MUSIC: Vinyl x DonHAVI

Vinyl became a big thing to me in '09-'10 while I was working in Ballard at Blackbird Ballard. BB was a menswear retailer that specialized in designer fashions and apothecary. The owner Nicole Miller (not to be confused with Nicole Miller the designer) has been as an inspiration and mentor to everything that we are doing now through my experience with her and her business. Her personal style and taste is so eclectic that her many sides helped me reveal some of my own. One of those would be my love for vinyl. Until working in her retail space I had little experience using a record player or understanding the complexity of its sounds and why people hold it so close and stand on their soapbox so tall in honor of its legacy. But I learned quickly and via our buyer Kris I learned a thing or two. 

My homie Havi is a really a crate head. I've known Havi for a little more than 5 years now, he's got close connects within the LAAT, but it was a little more than two years ago that he began to talk about records and has not stopped. His passion is pure - he's the kind of vinyl head who is just happy in the record store. In the beginning it seemed like his thirst for vinyl came without a theme, in hindsight his journey is that of many hip hop historians, he's a sample collector. He is slowly developing the skill of being able to identify the popular samples used in modern day music because he has the original record that was sampled in his collection. His growth is impressive he's finding faster more efficient ways of getting quality finds lots of them from the disco and soul eras. He dabbles in releasing music here and there but his focus is on the tradition and heritage of vinyl it seems. What his journey is doing is keeping the heritage of beat breaks, DJs and producers alive in the analog format. It's necessary to the preservation of hip hop culture. Salute to Havi for pulling up on us at the shop to chop game and play gems off his portable turntable w/ built in speaker.  Shout out to the top two record stores in town doing their part to make sure the culture is served in Tacoma, Hi Voltage and Rocket Records. Look out for more from Havi, he's going to be dropping things slowly on his SoundCloud but also he's working on releasing a cassette all recorded analog. We'll keep you in the loop as thing develop.