It was the mighty foursome of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young that once sang "If I had ever been here before, I would probably know just what to do."

In their case, I'm not sure to what they were referring to but in our case, we know exactly what to do. We keep spinning those records people.

At the start of the month, Mr Johnson uttered those all too familiar words; "stay at home." We don't want to belittle the message and the priority of the entire nation to stay safe, but when we hear the instruction to stay at home, we also hear the message to listen to music. So here were are, for the 4th time, to tell you we are here to support you do just that!

This month we have all our usual content, plus some new topics that will hopefully give you some food for thought, as well as give you some ideas for your next vinyl purchases and trust us, there are a lot of ideas!

Here at Wax and Beans we pride ourselves on our availability of stock, but also we like to stay one step ahead and have our fingers on the pulse of upcoming releases. We've included our favourite for this month below, but you can check out our extensive list of pre-orders here.

Just a word of warning, they move quick, so don't miss out!

As always, we want to hear from you! If you've got any suggestions for a pre-order, message us here. You can also chat to us about anything else using that same link.

Our favourite pre-order this month is DMA's Live at Brixton.

On 6th March 2020, a sold-out audience filled Brixton’s O2 Academy from wall-to-wall. The band played the biggest headline show of their career to date, half a planet away from home, yet the show conjured the atmosphere of an intimate homecoming celebration. The O2 Academy Brixton show was immediately hailed as one of the highlights of the band’s career so far, and it has taken on a whole new significance given the events that have followed. For many fans it was their final show before live music events were halted.

DMA’S - Live At Brixton (Limited 2LP Gatefold Sleeve Smoke Effect Vinyl) - £26.99

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We stuck a new question on the board just before lockdown 3.0. As there's no one in the shop apart from us picking online orders, tweet your answers here!!

During the last couple of months of 2020, our very own Jon aka @VinylLovingLefty ran a competition on Instagram asking people to nominate their favourite 5 albums of 2020. With one lucky follower being chosen at random to win a copy of the winning album.

Well, the votes were counted and the winning album was the much loved "The Universal Want" by The Doves.

The competition winner was @chrissyboy73. Chris, who resides in Canada already owned a copy of the winning album so he chose a copy of the second place album "Letter To You" by The Boss.

Happy spinning Chris.

As one of Ben's Christmas gifts, Lou commissioned our friend and amazing local artist Lee Crocker (@crockerart65) to paint our building. This stunning original will be framed, ready and waiting for you all to see in the shop. We'll also have some other prints of Crox's iconic artwork that we're stocking. We'll be uploading these onto our website this week. All proceeds go to the artist.

Thanks for agreeing to paint us, Lee - we LOVE it.

Here at Wax and Beans, we believe that sharing is caring. So every month we'll be picking one album to share with you awesome people. Right now, the album is. . . . 

Viagra Boys - Welfare Jazz (Indie White Vinyl)

Since their founding in 2015, Swedish post-punk band Viagra Boys have made a name for themselves burning up stages around the world.

There's a little Iggy Pop spit and seethe, a David Yow drunken stumble, and a bite of Nick Cave's haunted bark. Add a dash of motorik groove, a pinch of post-punk grime, and a dose of no wave howl.

Viagra Boys - Welfare Jazz (Indie White Vinyl) - £19.99

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Here, we invite one of our incredibly loyal band of customers to nominate a record that has really made their year. This month, we asked our pal Jarrod for his thoughts.

Hi Everyone! I’m Jarrod and I’ve been collecting records for 6 years. I’ve been a regular customer at Wax and Beans since the start of last year. I also post highlights from record collecting on my Instagram page @jarrodsrecordcollection. Ben has asked me to write this piece for the newsletter, highlighting my Album of the Year for 2020 and the release I’m most looking forward to in 2021, so let’s do this!

My Album of the Year 2020 - Biffy Clyro’s ‘A Celebration of Endings’. Scottish rockers Biffy Clyro’s ninth studio album was written before COVID-19 reared its ugly head. Even without reference to the subject matter, the lyrics closely reflected what everybody was going through at the time of the release, which closely resonated with me. I have always been a Biffy Clyro fan, with 2009’s ‘Only Revolutions’ being my favourite offering of theirs pre-2020, however the genre-blending ‘A Celebration Of Endings’ quickly overtook it. Favourite songs include ‘Tiny Indoor Fireworks’, ’Space’ and ‘The Champ. The amazing Zoetrope picture disc released on Blood Records is easily one of my favourite vinyl variants released this year too.

My Most Anticipated Release of 2021 – Only Sun’s ‘Tangled Mind’. The incredibly talented ‘Only Sun’ are a relatively under-the-radar 4-piece indie pop band who I have been a big fan of since the release of their debut single ‘Overcome’ way back in 2016. The lads have consistently been releasing music since then, with the ‘Late to the Party EP’ being an early highlight in the boys’ career. In 2018, they released 1 song at the start of every month for the entirety of the year and called the resulting collection of tracks ‘2018 (Thank God That’s Over!).’ After meeting the lads at Kendal Calling 2017 and staying in touch with them regularly, it is clear to say that they are four genuine lads that adore the music they make and deserved to be recognised. Their debut album is also their first offering to be pressed to vinyl, with Blood Records picking up a limited-edition purple wax pressing. As a long-time fan of Only Sun, I feel like the exposure that the lads are getting from the Blood Records release will put them fairly in the spotlight where they belong.

There's only one thing we love more than selling records and coffee and that's the interaction with our amazing customers. We have made so many friends through the wonders of social media; one of these friends is Rosie Mead. (You can find her on Instagram - @iamrosiemead).

Rosie is a Music Sociologist finishing her PhD at the University of Exeter. Rosie approached us to write a blog discussing the benefits of music on our mental health. A snippet of the blog can be found below . . .

I think it might be fair to say that if you’re reading this blog, you’re an active music listener. By this I mean that you listen to music probably on a daily basis, you have regular conversations around music, you might be a musician, music is a part of your life. But have you ever thought about how music affects your wellbeing?

Read Rosie's write up in full on our latest blog post.