Peninsula Records and Books

  ...and why it’s actually smarter than ever I read a few articles this week as I fell into a rabbit hole searching for release dates, and now I can’t stop thinking about why people, us included, are all so drawn back to physical stuff. Actual books. Vinyl. The tactile. Real things we can hold. There’s real science behind this. First up, reading comprehension. Studies show that people absorb way more information from paper than from screens; like up to six or eight times better comprehension when reading prints over e-readers or screens. Almost all quality studies point the same way: your brain remembers more from paper. Also, handing someone a physical book reduces stress. A classic study from the University of Sussex found reading just six minutes of anything you enjoy can lower stress by 68%. Better than music, better than tea or a stroll. Slows your heart rate, eases your muscles. Not woo woo either..  actual science.   Then there’s vinyl. Here's a stat I cou...

So picture this. It’s Saturday night. The footy’s on the TV. We’re Crows tragics through and through. Laptop’s open on my lap. Our schnauzer is curled up beside me. And I’m not watching the game, not really. I’m trawling through every single supplier, wholesaler, and distributor I can access, trying to find even one or two records from the Triple J Hottest 100 of Australian Songs that we could add to our collection. (see here for my recollection of earlier that night) And I am pretty sure I wasn't the only record store owner doing exactly this.. minus the footy and schnauzer maybe.  Some of the albums I knew we wouldn’t find. Like Down the Way by Angus and Julia Stone. We’ve had it before. Sold it more than once. And it’s on backorder but I genuinely have no clue when it’s coming. The Veronicas were my personal chase. That album? It’s a memory in itself. My daughter singing in the back seat. Little voice. Belting it out like her life depended on it. That album and early Taylor ...

We’ve pulled together a Hottest 100 Vinyl Collection to celebrate the albums that feature songs from this iconic list but really I want to talk about my reaction when the number 1 was announced... I love INXS. I grew up with INXS. I remember exactly where I was the day I heard Michael Hutchence had passed... I remember when Kylie and Michael were a thing... I remember my cousins and I playing Kick over and over like it was a religion. But when I heard that Never Tear Us Apart had taken out number 1 in the Hottest 100 of Australian Songs? I just sat there in my car yelling noooooooooooo at the radio. It wasn’t that it didn’t deserve the spot – of course it did. That song is a masterpiece. For me, it was the timing. The symbolism. That weird superstition that applies to football games in Adelaide. The Night of Number 1 It was Saturday night. About 7.34pm. Pouring with rain. I’d been listening all day as the countdown rolled on... but this was it. The top spot. I’d just dropped my...

Every few years, Triple J throws out the ultimate challenge-slash-emotional-spiral: name your top ten Australian songs of all time . Like, ever. In June 2025 , they reopened voting for the Hottest 100 of Australian Songs , and just like that, I was in. No choice really. The countdown airs on 26 July 2025 and if you’ve ever tried to pick just ten songs that define your life? Good luck. You can read the full explainer on what it is and how it works here. I love a list. But this? This was chaos. Absolute beautiful, nostalgic chaos. I could’ve picked ten songs per decade . Actually, per genre per decade. INXS or Midnight Oil? How do you choose between Kylie and The Church? Australian Crawl or Icehouse? That’s just the 80s and I haven’t even gotten to the Big Day Out era. Why It Was So Hard I started out all very logical and curated. You know... songs that shaped the culture, meant something nationally. But then it turned into a game of memories. The first car. The first heartbreak. The f...