Sparks - Kimono My House (Vinyl, 1974, Island Records ILPS 9272)
$
31
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Description
Sparks - Kimono My House (Vinyl, 1974, Island Records ILPS 9272).
Sparks' third album and their first real commercial success.
Kimono My House shows the band in full glam prowess. The music and lyrics are by turns serious, theatrical, condescending, pleading, joking, and more. Russell Mael's vocals sound like an affectation or a joke, but soon they seem not only normal but actually right.
The addition of Adrian Fisher really improved Spark's overall sound . . . the songwriting feels more evolved than in previous efforts. Kimono My House has been influential as well, with artists as diverse as Morrissey, Steve Jones, Bjork, and John Frusciante, citing Kimono My House as an important record. This record snuck into the Rolling Stone list of 500 Greatest Albums Of All Time, at #475.
The record was hit in England and Australia, somewhat less so in the US and Canada.
One daring aspect in packaging terms, especially in 1974, is the fact that neither the band's name or the name of the album appears on the front cover. (I can't remember exactly, but almost certainly in the US a sticker with the band/album name was put on the shrink wrap.)
The record comes in a non-gatefold jacket with a custom inner sleeve. The inner sleeve has the lyrics on one side and a picture of the Mael brothers on the other side.
This 46-year-oid jacket is in very good shape overall. There is some corner wear/damage upper right. The sides and spine have less wear than would be typical for a record this old. HOWEVER -- I downgraded the jacket to Good+ because the glue holding the jacket has completely come apart; pictures 5 and 6 show the jacket opened up . I personally don't try to repair things like this, because a) I almost always ends up make it worse than it was, and b) I want to present/sell the item in the condition it naturally has assumed. Of course, if you end up buying it, it's yours to try to fix as you like.
The inner sleeve has held up generally well -- there are some creases here and there and it looks like someone taped the upper right of the side (where it has split) with the Maels' picture on it.
This is the Pitman pressing, The record is well-recorded and sounds great, to my ears. There is the occasional crackle and tick, but they are few and far between, and there are no skips.
I've marked it down a few dollars from the low $40s trending price due to the jacket and inner sleeve considerations detailed above.
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