Saturday was Record Store Day - the day when you're supposed to go to your local record store and buy something/anything (perhaps even a copy of Something/Anything) in order to help stave off said record-mart's extinction. I guess you could say I celebrated a few days early this year (though really every day is sort of Record Store Day for me). By chance this past week I had the opportunity to spend about 24 hours in Pittsburgh - home to the legendary Jerry's, the most monstrous-est record emporium around. It's a store you could literally spend a week at without going thru everything that's out on the floor. You just don't see places like it anymore.
The last time I rolled thru town was maybe 13-14 years ago, but - as local peeps told me - certain things don't change all that much here. And thankfully the sheer volume of affordable stock at Jerry's is one of them. (Thanks to J. Malls for staying open extra late so I could feed my record jones on the after hours tip.)
Besides looking at records I had a great little whirlwind visit. A few other random observations on my brief time in the Steel City:
1.) Every meal I had within 24 hours was a huge sandwich. Every sandwich came with cole slaw (and sometimes fries) in the sandwich, not on the side. Every sandwich was incredible.
2.) Pittsburgh (much like my old hometown of Boston) is crazy heavy into sports. Every business has a "Go Steelers" or "Go Pens" sign in its window. Every bar or club (actually every place that serves food or drink) has a TV (or several TVs) showing sports, sports highlights, or fake sports like professional poker. I went to a club where Diplo was DJ-ing and they had Baseball Tonight on behind the bar. One minute I'm looking at a bunch of would-be hipster kids freaking out to some remix of Robin S.'s "Show Me Love," the next I'm seeing highlights of Cleveland running up the score on the Yankees (ha-ha). Maybe it was the Itis (having, of course, just consumed a huge sandwich), but I was pleased that I could witness both of these things without having to expend a lot of extra energy.
And in case it hasn't sunk in that folks here love them some sports - just check out the statue that welcomes you at the airport:
Franco Harris making the "Immaculate Reception." (BTW, the guy on the right is George Washington. But honestly it could be anyone. It's all about Franco.)
3.) I saw White folks and Black folks while I was there, but not a whole lot in between. I might have guessed this just based on who drove the taxi cabs. (Which, BTW, are actually kind of difficult to come by. You can call for one, but there's no guarantee that it'll actually show up - unlike the above photo, which has obviously been staged - and a recording informs you of this when you're on hold waiting to talk to a dispatcher.) I took three cabs during my stay. Two were driven by dudes who looked like they were Barksdale Crew extras from The Wire. One was driven by a Grizzly Adams-type older gentleman who looked like he'd shoot the other two dudes if he saw them on his property (and maybe even if they weren't). They were all very professional and courteous. Zero cabs were driven by immigrants from South Asia or the Middle East. I guess it's a tough rotation to crack.
Anyways, all in all I'm kinda feeling Pittsburgh. Special shouts to the dude Zimmie for being such a gracious guide. Looking forward to going back there again (hopefully much sooner than another 13-14 years). In commemoration of my trip here's the finest homage to the town ever recorded:
"What's the word?/ The Burg, the Burg." Word.
1 comments:
If ya don't want an Asterisk you gotta go with Asterik.
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