Eddie Cochran, Sharon Sheeley, ‘At Wallichs Music City’

© Eddie Cochran’s Lost Locker Collection
Hollywood, U.S.A. c. mid- 1950s
Eddie Cochran’s Lost Locker Collection series
Accompanied by a Certificate of Authenticity

This wonderful shot depicts singer and actor Eddie Cochran, next to songwriter Sharon Sheeley, shopping for music at Wallichs Music City in Sunset and Vine. In an era when most recorded music was sold through corner shops, Wallichs Music City became the premier speciality record store in Southern California and the world's largest. The record shop operated from 1940 to 1978, it was one of the first to display cellophane sealed albums in racks, and it stayed open until 2 a.m.

Sonny West is a musician and lifelong Eddie Cochran fan. When he stumbled across an online auction in 2021 of the Cochran family home, including all of Eddie Cochran's belongings, Sonny sensed the significance of what he was looking at. He bought as much as he could. As quickly as he could. Knowing he had found the lost pages, from one of rock and roll's greatest stories.

Eddie Cochran was only 21 when he died. He still lived at home with his family. After his death, his parents left his room untouched. A shrine to Eddie, his life and his music. Nothing from that room had come to light, since then. Until that auction appeared online. The reason such special items had ended up for sale, was strangely mundane; unpaid rent on a lock-up in California.

For decades after the death of Eddie's mum, everything was kept in storage. Eventually, the rent stopped being paid, and the contents of the lock-up were sold. The buyers were in the business of acquiring the unknown contents of unpaid lock-ups. Nobody seemed to know quite what had been discovered, until Sonny.

Goldmine Magazine
Deadline
Watch / Sonny West on Eddie Cochran and Lew Allen
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