Meet Me In The Dollar Bin

Note: here's something I wrote in 2018 when I did two posts of a dollar bin blog, then promptly forgot I'd ever started it. I'm moving it here because here's where I write now.

I've been thinking a lot about writing again.

It was nearly nine years ago that I stopped writing for my last Blogspot blog. I was newly divorced and back on the scene and I just figured, "Fuck it...I'd rather go live it than chronicle it." So I dove into singing for a band in Baltimore. I bought a house. I found a new gig down South, then it moved me out to the PNW. And then I lost my job. And I was out of work for over a year.

Now, being out of work for a year+ teaches you a few things. They include:

1. Maybe you weren't as well regarded in your industry as you thought you were.
2. You can get fairly decent health care if your partner is a bulldog on the phone/internet on your behalf.
3. You better get clever if you want to have some fun.

So, in spite of abject poverty, I've actually probably acquired more music in the past 12 months than at any point in my life. And, with the rare exception of a Bandcamp purchase (the best thing since sliced bread for the DIY musician, IMHO), I haven't spent more than $3 on a single recording. A lot of it is out-of-print. A lot of it is really good. These all came from Goodwills, Value Villages, libraries, and $1 shelves in record stores.

The inspirations for this blog are folks like Spavid at Wilfully Obscure, Matthew Perpetua at Fluxblog, and Grey at Shiny Grey Monotone, all of whom have provided me with 1,001 new things to listen to over the years AND have kept the faith long after Mediafire killed all our links. The soundtrack and namesake is this song by Les Savy Fav, who once put on a hell of a show for a cynical 23-year-old, then became a late night talk show band. I found a copy of "Inches" in a Oregon Salvation Army for a dollar. It made me sad to think this might live there for another six months. So I brought it home, and an idea took shape, and now here you are.

"Meet me in the dollar bin
It's a band I once was in
Haven't done much better since
This is no coincidence
Been rubbing off our finger prints
Covered up with phony skins
This giving in has worn so thin
That you can see the beat within"

 Les Savy Fav, "Meet Me In The Dollar Bin", 2004