‘After eight hours, my feet and fingers throb’: my epic treasure hunt for vinyl gold

This Saturday, Record Store Day will see an avalanche of pricey rarities and flashy reissues. Instead, our writer scours the secondhand bins of indie stores and charity shops – and bags a dozen crackers

Having dipped in and out of Record Store Day over the years, I have always dreamed that one day, while supplementing a collection founded on records I’d nicked from my dad’s garage, I’d track down the one and only 7-inch release by his 1960s band – called Sunny and the Cloudbursts – for a few pennies rather than a big wedge of notes.

So, to a soundtrack of screeching seagulls, I have come to Brighton, to continue searching for my vinyl holy grail and partake in a warm-up, my own bargain basement alternative to RSD, which falls this Saturday, bringing a dizzying avalanche of picture discs, rarities and Blur zoetrope reissues – albeit at a price. I want to see if there’s still joy and value to be found digging through the dusty secondhand crates. With Brighton home to upwards of a dozen record stores and 20 charity shops – which are increasingly wise to the true value of secondhand records – will today be the day I strike gold?