records cars weird stuff: Last additions of 2025.

Well,

2025 is coming to an end, and last week I added the final two records of the year to my Kallax - records that came from Belgium after almost a month from when the order was placed.

Unfortunately, this last shipment really soured the experience.

I bought a copy of Stealers Wheel, the first album by the Scottish band Stealers Wheel from 1972; I bought and paid for it as a 1972 US A&M Pitman pressing… but what arrived was a Dutch A&M copy from an unspecified year. Various surface scratches were also included, unfortunately.

The good news?

Stealers Wheel sounds great after a deep cleaning with the Knosti and the Humminguru! I bought this record mainly for the song Stuck In The Middle With You and because I want to explore 1970s rock music.

However, Stealers Wheel turns out to be a great rock album overall - powerful and never boring from beginning to end.

The second addition is Non Stop Ecstatic Dancing, an album released by Soft Cell in 1982. I was a little disappointed because the cover has a bad circular mark that I couldn't remove… and once again, I ended up with a Dutch copy from 1982. The record itself is so light that it almost feels like a flexi-disc:

it must be handled with great care!

Fortunately, after the deep cleaning, this one sounds great too.

Let's take a look at the last two addictions of 2025:

1- Stealers Wheel by Stealers Wheel (1972)

Dutch A&M release from an unspecified year; sounds great.

This album contains the famous song Stuck In The Middle With You - do you remember Reservoir Dogs by Quentin Tarantino?!

2- Non Stop Ecstatic Dancing by Soft Cell (1982)

Original 1982 Dutch Vertigo release; small circular mark on the cover.

The original UK release is on the Some Bizzare label and features a blue label on side A and red label on side B; it also came with a picture sleeve.