Stop the Week 9

The unnaturally mild weather is helping to make the customarily difficult month of January fly by. It’s easy to think we’re over the worst now, but bitter experience of French winters has taught me not to be so stupid. More snow is surely on the way…

One of January’s few compensations, helping me pull through till February relatively unscathed, is the biannual sales or soldes. In this regulated society, retailers are limited to two per year and they happen between certain designated weeks in January/February and July/August. Woe on them who try to lure shoppers in with wildcat sales.

Actually, it’s a sign of the difficult economic times that a little leeway has been officially granted. Shops have been showing signs of the British malady by offering inducements like 3 FOR THE PRICE OF 2!! for some time now.

Nevertheless, these are only make-believe sales. The official biannual therapeutic sales are genuine affairs. I anticipate them keenly. No matter how scathing I can be about the British nation’s obsession with shopping, I do love to shop in sales. Music sales, that is.

They always start on a Wednesday in France. I think it’s something to do with the pedagogic community. Since schools tend to shut down on Wednesday afternoons, the idea is that teachers can rush to the soldes after their two-hour lunches. They are not, therefore, disadvantaged.

In this neck of the woods, cultural activities take a back seat to things like log-stacking and jam-making, so the early bird doesn’t necessarily catch the worm. I have known the most absurd bargains lie fallow in the racks for days. Drop-in visits have netted rewards like the complete Stax singles reduced from €100 to €10, and a double DVD of Keith Jarrett’s Standards Trio in concert and a boxed set of Fela Kuti classics for a buck each.

Nevertheless, I try not to leave anything to chance. So I was there at Cultura by 10.30, the multi-media emporium on the outskirts of town, where Brive turns into a kind of Americanised main drag. I’d dropped the daughter off at school and done the weekly supermarket shop and felt that a little leisure and pleasure were justified.

Sometimes my legs shake with anticipation; it’s like a hit of very strong coffee. My fingers tingle with febrile energy as I flick through dem racks. There’s no longer the comforting muffled phlumpp of LPs being displaced; now it’s more of a plastic clatter as CDs are assessed in the blink of an eye. Of course, if I forget my glasses, I’m in trouble. I have been known to leave behind more recherché bargains due to an inability to read the small print.

Records or CDs, the excitement has not diminished over the years. It’s the thrill of the chase. Some bastards around here shoot at majestic four-legged creatures, I hunt for music bargains. There are worse vices on earth. It’s also about the mystery of the unknown. You never know what you’re going to find. You have no preconceived notions. Downloading from the internet doesn’t do it for me. Where’s the degree of difficulty in pointing, clicking and waiting?

Chet Baker - with horn

Anyway, I was not disappointed – even if inflation has doubled the standard price from one to two euros. Forgive me if I tell you what I got – as I used to do as a child writing thank you letters. I just need to share my excitement. Well, there were: singletons by David Byrne, Daniel Lanois, Gilberto Gil and a blues chanteuse by the name of Ruthie Foster; re-mastered re-releases by Traffic and dead Beach Boy, Dennis Wilson; DVDs of Steve Winwood, Isaac Hayes and Sam & Dave in concert; compilations of reggae greats, Augustus Pablo, King Tubby and the Pioneers; compilations of British blues guitarists from the 1960s; a Rough Guide to the glorious music of the Congo; a 3-CD Ministry of Sounds set of Club Classics; a 4-CD set of the 70s recordings of bearded German big-band leader, Peter Herbolzheimer; and, best of all, a six-CD boxed set of Chet Baker recordings from the early 1950s.

The Young Man with The Horn, it’s called – appropriately enough. Chet Baker, he of the matinee-idol looks and the lifelong problems with drugs and the opposite sex. A bit of a bastard, in other words. Yet, when he put down his trumpet and sang, his haunting androgynous voice could transform the most anodyne popular song into a little masterpiece of melancholia.

So all that and more for less than the price of filling up our Citroën Berlingo. Nothing like a good sale. This year’s booty should help me get through the rest of January.