Josh Rosenthal is the cratedigger and DIY musicologist behind such fantastic collections as the Grammy-nominated “He Is My Story: The Sanctified Soul of Arizona Dranes,” “Work Hard, Play Hard, Pray Hard : Hard Time, Good Time & End Time Music : 1923-1936,” and dozens of other fine releases on his own Tompkins Square Label. Rosenthal recently self-published a combination memoir and musical history, Record Store of the Mind, that tells his own personal story through the lens of the artists he loves and has championed, from 1950s country pioneer Charlie Louvin to Big Star’s Alex Chilton to finger-picking folk guitar master John Fahey. It’s a wonderful read and a great reminder that no music streaming service could ever replace the magical moment of visiting your local record store and flipping through the bins to uncover the music that moves you. From a KQED profile of Rosenthal:
College radio and internships led to an entrenched major-label career, concluding with Sony. He witnessed the industry’s lavish decadence, grappled with the cultural realignment brought by hip-hop and indie rock, and then rode out the great millennial unraveling. By 2005, he says, “The whole atmosphere was getting very corporate… so I started tinkering in my spare time with what would become [Tompkins Square’s] first title, Imaginational Anthem.”
A compilation of solo guitar stylists now expanded to several installments, Imaginational Anthem Vol. 1 features artists such as Max Ochs, John Fahey and Sandy Bull. “I had no real intent to start a label,” he says, but fortune and friends intervened. NPR kissed the title, for one, and he snared very favorable distribution through an old industry contact. Christened Tompkins Square after the historic park by his home in New York, Rosenthal’s unheard-of label moved several thousand units of a niche instrumental compilation. It was a coup. As he recalls, “I batted a thousand right there.”
Moreover, Rosenthal remembers that he was simply so “totally intoxicated” by producing the compilation — by unspooling dormant tapes and unearthing old stories — that Tompkins Square began hurtling towards the celebrated, decade-old label that it is today. “I got addicted,” he says. “It was bigger than me.”
Record Store of the Mind (Amazon)