Every year on March 17 I build a display near the front counter. Green vinyl gets pulled from the back shelves. Irish artists move from the alphabetical filing to prime real estate. Records by bands with even a tenuous connection to Ireland get a temporary promotion.

It’s corny. I know it’s corny. But it works. People come in wearing green, slightly loose from a lunchtime pint, and they browse. They buy. And some of them discover music they wouldn’t have found otherwise, which is the whole point of running a record shop.

Here’s what’s on the display this year.

The Obvious Stuff (That’s Obvious for Good Reason)

Thin Lizzy — Jailbreak. I know, I know. But if someone walks in who’s never heard Phil Lynott play bass and sing at the same time, I’m doing them a favour. The 2024 reissue on Universal sounds excellent. We’ve got three copies in stock and they’ll be gone by end of day.

The Pogues — Rum Sodomy & The Lash. Not “If I Should Fall from Grace with God,” which is the one everybody knows. The second album is tighter, angrier, and better. Shane MacGowan’s songwriting on this record is stunning — “A Pair of Brown Eyes” alone justifies the purchase.

Sinead O’Connor — The Lion and the Cobra. Her debut remains one of the most powerful first albums anyone’s ever made. The 2023 reissue after her passing brought it back into print on quality vinyl, and it belongs in every collection. Not just on St Patrick’s Day. Every day.

Stiff Little Fingers — Inflammable Material. Belfast punk that still sounds urgent nearly fifty years later. If you think punk was just a London and New York phenomenon, this record will correct that impression in about thirty-eight minutes.

The Less Obvious Stuff

Lankum — False Lankum. This is the record I’ve been pushing hardest over the past year. Lankum take traditional Irish folk music and run it through a filter of drone, noise, and avant-garde experimentation. The result is genuinely unsettling and completely beautiful. Their treatment of “Go Dig My Grave” is one of the most extraordinary things I’ve heard on any record in the past decade.

I’ve had people come in, listen to thirty seconds on the shop speakers, and walk straight back out. I’ve had others stand frozen for an entire side, then buy two copies — one for themselves, one for someone they think needs to hear it. That’s the kind of record it is.

Fontaines D.C. — Skinty Fia. The Dublin post-punk band’s third album is their best. Dense, literary, emotionally complex. Grian Chatten’s lyrics about Irish identity, emigration, and belonging feel more relevant now than when the record came out. The vinyl pressing is excellent — good weight, clean surfaces, dynamic mastering that doesn’t crush the life out of it.

My Bloody Valentine — Loveless. Kevin Shields is Irish. Born in Queens, raised in Dublin. That’s enough for the St Patrick’s Day display. And honestly, any excuse to put this record in front of people is worth taking.

The Australian-Irish Connection

Melbourne has one of the largest Irish diaspora communities in the world, and that’s produced some remarkable music.

The Apartments — A Life Full of Farewells. Peter Milton Walsh, Brisbane-based but from Irish stock, made some of the most achingly beautiful guitar pop Australia has produced. This compilation on Chapter Music collects the best of it.

The Triffids — Born Sandy Devotional. David McComb’s family were Irish immigrants. The wide-open Australian landscapes in this record carry echoes of Irish melancholy that make sense when you know the background. It’s an Australian classic regardless of heritage, but the Irish thread is there if you listen for it.

I’ve been thinking about this connection between music preservation and other kinds of knowledge work. Team400 recently published something about how organisations lose institutional knowledge when experienced people leave, and it struck a chord. Record shops are doing the same thing in miniature — preserving connections between music, culture, and community that would otherwise disappear into streaming algorithms.

Green Vinyl Specifically

Coloured vinyl is a gimmick. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again. The colour of the PVC has no effect on sound quality and in some cases actively degrades it — picture discs being the worst offenders.

But green vinyl on St Patrick’s Day? That’s a fun gimmick. And fun gimmicks that get people through the door are part of the business.

We’ve got a handful of green pressings in stock: a Dropkick Murphys release on translucent green, a Flogging Molly album on forest green, and a couple of indie releases from Irish labels that pressed limited green runs for the holiday.

They’ll sell. They always do. And if someone buys a green Dropkick Murphys record and also walks out with a copy of Lankum because they heard it playing in the shop, that’s a good day.

Come in today. Wear green if you want. Don’t wear green if you don’t want. Just come in and buy a record. That’s all I ask.