Twin Cities, MN | With Record Store Day postponed, local shops are getting creative: A few months back, we’d have expected record stores throughout the Twin Cities to be teeming with visitors for Record Store Day. That annual event has been postponed from April 18 to June 20, another effect of the COVID-19 pandemic. But like the rest of us, record stores are learning to adapt to these retail-unfriendly times. They’re offering expanded online sales, “virtual browsing” where someone will flip through the racks with you, specially curated care packages, and online auctions. There’s even a new limited edition Trampled by Turtles EP, Sigourney Fever, available only through Down in the Valley and Electric Fetus as of today. So in honor of what would’ve been Record Story Day, here’s what’s up at your local record store. See you all in June, we hope.
San Francisco, CA | ‘A devastating loss’: SF record shops lament closures on what should have been Record Store Day: It was 8 a.m. on Record Store Day, and the line in front of Amoeba Music buzzed with anticipation, stretching down Haight Street and around the corner onto Stanyan. Though it was the first time in 12 years that the San Francisco location had opened at such an early hour, manager Tony Green estimates that at least 8,000 people visited his independent record shop that day, eager to get their hands on a limited edition release or sought-after relic to add to their collection. That was last year. Now, the shuttered shop, which would have celebrated Record Store Day this weekend, is depending on online sales as the annual event is postponed until at least June 20. But Green thinks even that seems optimistic. “Of course, it is a certainty that we could not do it the same way we have in the past, with a lot of music fan frenzy and close social interaction,” he told SFGATE, adding, “Our main focus right now is figuring out how the store will run when we finally get to reopen. I never thought that my job would ever involve tracking down N95 masks for our employees!”
“Record stores changed our lives”: New doc “Vinyl Nation” celebrates Record Store Day at home: Kevin Smokler and Christopher Boone spoke to Salon about making their love letter to vinyl heads and indie stores. Vinyl heads, here’s your chance to celebrate Record Store Day from your own home while still supporting your favorite shop. The new documentary “Vinyl Nation,” is selling tickets for a virtual screening this weekend (April 18 and 19) with all proceeds donated to participating local record stores. Shot over the course of two years, “Vinyl Nation” visits indie shops nationwide and talks to musical experts and everyday collectors alike to spotlight the breadth and diversity of the vinyl fandom. What emerges is a fuller picture of how the record renaissance of the past 15-odd years is no longer the domain of the older, oddball or affluent; it’s a populist unifier. The doc was supposed to make its public debut at the Austin Record Convention in May, but won’t get that chance because of safe social-distancing.
Memphis, TN | Local book, record shops ‘essential’ to the city we want to keep: A signed, used hardcover of mystery writer Ross Thomas’ 1989 novel “The Fourth Durango.” A good-as-new used vinyl copy of the Chuck Berry compilation “The Great 28.” A remastered, good-as-new, used CD of The Clash’s 1979 album “Give ’Em Enough Rope.” A new paperback of the Larry McMurtry novel “All My Friends Are Going to Be Strangers.” Respectively, those were my most recent purchases at Burke’s Book Store and Goner Records in Cooper-Young, at Shangri-La Records on Madison near Overton Square and at Novel book store in East Memphis, all in the weeks just before our world mostly shut down. There are things I’m missing over the past few weeks: Having my kids in school. Being able to escape to a coffee shop to write. FedExForum “Whoomping” through an unexpected Grizzlies playoff race. Enjoying a bacon-and-egg grilled cheese and hibiscus tea from the Fuel food truck on a bustling Memphis Farmers Market morning. The mere prospect of lying on the lawn for a Levitt Shell concert. Going to the movies. But high on the list is this: Glancing over the stacks or flipping through the racks at book and record stores.
The Record Store: What Used To Be: VIBE takes a look back at record store release Tuesdays. Monday nights used to be unique. The anticipation for Tuesday mornings could barely be contained. Plans were made on how to ensure you could get to the mall and still make it to class on-time. Or, in many cases, how you were going to skip school altogether to sit with your newfound treasure. At one time, Tuesday mornings were the most significant moment each week for the music industry and music fans as new albums hit record store shelves. And unlike modern-day music consumption, decisions would need to be made. You couldn’t purchase every new release at $15 per CD. What album would sustain the listener’s insatiable music hunger until the next payday or allowance? In the “old days,” the second day of the week was about more than half-price movies; it was also the day that curious music fans found out who Cam’ron was or what this mysterious white boy from Detroit was all about. If the water cooler was the place to discuss politics and internal politics, the record store was the high school locker where jocks, hip-hop heads, goths, and others gathered to purchase the music of the day.
