“I grew up in Belfast, Northern Ireland before moving to London where I met the rest of The Wolfnotes. My dad was amongst the first DJs in Belfast after the show band scene started to fizzle out, so I was surrounded by vinyl from a young age.”
“There was a record/tape combo deck in the living room and vinyl from floor to ceiling of everything from Abba to Zappa, so I was allowed to browse through the mountain of records (as long as the crayons were hidden) and pick a record to listen to. I had a fascination with The Clash song “Should I Stay Or Should I Go” and I would sing along to “Prince Charming” by Adam and the Ants, probably dancing around the room at the same time!
Fast forward to my early teens and by this time I was playing drums along to Nevermind and It’s A Shame About Ray in my parents’ garage after school. On Saturdays I would go into the city with my friends and visit a record store called Good Vibrations (Cathedral Records) owned by a guy called Terri Hooley. He discovered Irish punk band The Undertones (famous for “Teenage Kicks” – John Peel’s favourite song of all time) and there I picked up my first pocket money record, “Heart Shaped Box” 7” single by Nirvana. This was a place I dreamt of having a record store of my own in someday, and no matter what part of the city you were from, it was a place to appreciate new music.
Sadly the record store burnt down a handful of years ago in an arcade fire that was rumoured to be malicious. The city lost a piece of its musical history with that fire, but this didn’t stop him opening another, after a massive benefit gig held by the bands that he had helped all those years before. The legend now lives on with an independent movie about Terri and the Good Vibrations Records legend.
When I moved to London, I never thought I would find a record store that would help me revive the passion and energy about music that I had at record stores as a kid. I didn’t think I would find one at all, because the digital age had had its way with most of the indies and they were getting harder to find.
So, when I was introduced to Banquet Records in Kingston upon Thames by the guys in the band after a rehearsal, it was the nearest I had come to the memory I held so close to my heart. People there cared for new music and organised gigs and in-stores for the bands. So in time we ended up playing an in-store show at Banquet Records and had a 7″ single of the week on the shelf within the year of that first visit. This made me feel better about not having the opportunity to get a record on the shelf of Good Vibrations record store from my home town – this was the next best thing.
Long live the independent record store. Long live vinyl.”
—Chris McComish, drums/vocals
