HMV plans vinyl week: HMV will be holding another vinyl week across its stores in June, following the success of last year’s event and the continued rise in vinyl sales. Fans of the format will have access to a range of exclusives and discounted lines from June 13-19, with the first batch including Manic Street Preachers’ Everything Must Go (1,000 copies on blue vinyl), In Rock by Deep Purple (1,000 copies on marbled vinyl), John Martyn’s Solid Air (500 copies on green vinyl) and The Sun Records Collection (1,000 copies on black vinyl).
Last song: Popular Checkered Records store closes: Checkered Records was almost empty Tuesday afternoon. Gone were the rock posters ornamenting the walls. Empty was the space where countless vinyl records used to be stocked. The music was gone, the heart and soul of the local institution popular with music lovers, especially connoisseurs in search of promotional copies and other rarities. Customers also used to visit the shop regularly for more than CDs and records and special orders. When store owner George Bertovich died last year, Checkered Records lost its caretaker and supreme musical aficionado.
Another one bites the dust: A eulogy to a much-loved record store: The Audiophiliac mourns the loss of one of the last great New York City record stores, Other Music: New York City still had a lot of record stores — big chain outlets and small neighborhood shops — as recently as 10 years ago. One by one they dropped out, but now that Other Music is counting down to its last day on June 25, the news has hit me hard. Other Music is my favorite store, and I don’t have another one to take its place. It’s a big loss.
New Vinyl LP Technology Developed In Canada: Who would have imagined Canada as a leading-edge technology supplier for the record vinyl manufacturing industry? It’s true, as the Globe & Mail explains today. A Canadian solution to physical music’s biggest bottleneck just became even more Canadian. The Toronto startup Viryl Technologies, which announced earlier this year it had designed newly modernized and improved vinyl record presses, has inked its first partnership, with Calgary’s Canada Boy Vinyl. The Alberta record-pressing company has purchased three of Viryl’s presses, and they are expected to ship in September.
Why a Record Label Crushed a Batch of Vinyl Records: Matador Records scrambles for a new pressing after it recalled a Car Seat Headrest album that used parts of a Cars hit: The vinyl stock of “Teens of Denial” is expected to be replaced in early July by Independent Record Pressing, a plant near Trenton, N.J., that opened last year. Making IRP’s job more painstaking: the fact that “Teens of Denial” is a double LP. The pressing company will save and “quarantine” the records (featuring sides C and D) that didn’t include the offending song.
For the record: Peter Dante is retiring and looking to sell his Looney Tunes record shop: Dante, whose old-school mentality is reflected in his shop, is sharing the news mostly by word of mouth. He is hopeful he can find a buyer who will continue to operate Looney Tunes II as a record store. The new owner will absorb his entire inventory, all of the fixtures, business contacts and – perhaps most importantly – a business name that’s been in southern Rhode Island for 40 years. “I’m thinking it’d be perfect for someone with more energy to make it their own,” he said. “If I were a young guy I’d be excited to have this now with the resurgence of vinyl. Whatever happens with digital media – who knows – records aren’t going anywhere.”
