We spent last weekend in Ballard doing a workshop, and at lunch and on Saturday evening, we found all manner of cool stuff to eat and do out there. Ballard seems to have morphed from the tragically unhip home of elderly Scandinavians to a happening hangout for hippy artists who like to eat good, cheap food. We didn’t have a lot of time for lunch, but we had excellent Thai and Indian food, and we managed to find an hour to browse among
Turtle Press’ fine inventory—taking a good bit of it with us when we left.
One store that completely blew me away was Sonic Boom, an amazing record store, specializing in “Northwest and indie label records and CDs,” that I’d never even heard of before. I only had about five minutes to browse and buy, but I still managed to put my hands on two CDs I’d had no luck finding anywhere else (
Remixes and
Every Day, by Cinematic Orchestra—they’re not rare or anything, it’s just that none of the stores I went into seemed to stock them). Since it was such a brief visit, I blindly grabbed at a bunch of postcards and flyers on my way out the door, and I was astonished to learn from one of them that the mysterious new tenants of the space that until recently was the home of Chameleon Books in my very own neighborhood are … none other than Sonic Boom! They even have a bunch of “in-store” appearances lined up, but not with local schmoes—folks like Supergrass and Stephen Malkmus will be performing four blocks from my home!
I have a feeling I’ll be buying more CDs.
