Footscray Records Purchases Record Collection That Belonged To Pentridge Prison
Footscray Records urges anyone with more information about the collection and how it was used to reach out.
Footscray Records VIC (Supplied)
Footscray Records has acquired a historic collection of records, purchasing the vinyl collection that belonged to Pentridge Prison, a notorious maximum-security prison located in Melbourne.
Established in the Melbourne suburb of Coburg in 1851, the prison shut down in May 1997. Notable prisoners who were at the facility included Ned Kelly, Julian Knight, Mark “Chopper” Read, Craig “Slim” Minogue, and many others.
In 2016, developers Shayher Group rebranded the Pentridge Coburg site as “Pentridge” and hosted an open day. They also began restoration works, while the Horizon apartments—the first residential development on the site—were completed.
In 2019, construction of the shopping centre, cinema, Victoria Tower, and The Rook apartments began. The redevelopment of the prison opened to the public in 2020.
On Thursday (28 August), Footscray Records shared a “weird one” to Instagram, revealing that they’d purchased the record collection that belonged to Pentridge Prison.
They added that the facility had a system where certain inmates would DJ on a “prison-only radio network” for other inmates. One of those DJs was Stan Taylor – also known as the Russell Street bomber.
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The record store’s post also stated that some records had “certain songs carved out by the prison,” such as Desolation Row from Bob Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited, “purposely scratched out.”
Within the collection, Footscray Records has discovered “Heaps of cheap stuff, but there are gems throughout.” Promising to blast the collection over the coming days, the record store urges anyone with more information about the collection and how it was used to reach out.
Check out the post below.
In June, Footscray Records competed in the running to be named Australia’s best record store in a search run by The Music.
The record store opened in 2022 to service the people of Footscray and proudly showcases “Strange psychedelic oddities from all over the world, cheap prices, and free in-store gigs.”
The team revealed that Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours is the most popular best-seller, while they’ve also recently sold plenty of records by Irish rap trio Kneecap.
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