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Live at Grimey's (2010)
Released
A stadium band in a basement. Metallica played The Basement, the small club under Grimey's record shop in Nashville, on June 12, 2008, just before their Bonnaroo set, and the tape catches them loose and loud in a room that size. It came out on November 26, 2010, as a Black Friday release sold only through the independent shops that support Record Store Day, plus the band's own site.
It fits this list because it is a gift to the shops themselves: the band that kicked off the very first Record Store Day, recorded in one. The double 10-inch vinyl is the edition collectors look for; the CD is the cheaper way to hear the set.
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Medium Rare (2011)
Released
Foo Fighters gathered their scattered cover versions, songs that had been B-sides or compilation tracks, onto one limited vinyl LP for Record Store Day on April 16, 2011. Hearing Dave Grohl take on Prince's Darling Nikki next to a live Young Man Blues tells you more about the band's record collection than any of their studio albums.
The lasting appeal is having those strays in one place. A CD copy went free to new Q magazine subscribers for a limited time, but it left out Darling Nikki, so the Record Store Day vinyl is the version with every track.
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Feistodon (2012)
Released
The best odd couple Record Store Day has produced. Feist and Mastodon got talking backstage at Later... with Jools Holland and agreed to swap songs: Feist covers Mastodon's Black Tongue, and Mastodon turn her A Commotion into a sludge-metal workout. The split 7-inch came out for Record Store Day on April 21, 2012.
Both sides work as songs, not just as a joke on paper. A digital version followed that summer, so you can hear it cheaply first; the 7-inch is the object for anyone who loves either act.
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The Flaming Lips and Heady Fwends (2012)
Released
The Flaming Lips recorded across 2011 and 2012 with guests including Bon Iver, Nick Cave, Yoko Ono, Erykah Badu and Kesha, then released the results as a 10,000-copy double LP for Record Store Day on April 21, 2012. Each disc was pressed by hand with mixed shades of vinyl, so no two copies look the same.
Here is the reason to want the original rather than the June 2012 CD and reissue: Chris Martin's track, I Don't Want You to Die, appears only on the Record Store Day vinyl and was replaced on every later edition. There was also a blood edition, with collaborators' blood pressed into the vinyl; ten plexiglass-encased copies sold for $2,500 each, which makes it a museum piece rather than a realistic hunt.
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American Beauty (EP) (2014)
Released
Four Bruce Springsteen songs nobody had heard, outtakes from the High Hopes sessions, pressed on a 12-inch limited to 7,500 copies for Record Store Day on April 19, 2014. Springsteen said it felt like a good time to support record stores, which were dwindling, and he did it with new songs rather than a repackaged hit.
Be honest about what you are paying for: a digital download came out three days later, so the music is easy to hear. The vinyl is for Springsteen collectors who want these songs on a physical record, and at 7,500 copies it was never going to stay cheap.
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Lazaretto
The live Record Store Day 7-inch, April 2014
On Record Store Day 2014, Jack White recorded Lazaretto and a cover of Elvis Presley's Power of My Love live in the Blue Room at Third Man Records in Nashville, then pressed and sold the 7-inch at the label's shop in three hours and 55 minutes. It was billed as the world's fastest released record.
This is the entry where the day itself is the music's story. The A-side is a ragged, early live take of the song that later titled his album, and owning a copy means owning the stunt. Accounts differ on how official the Guinness recognition was, so buy it for the record, not the certificate.
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Some Other Time: The Lost Session from the Black Forest
The jazz find of the Record Store Day years. Bill Evans, Eddie Gomez and Jack DeJohnette played together for only about six months, and this June 20, 1968, session in Germany's Black Forest is the only studio recording that version of the trio made. Nobody had issued it in any form until Resonance released it as a hand-numbered double LP on Record Store Day in April 2016.
The CD and digital editions arrived within the week, so this is about the music first. Start with You Go to My Head, where Evans sounds unhurried and the trio's short-lived chemistry is easy to hear. The LP set is the handsome way to own it if you find one at a fair price.
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ChangesNowBowie (2020)
Released
In 1996, while rehearsing for his 1997 birthday concert, David Bowie recorded mostly acoustic versions of his songs for a BBC broadcast marking his 50th birthday, aired on Radio 1 in January 1997. Those recordings had no official release until 2020, when they came out on streaming in April and then on vinyl and CD for the Record Store Day drop of August 29, 2020.
It earns its place as a real discovery: late-period Bowie reworking his own catalog in an intimate setting, a side of him the hits compilations miss. Since it streams, the physical copy is for collectors rather than a must for anyone who just wants to hear it.
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Regimental Sgt. Zippo (2022)
Released
Elton John's lost first album. He recorded Regimental Sgt. Zippo between November 1967 and May 1968, then it was shelved when his publisher disliked the direction, and Empty Sky became his debut instead. It stayed unreleased until Record Store Day on June 12, 2021, as a mono vinyl limited to 7,000 copies.
Expect late-1960s British pop rather than the Elton of the hits, which is exactly why it is fascinating: you hear a major songwriter before he found his voice. A CD and stereo vinyl followed in July 2022, so the mono Record Store Day pressing is now the first-edition collector's copy rather than the only way in.
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