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8 Days Of 80’s ~ Day 7 ~ Deacon Blue ~ Dignity

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Day 7 of 8 Days Of 80’s and I’ve gone with Deacon Blue’s “Dignity”.

Carrying on from yesterdays post and my time running the Disc & Tape Centre with Michael – such good times, so many concerts and nights out. Michael always had great ears for music and championed many new acts to our customers. Deacon Blue were one such act.

We had good friends at CBS who were very excited about Deacon Blue and frustrated by the difficulty they had establishing the band. “Dignity” has been officially released as a single three times. It was first released in May 1987 as the first single before the release of their debut album Raintown. The single failed to chart and sales on the album were slow to start. After the release of two more singles(“Loaded” and “When Will You Make My Telephone Ring”), “Dignity” was re-recorded late in 1987 and the new mix released early in 1988 as the fourth single.

On the 29th March 1988 we were invited as guests of CBS to see them at Southampton Top Rank, which closed not long after. It was a very good night, Fairground Attraction were support and their debut single “Perfect” reached number one a few weeks later. “Dignity” was finally hit too and things finally started to happen for Deacon Blue. This also meant their previous singles became very collectable which takes me on to think about record fairs and our involvement in the collectors market … but that’s another story.

I’ve seen Deacon Blue at least once more and would like to see them again.

Record Store Day

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“Where do I begin to tell the story of how great a love can be?”

Music has always been a huge part of every day, for most of my life records were the medium that produced it. I’ve been very fortunate to have parents that fed and nurtured my passion in my early years and taught me how to cherish and care for their and then my vinyl. What a fabulous time to grow up and experience the joys of shopping for music, taking it home and carefully putting it on to hear the joy in the grooves.

I DJ’d on vinyl for twenty years, I worked for record companies promoting and selling to shops across the South West, visiting many stores most of which no longer exist – a few do, and I salute you!

I had my own store, along with my partner Mike, The Disc & Tape Centre in Lymington. We shared some fantastic times in the ten years it lasted before the economy shifted and the supermarkets forced out of business selling the big titles at discounts for longer hours. My friend Steve sold his shop, Pinpoint, in Eastleigh about the same time. Two other friends Steph and Piers, who started before us are still going and I got my Record Store Day t-shirt form their amazing shop in Bridport. BRIDPORT MUSIC.

Today I can find almost any track in a couple of minutes and buy it for less than a pound with a click of my track pad. That’s fantastic, but there is no sleeve full of information to read, no fabulous 12″ artwork to soak up, no message on the run-off to laugh at … I could go on!

Times change but one things for sure ~ Life sounds better to music!

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