speakers that are something of a focal point in the shop. ‘They were a prototype that never went into production, but they called the design “Blue Room”, so they gave Alex a pair’ [referencing The Orb’s top-10, 40-minute opus of the same name].
‘Alex said “What do I want them for?”, so I was the lucky beneficiary. They’re good speakers! But he never lets me forget they’re his,’ Mark says with a wry smile.
Virgin vinyl experience
I’m always curious to know about the first record people remember buying, and Mark’s story is one of the best I’ve come across.
‘I remember my dad dragging me around the town, in Barnsley, and into a record shop called Scene and Heard,’ he says. ‘Despite the dodgy name, it was quite a cool little record shop.’
‘My dad took me in and produced this record out of his bag and said to the guy at the counter, “I want to get my money back for this, please.” It was a copy of Mike Oldfield’s Tubular Bells,’ Mark laughs.
‘The guy said, “OK sir, but what’s wrong with the record?” And my dad just said, “There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s just horrible.”’
‘They offered him another record in exchange, and he said he didn’t want anything. So he turned to me and said, “Do you want one, lad?”, and I pointed at the X-Ray Spex album on the wall. So that was the first record I remember buying, and I still have it now.’
I remark that this seems like an achingly cool first record. However, Mark says ‘I’d already seen them live, but yeah, I guess it was a lucky strike!’
The principle of this first encounter has stuck with him, too. ‘Now, if someone brings a record back to the shop because they don't like it, I tell them they can exchange it – because that’s how I got into records. And it’s kind of an homage to my dad too.’
The Manifesto of Metamono
Sound Vinyl is a bit of a hang-out for musicians who know each other from the South London music scene, and Mark has plans to turn the shop’s large basement area into ‘a youth club for old people’ (his words) to accommodate them, as well as a place to buy and sell second-hand instruments.
These will include both traditional instruments as well as electronic kit. Analogue synths and the like are close to Mark’s heart, as he plays in synth band Metamono with two friends (Jono Podmore and Paul Conboy). The band operates under a strict ‘Manifesto’ which decrees that microphones and overdubs must not be used when recording, and that everything should be recorded with hand-built or restored analogue equipment, where possible.
The full Manifesto is there to read inside the cover of Metamono’s first album, With The Compliments Of Nuclear Physics, released in 2013, and for which Mark produced the sleeve. Once again, he used a found object – an old record that had deteriorated under damp conditions – to create an intriguing-looking industrial texture that he was able to photograph and reuse for the packaging. Even the album’s title came from a note that Mark says fell out of a book he was looking at on a market stall.
Metamono have a principle of releasing their music on vinyl first, although you can find bits of it on Bandcamp, Spotify, Youtube and so on. Having had a brief listen to With the Compliments of Nuclear Physics in the shop, I go home with a copy, intrigued to delve further into the pulsing acid squelches and the original, organically layered compositions.
If you’re in London, you can catch Metamono playing the odd gig – the most recent one being in The Book & Record Bar, for which Mark insisted on selling paper tickets (which sold out in two days).
It’s another nod to the physical world of music that Mark prefers to operate in. This, along with the rest of the Sound Vinyl experience, is not about token nostalgia. It’s a manifestation of a heartfelt principle to push back against the digital tide, at any opportunity…
Run-out questions
Do you remember the first record you bought? ‘Yep, it was X-Ray Spex with my dad.’ [see above]
Coolest record in the shop right now? ‘I really love these Four Tet remixes of Madvillain.’ [In good nick, priced at £30.] ‘The instrumental side, especially, is great. I’ve never seen it before, and have been playing it in the shop a lot. No-one seems to know what it is. But then Alex Paterson came in the other day when it was playing and named it instantly… he remembers everything!’
Do you sell online too? ‘I sell some of the more niche things I get in on Discogs, but there’s not really any cross-pollination with the shop stock. If I get some rare Cambodian 7-inch folk records, it’s unlikely that someone’s going to walk through that door looking for them. But there is a market out there. I don’t want to go too much that way, though, because I like the social aspect of the shop.’
What’s on your want-list? ‘I don’t have a want-list as such. I’ve already got a huge record collection. I don’t play it because I’m in here playing records eight hours a day. Plus, I’m moving house at present and I don’t even know where my records are [haha]. I wonder whether I actually need a record collection, or if this shop is just my movable record collection now...’
What was the last gig you went to? ‘I think my most recent gig was The National in the Crystal Palace Bowl. They were good. But the best recent gig I’ve been to, in terms of surprise at the sheer excellence of musicianship and the fact that they got everyone dancing in a seated venue, was War at the Queen Elizabeth Hall on the Southbank last June. That’ll take some beating.’
Sleevenotes
Where to find it
Sound Vinyl, 58 Church Rd, London SE19 2EZ
Free parking nearby (in Sainsbury’s, ahem). Nearest train station is Crystal Palace (5-minute walk).
Thurs - Sun: 11am-6pm | Mon - Weds: Closed
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