DJs find lost record collection a decade after it goes missing

Two Bristol DJs have been reunited with their record collection, 10 years after they misplaced the rare vinyl on their way home from a city pub performance.

Sean Kelly and his brother Dan, known as The Kelly Twins, were performing a massive eight-hour set of garage, disco and house at The Bell near Stokes Croft in Bristol in 2011. Due to the length of the set, they had taken three bags of records into the pub with them.

They took a taxi home after their show and only realised they had lost a large record collection once they arrived home. They had realised that one of their three bags, containing around 80 records, had gone missing.

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Speaking to Mixmag, The Kelly Twins said that the collection included several Shangaan electro remixes, a Mark Ernestus record, Levon Vincent and a Jameson remix of Whitney Houston.

Speaking to Bristol Live, Sean, 36, said: “We had cherry-picked our record collection for the choice cuts and that was the bag we lost so we were particularly gutted as it contained a lot of rare white labels which are hard to find.

“When we realised we’d lost it, we started to phone around cab companies, retraced our steps back to The Bell and called friends. We eventually had to accept they had gone for good.

“It still feels pretty fresh actually - it’s always really sad if you lose records as they cost money but also because they all have memories attached to them.”

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This week, an old friend of the twins phoned them to say he had discovered a bag of records in a garage he was cleaning out.

The bag of records contained a letter with Sean’s name on it and a drawing done by his nephew when he was one year old. His nephew is now 11 years old.

On Twitter, Sean wrote: "Lost a bag of records 10 years ago, a mate of mine was having rummage at his cousins (who is a taxi driver) the other day and there was a letter with my name on it in the bag. I shed actual tears after losing that and now it's made its way back to me after all this time. Muad."

Sean claimed he never expected to receive them back and had even re-bought some of the missing music.

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The duo told Mixmag that they feel great to have the collection back with them.

Sean has already been playing the rediscovered records again and says that the records may see the turntables again soon.

Aneesa Ahmed is Mixmag's Digital Intern, follow her on Twitter