Edinburgh, UK | Why one of world’s greatest record stores in Edinburgh had me singing ‘Dancing in the Moonlight.’ With no online sales, you have to go to the actual shop to understand the romance of the Thorne Records experience. I often wonder: If my life was a movie, what would the soundtrack be? One recent Sunday, the city awoke to sunny, clear skies. Morning joggers zoomed past me as I walked to my local specialty coffee bar in Edinburgh, pondering this question. What song would play when I’m happy, when the world is Technicolor, and walking feels like skipping down the street, or when I’m in love and my heart flutters like exploding pink butterflies or when I’m sad, and my chest sinks into a black hole? What would my life sound like? …Thorne Record’s distinct sunflower-yellow exterior makes it impossible to miss. The street was buzzing with traffic. Crossing the threshold of the shop door was like entering a bubble where time stopped – the sound of cars faded, replaced by old tunes playing in the background.
McKinney, TX | Red Zeppelin Records finds new home on McKinney’s downtown square: Red Zeppelin Records can now be found in a new spot in Historic Downtown McKinney, owner Katie Scott said. The shop, which sells vinyl records in a variety of music genres, relocated in mid-December to a space around the corner from its prior location at 206 E. Louisiana St. The store remained open during the relocation process, Scott said. “We made it happen really quickly,” she said. “We have such a great team and great community that was willing to help.” The record store is now adjacent to The Groovy Coop, a boutique also owned by Scott, and has the same amount of product held in the previous location, she said. Red Zeppelin Records will also continue to host live music performances in its new location. “We’re just here to be a space for everybody … Everybody’s welcome, we encourage diversity and inclusivity here,” Scott said. “We’re just happy to be here for good vibes and good music.”
Bristol, UK | New Mexican restaurant and record store to open in Bristol city centre: It is opening next month. A new venue serving up tacos, drinks and other Mexican street food, as well as records, is set to open in Bristol next month. Alta Loma will be ‘coming soon’ to number 18 Upper Maudlin Street in the city centre, near the BRI. In a post to its Instagram page, Alta Loma says: “Who’s ready for tacos and vinyl?! Tacos, tortas, drinks and other Mexican street food upstairs with a record shop in the basement. …The team have now confirmed via the official website that the venue is ‘coming March 2025’ and while there is no specific official opening date as of yet, more social media posts show the interior of the record shop and the transformation of the restaurant space. It comes after Alta Loma originally aimed to open by the end of summer 2024. The space will be shared, with Alta Loma in the restaurant above, and the record shop, Coffin Wax, in the basement selling music and merch from Bristol independent record label Stolen Body Records.
New York, NY | Rutherford Chang, Who Turned Collections Into Art, Dies at 45: He was best known for amassing more than 3,400 copies of the Beatles’ “White Album” and using them to demonstrate the aging of a cultural artifact. …Mr. Chang was not initially a collector of the 1968 double LP “The Beatles,” better known as “The White Album.” He bought one copy of it as a teenager, but when he got a second one some years later, he realized that the two — with their plain white covers as blank canvases— had changed over time. “The more I got, the more I could see how different these once identical objects had become,” he told the website The Creative Independent in 2017. “I didn’t know where it was going when I started other than that I wanted at least enough to see the differences between them. Then it just kept going and I can’t stop.” Mr. Chang’s installation, “We Buy White Albums,” unveiled at the Recess gallery in Manhattan in 2013, took the form of a facsimile of a record shop, with albums in bins and turntables to play the music.
Marquette, MI | The Emporium moves to Third Street, and records springing up at Ore Dock in March: A conversation with organizer Jon Teichman. You may be thinking spring already; Geoff and Jon’s Spring Record Show returns to the Ore Dock Brewing Company in Marquette from March 27th through the 30th. Geoff Walker and Jon Teichman will host a four-day vinyl record show on the 2nd-floor community room of the Ore Dock Brewery with new and used vinyl records, CDs, posters, cassettes, and more available to purchase. The ongoing event between Ore Dock Brewing Company and the NMU Vinyl Record Club continues in its 12th year. Visitors can talk with Jon and Geoff about trading old records and tapes or finding a new home for unused media.
Love Your Old DVDs, Vinyl Records, and Game Consoles? You’re Not Alone. Millions of us also hang on to cassettes, film cameras, and other old physical media, CR’s survey shows. It all started when my wife came down to my music room and described my rack of old electronics gear as “your island of misfit toys.” We then had a lively discussion about why I had such a fondness for stuff most people would have abandoned years ago. To be fair, she had a point. My favorite acoustic guitar is a 1941 Gibson, and my Telecaster electric guitar was built in 1967, a year later than the Fender amp it plugs into. I still listen to vinyl records and CDs, and watch movies on DVDs and Blu-ray discs. (We won’t even get into my collection of SACD and DVD-Audio discs.) That conversation got me wondering how many other people were still using audio, video, and home office products that most of us would consider antiquated.
Los Angeles, CA | Thump Records celebrates 35 years of lowrider jams: Thump Records turns 35 this year. This is how the L.A. label has kept oldies alive through pop-up trucks, word-of-mouth and a music roster of up-and-coming artists. …Founded in 1990 by Bill Walker, Thump Records specializes in distributing oldies mixtapes like “Old School Collection,” the “East Side Story” series, “Latin Oldies” and “Lowrider Oldies.” Crafting different mixes for various L.A. listeners, like “The Best of El Chicano” or “East Side Classic,” Thump prioritizes vintage sounds that are typically hard to come by in the age of streaming. With the help of nostalgia chasers and others wanting to keep the culture alive, the label is celebrating its 35th anniversary in 2025. Today, they focus on selling their anthologies with their three trucks—which take on various Southern California swap meets, car shows, record fairs and even mall parking lots every weekend—and representing new, up-and-coming artists who embody Thump.
Black Sabbath Classic Album Remastered For Special Reissue: Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi shared that the band’s 1987 album “The Eternal Idol” has been remastered and will be available as a limited edition vinyl for Record Store Day, as well as released on CD and digitally. Iommi took to X to share, “Writing on X this morning, “We’ve gone back to the original analogue tapes and had everything newly remastered, and it’s sounding better than ever. It’ll be available on vinyl, CD, and digitally for Record Store Day 2025. The limited edition ruby vinyl looks fantastic! Can’t wait for you all to hear it – Tony” Record Store Day says of the special vinyl edition: “The Eternal Idol is the 13th album from Black Sabbath, originally released in late 1987. Now available for the first time domestically on 140g red translucent vinyl. “It’s the first Sabbath album to feature vocalist Tony Martin, who would sing across five Sabbath studio albums between 1987-1995 (excluding 1992’s Dehumanizer).
Cambridge, UK | The resurrection of the record: a love letter to physical music. Daisy Cooper looks at her record collection and wonders if it’s really worth the effort. …Maybe it’s the collectability that draws me to records, and the idea of having cabinets full of them in a sitting room one day. Some elitists scorn ‘fads’ of coloured vinyl and extras. But novelty is all with my record-collecting habit. With the release of their final record Hellfire, I was frankly overjoyed to receive a set of black midi-body builder fridge magnets, (which now adorn our fridge, much to my flatmate’s confusion) with the ex-band member’s heads photoshopped on. And I’ll admit I roped myself into buying FKA Twigs’ new album Eusexua in a clear variant for a staggering £38 in FOPP (unregretfully worth every penny) the other day. Nevertheless, I’ll inevitably be back in a few weeks’ time to buy special editions of Squid’s Cowards and Oklou’s Choke Enough upon their release—it’s an obsession even the bounds of my bank account will never kill.
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