THE VINYL
FRONTIER
Exclusive to this website and our retailer outlet at 101-103 Union Street Aberdeen AB11 6BD.
The atmosphere of second-hand vinyl record dealing is like a black hole, time capsule and vortex to other worlds all rolled into one. Any Vinyler knows that. But how are all these records found? Who spends their lives looking for them? And why do they do it? There’s easier ways to make a living. Call it therapy, call it addiction, call it The Vinyl Frontier.
The Vinyl Frontier is a collection of stories set in Glasgow, involving the same characters who are rival Vinyl dealers and collectors and the competition between them to accumulate the rarest pieces. The rarer the collections you have to offer fellow addicts, the greater your reputation as a dealer is.
Without reputation, no one will come to your record store. Without customers, you’re just a collector with a shop leaking cash. Never forget that you’re only as good as your last collection.
This Promo Edition of The Vinyl Frontier has two stories. An A-side and a B-side. The A-Side is Deadline Day, the story of how a collection was sought after by a dealer and a collector. The B-Side is a shorter story, Moonlight Mile, about a collector selling his lifetime’s collection with dealers salivating over it.
About the Books
The Vinyl Frontier is a fictional series of six books, each containing two, three or four stories related to record collecting and the dealers who bring collections to the public via record shops.
While these stories are set in Glasgow, Vinylers and Vinylettes across the globe will recognise these characters and situations. We’re kindred spirits!
Each book is presented as a 45rpm single with one story on an A-side and another on a B-side, or as an E.P. with more than two songs.
Eventually, the LP version will be published incorporating some of the stories already released in “single” form but also including exclusive stories for the LP version.
Each copy will be numbered and signed. The print runs will be small, thus ensuring these become collector's items.
This first volume of The Vinyl Frontier is 80 pages and part of a very limited edition print run. Publication Date 19th September 2025.
The following volumes will be published Quarterly.
About the Author
Jerry Keith has been a vinyl record collector and dealer for many years. After the expected stardom of his band mysteriously failed to materialise, Keith started his working life in the 1980s as a Door To Door salesman for German Publisher, Bertelsmann, and eventually worked in publishing for over thirty years. Keith has also written more than forty books published under various names in various languages across four continents by publishers such as Mondadori in Italy and others.
Keith tries to inject his books with humour, however edgy some of the characters.
PS, these books contain swearing because record dealers swear. A lot. So, maybe don’t take them to church.
How will it sell? How quickly will it sell? What will I get for it? What’s the total cost? What’s the cost of NOT buying it.
Your reputation as a dealer is only as big as your stock, the search for which is never-ending. If you’re sleeping, the competition might be buying. No rest for the addicted. Vinylers can be addicts. But the dealer’s addiction is feeding those addicts. Like in The Wire, when Stringer Bell’s crew had poor product and the addicts went to Prop Joe instead, it takes a week to lose them, a month to get them back.
So, when you hear of a collection, you stalk it. Sometimes for days, sometimes for months, or even years, depending on its size. But there are other hunters in the jungle too. Sometimes you make alliances. Sometimes you don’t.
This creates perfect conditions for drama, for tests of character, morality, ingenuity, courage and of course, decency. Do you want to fill your pockets? Or feed your soul? How far will you go?
Never forget – you’re only as good as your last collection.
The B-Side is Moonlight Mile, a shorter yet poignant tale that follows a collector at the twilight of his journey, parting ways with the treasures he has spent a lifetime amassing. As word spreads, dealers circle with anticipation, eager to claim pieces of history for themselves. Beneath the surface of transactions and valuations lies a more personal undercurrent — the bittersweet weight of letting go, the allure of ownership shifting hands, and the quiet dignity of a passion lived fully before passing into new custodianship.
Published by AVR Publishing
AVR Publishing was founded to publish books on the joy and the pain of record collecting. As any vinyler or vinylette knows, searching for the rarest beasts can be quite the safari. Sure, you can buy any rarity online. Sometimes that is what is required. Then again, you can always find a tiger in a zoo. But finding it in the wild is a different experience. That’s where record shops come in.
Record shops owned by complex animals known as dealers. They are all looking for the same things, from Led Zeppelin 1 Turquoise Lettering to the withdrawn Sex Pistols God Save The Queen on A&M Records, and trying to avoid the same things, like Jimmy Shand or Holst’s The Planets. That’s no reflection on the music. It’s all about what you can sell. Some terrifically shite music sells like hot cakes. Some transcendently beautiful music can’t be given away. Dealers learn quickly to leave personal taste at the doorway of any house we’re going to buy a collection from. All we need to know is:
