Products & Accessories

Another record I picked up on my recent California trip was a test press of the Sparkmarker 'Products And Accessories' double LP. This was released by Indecision Records in 2017. Prior to my trip, I had zero intention of buying this record. But there were a couple of spare tests at Indecision HQ, and the price was so good that I just couldn't say no.

The record itself is a vinyl pressing of the CD release of the same name, which was originally released by Final Notice Records back in 1994. The CD was a compilation of the band's first four 7"s, which were released in the early 90s. So this LP is a vinyl pressing of four 7"s. Anyway, given that I picked up a test press, I kinda also wanted one of the regular versions, as I don't like owning only a test press of a record. So I set about looking for a regular copy of the record. I wanted either a purple or red copy, as I found out that most of those were destroyed because the sound quality was poor. I didn't care about the sound quality. I wanted one because it was rare. Well, I got lucky and found one in the UK that cost me £7 including shipping... which seemed crazy as the shipping cost was probably £4.

I'm not sure how many copies were originally pressed on purple as Indecision no longer maintains a discography on it's website. But regardless, the colour itself is kinda interesting - purple with black smoke.

Back around 1994-5, Sparkmarker were a pretty big deal and it felt like everyone was into them. At the time I tracked down the 7"s one by one (which wasn't overly easy in the UK in the mid 90s) and I was disappointed that none of them came on colour vinyl. But even now their songs really hold up. They were doing a sound kinda similar to Quicksand, and even though they got a lot of positive press, it just felt like they never really got anywhere near as popular as other similar bands. Probably because they were from Canada I guess. But damn, these early songs are so good.