Music fans grab records at sale

The annual event is a vitally important fundraiser for the group, which organises the annual music event at Vale Castle. The money raised at the weekend will go towards staging the event, which allows profits from the music event to go to charities such as The Burma Campaign UK, Free Tibet and Bridge2Haiti.

Vale Earth Fair Collective’s Rob Roussel said this was the first time they had held the record fair at St James and it had proved to be a good venue.

‘We have about 5,000 LPs on the Vale Earth Fair stall, as well as 2,000 singles and about 1,000 CDs,’ he said.

‘There are also seven other stall holders, who have paid for their pitch, so that adds to the funds.’

The collective has been busy organising acts for this year’s event and a headliner is set to be announced this week.

‘It is exciting,’ Mr Roussel said.

Gathering together funds now is important, because the collective needs to start booking hotels and flights for acts travelling to the island this summer.

Tickets have gone on sale online. Sales have been slow so far, but it is hoped they will pick up closer to the event. Mr Roussel said after the bad weather last year, all funds were very important.

Among the music fans browsing the records was Matt Le Blond.

‘We just bought a record player from HMV when it closed, so now we need some records,’ he said.

Ricky Mahy took the chance to buy some Duran Duran and U2 records at the event.

‘I was looking for 1980s and 1990s music,’ he said.

‘I’ve got them on CD, but they don’t have the warmth of vinyl records.’

Mr Roussel said they were grateful to St James for letting them use the space for free.