Album Addict is what Steve Belcher calls his booth full of vinyl albums at Cedar Chest Antiques in downtown Lake Charles. He thinks he has 5,000 to 6,000 albums for sale at the moment.<\/p>\n
So far, Album Addict has mainly been selling vinyl from the 1970s through the \u201890s.\u00a0 <\/span>Belcher calls \u201cclassic rock\u201d the \u201csweet spot\u201d of the store\u2019s collection. Big sellers have included such acts as Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen and the Allman Brothers.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople buy Beatles albums by the armful,\u201d says Belcher. He devoted January to a month-long Beatles vinyl sale. He\u2019d already sold two full Beatles catalogues before his January sale and had two more on hand ready to go. He\u2019ll have a similar Rolling Stones promotion in February.<\/p>\n With consumers able to buy a pristine vintage album by the Beatles (or other old school acts) for $14, Belcher thinks he can offer a high quality music product at an attractive price.<\/p>\n His stock isn\u2019t all one flavor. He says the store has a little bit of everything, including contemporary rap. He just bought a collection of jazz albums. And he\u2019s also acquired \u201c2,000 mint condition classical albums\u201d with \u201cno scratches, no ring wear.\u201d These will be priced at $3 each.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n There are also t-shirts; several hundred CDs; and vintage posters, mainly from the \u201860s and \u201870s. The vinyl in the bargain bin $3; you take these as you find them.<\/p>\n When Belcher brought by a selection of his merchandise, he showed me a new-looking copy of the Pink Floyd album Dark Side of the Moon. It felt big and heavy. Belcher said the disc was made of 180 gram vinyl. This super thick vinyl is made of \u201cdeeper grooves\u201d \u2014 groves so deep that small scratches made when one is removing the disc from its jacket are too small to have any effect on play back.<\/p>\n Belcher has learned what many youths are learning: the sound of a vinyl recording played on a good stereo system has a richer and more satisfying sound than that of digital recording: especially when the latter are played through weak, tinny computer or phone speakers. \u201cListen to an old analog system,\u201d he says. \u201c[You\u2019ll be] hearing things [you] didn\u2019t know were in there.\u201d<\/p>\n Business has been good so far. \u201cLast month, we couldn\u2019t get them out fast enough.\u201d<\/p>\n All records are cleaned, inspected and placed in a static resistant jacket. The original jacket is also sold as part of the package.<\/p>\n Belcher also runs the Album Addict web store. But he says online selling is labor intensive. He\u2019s moving more towards selling person to person. In fact, he\u2019s hoping to move Album Addict into its own storefront by the end of the year. To learn more, visit the Album Addict booth at Cedar Chest Antiques or visit albumaddict.com<\/p>\n The Other Side? I\u2019m All Ears.<\/strong><\/p>\n It\u2019s not often that a big Up Front story comes from DeQuincy. The special attention being showered on that city in this issue is entirely due to the actions of Dr. Eric Jacobs, who works on the staff of DeQuincy Memorial Hospital. On the night of Jan. 8, Jacobs called the hospital and said \u2014 according to the DeQuincy PD \u2014 that \u201ca man was coming to the hospital to shoot them.\u201d<\/p>\n Police got to the hospital within minutes. But when they arrived, they were told that the call had just been a bad joke.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n KPLC asked Jacobs to explain his little joke; he said, \u201cthere\u2019s two sides to every story.\u201d<\/p>\n Well I\u2019m heartily relieved to hear that, because I\u2019m damned if I can figure out the other side of a guy with an MD calling a hospital and saying a shooter\u2019s on the way.<\/p>\n Another person who may be looking for that other side of the story is DeQuincy Police Capt. Tom Threet, who said \u201cpeople [at the hospital] were scared to death\u00a0 <\/span>… We\u2019re telling them that we have a possible shooter … [We saw] horror … on people\u2019s faces … [We read on social media that people] locked themselves in a closet, they hid … \u201c It wasn\u2019t lost on Threet that this horrifying \u201cjoke\u201d had been made by somebody with several degrees; he said, \u201cwe cannot have these kinds of actions, especially from an educated person.\u201d (All of this was quoted in the KPLC report.)<\/p>\n Jacobs, by the way, did not tell KPLC the other side of the story. He just said there was another side.<\/p>\n One person who wasn\u2019t waiting for the other side was Judge Guy Bradberry, who ruled that Jacobs would be charged with three counts of terrorizing.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Think you\u2019ve read the wildest part of the story? Well, don\u2019t quit reading yet. A hospital spokeswoman said that in spite of the fallout from Jacobs\u2019 phone call, it was \u201cbusiness as usual here at DeQuincy Memorial Hospital.\u201d Jacobs was seeing patients at the hospital the day after his call.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Strap me to a hog and roll me in the mud! What if it turns out that sometimes there\u2019s actually just one side to a story?<\/p>\n Mardi Gras Babies Deemed Obscene<\/strong><\/p>\n A few months ago, Tumblr announced it would remove all adult material from its web site and proceeded to do just that. I wondered how Tumblr could possibly stay in business without that material. For a few weeks there, the media was full of editorials by writers wondering exactly the same thing.<\/p>\n But all of that hubbub was swept aside when a Louisiana ad firm tried to sneak a hardcore porn photo onto Facebook. It was a photo that featured … well … I\u2019ll just have to be blunt … nudity. That\u2019s right. Nudity. And just what was pictured in full nudity, without so much as a scarf or garter belt? The answer is plastic King Cake babies.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Now, if you\u2019re having a hard time wrapping your mind around this, just think it over. Think of all the plastic babies you\u2019ve seen in all those King Cakes you\u2019ve eaten over the years. Did you ever see one of those babies that had a little plastic diaper on it? No. Every single one of them was stark staring nude.<\/p>\n An anonymous Daily Advocate staffer had some fun with the story, writing that \u201craw, uncensored king cake babies are not suitable for Facebook advertisements … \u201c\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The ad with the photos of the offending little plastic babies was run by a Mandeville company called Innovative Advertising for its annual King Cake Snob event\u2014 a project designed to find the tastiest King Cakes in Louisiana in any given year.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n But Facebook put the hammer down hard this year, telling Innovative \u201cthis ad isn\u2019t running because it includes an image or video depicting excessive skin or nudity.\u201d Facebook suggested Innovative \u201cremove any images or video that contain nudity.\u201d \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Innovative has run the very same ad with the very same pictures of the very same dolls in previous years. But this year was the first in which they were alerted by the Facebook goons that their ad was kiddie porn that was too low-brow for the pristine, high-minded feeds of the world\u2019s primary forum for sophisticated and ethically rigorous discourse.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Do you think Tumblr messed up \u2014 I mean, messed up in the sense of losing many millions of dollars? Well, just wait until the unenlightened masses on Facebook find out they can no longer post photos of babies or dolls.<\/p>\n Andrew Alexander, a representative of King Cake Snob, said, \u201cThis is absurd.\u201d I think nobody outside of Facebook is going to disagree with him. The Notorious B.I.G. once rapped, \u201cmo money, mo problems.\u201d He could just as easily have rapped, \u201cmo money, mo stupid.\u201d<\/p>\n Prepositions Aren\u2019t For Sale!<\/strong><\/p>\n About as effective as Facebook\u2019s censorship algorithms are the algorithms Amazon uses to troll my Internet activity. Recently, I went to a site where the banner ad was for an Amazon product priced at $309.99. Amazon described the product as the \u201cGARMIN STRIKER PLUS SCV WITH CV20-TM TRANSDUCER … \u201c<\/p>\n Here\u2019s the problem I have with the whole thing. I don\u2019t know what Garmin is. I don\u2019t know what a Striker is. I don\u2019t know what SCV and CV20-TM are. And, finally, I don\u2019t know what a transducer is.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n I do know that \u201cPLUS\u201d is a conjunction and \u201cWITH\u201d is a preposition. But I don\u2019t need to pay $309 for them. I know how to use them for free.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Album Addict is what Steve Belcher calls his booth full of vinyl albums at Cedar Chest Antiques in downtown Lake Charles. He thinks he has 5,000 to 6,000 albums for sale at the moment. So far, Album Addict has mainly been selling vinyl from the 1970s through the \u201890s.\u00a0 Belcher calls \u201cclassic rock\u201d the \u201csweet [&hellip<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":270,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[38,37],"yoast_head":"\n