Traverse City, MI | Eugene’s Record Co-op reopening in new location: …”I’m just ready to get back to work,” Chamberlain said from the new store at the corner of Barlow and Carver streets. “Let’s get back to doing what we do and letting people know where we are.” Chamberlain opened Studio Anatomy — an all-ages recording studio and music venue — in the lower level of the Arcade Building. He added Eugene’s Record Co-op in December 2019. While he wasn’t able to bring back the studio at this time, Chamberlain said he’s ready to get the record store rolling in the new location. Even though Eugene’s isn’t downtown any more, the store may benefit from its new location and on-site parking. “We’ll have more extended hours than downtown,” said Chamberlain, who plans to be open from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and noon to 4 p.m. on Sunday. “I can open a little earlier not being downtown and stay open a little later during the week.
Jackson, MS | Jackson vinyl record shop promotes local artists through live concerts: For the first time in over three decades, vinyl record sales were higher than CDs, prompting one record store in Jackson to promote local artists’ physical work through live concerts. According to the Record Industry of America, approximately 41 million records were sold, compared to 33 million CDs. Vinyl purchases accounted for 71 percent of physical music sales and reeled in nearly $1.2 billion in revenue. Hayden Boyd, who manages The End of All Music vinyl record shop, believes popular artists heavily endorsing physical copies of their work has boosted the economy for record stores to the point in which it is difficult for stores to maintain a supply of newly-released albums. “People are kind of going back to physical copies of things and records are one that people like to collect, especially with big names like Taylor Swift and all these big pop artists pushing their records really hard. It really helped with the vinyl industry,” Boyd told SuperTalk Mississippi News. “It can also be a problem because we can’t keep up with stock.”
Rockford, IL | Rockford’s ‘Toad Hall’ celebrates 50 years of selling records, comics: Rockford’s “Toad Hall” has supplied the community with records and comic books for five decades. The vintage book, record and comic shop continues to attract locals and visitors from far and wide. Nick Naruz, Toad Hall’s owner, said that selection has been the key to their success. If residents want something, Toad Hall has it, and if residents do not know what they want, they will find somethings to walk out of there with. “You gotta have used record stores, comic book shops, books,” Naruz said. “A place for people to gather, explore and find things the old fashion way.” The location for all of that is 2106 Broadway. Toad Hall moved into the location in 1980, but the business was born in 1973. The shop has continued to be a hot spot in the community for 50 years.
Detroit, MI | An inside look at Detroit’s Third Man Records: Vinyl is back, and it’s getting more popular by the year. So popular that record makers can’t keep up. A new report shows more vinyl records sold last year than CDs for the first time since 1987. Forty-one million vinyl albums were sold last year, bringing in $1.2 billion, more than double what was spent on digital downloads. Eddie Gillis manages the vinyl pressing plant at Third Man Records in Detroit. Since the state-of-the-art facility opened a few years back, business has been booming. “It has definitely taken off. And it’s not just one age bracket, it is all across the board,” Gillis said. From those adding to their original collections from back in the day to those who were barely born when the iPod took over. “There’s a lot of people my age who really like listening on vinyl, even though we didn’t grow up listening to it,” said vinyl collector Kelsey Stratman.
IN | Once dying, then a novelty, vinyl is back and thriving: Big-box retailers have embraced the retro format, and megastars including Taylor Swift, Harry Styles, and Billie Eilish have sent pressing plants into overdrive. Like many people in his generation, Vijay Damerla finds most of his new music online—but the 20-year-old is slowly becoming a vinyl junkie, amassing records in his room. The student says he doesn’t even own a turntable, saying for him “it’s the equivalent of like getting an artist poster, or like even an album poster on your wall.” “Except, like, there’s actually kind of a little bit of a relic from the past.” For Celine Court, 29, collecting vinyl—she says she owns some 250 records—is about the nostalgic, warm sound that many listeners say digital copies chill. “If you listen to music on vinyl, it’s so different,” she told AFP as she perused the stacks at New York’s Village Revival Records. “It has like this authentic kind of feeling to it.”
Santa Rosa, CA | Photos: Massive record sale in Santa Rosa attracts those searching for nostalgia: Thousands of records were for sale during the Sonoma County Record Show over the weekend. Nostalgia was on tap Sunday at Shady Oak Barrel House in Santa Rosa during the Sonoma County Record Show, organized in partnership with Radiothrift and The NorCal Vinyl Society. People thumbed through the thousands of records for sale, along with vintage merchandise and used gear; DJs offered live performances and others ate tacos and drank beer.
Athens, GA | Orange Twin Record Label a fixture of Athens music’s past, present and future: Just before the year 2000, musicians Laura Carter and Andrew Rieger found “Elyse,” a 1960s psychedelic folk rock album by Elyse Weinberg in a thrift store bin in Missoula, Montana. The record caught their eyes with its striking cover art of detailed, colorful sketches. The pair had no idea that the find would lead to the start of their own record label. Carter and Rieger are members of the popular Athens based band, Elf Power, and quickly fell in love with Weinberg’s album. However, they soon discovered that it had been out of print for quite some time. “We were like, man, more people should hear this. But nobody knows who this is,” Rieger said. This began a year-long quest to track Weinberg down, finally ending when they found her living in Oregon, surprised anyone still cared. Because Weinberg did not own her master tapes, Carter and Rieger eventually remastered “Elyse” off of a vinyl record. “It’s all we had to work with, so you can actually hear the needle hit the record,” Rieger said.
