Fort Collins, CO | Old Bisetti’s location gets flipped to record store in Fort Collins: In a twist of events, a former restaurant becomes a brick-and-mortar record store, as the old Bisetti’s location becomes All Sales Vinyl. Bisetti’s was a part of Old Town Fort Collins for decades, on the main drag of College Ave. While many were sad to watch the Italian joint go, it’s refreshing to see it become something else we’ve seen vanishing in recent years — an actual record store. All Sales Vinyl sells new and used records (and they will be a part of Record Store Day, according to their Facebook), CDs, novelties, ukuleles and more. All Sales Vinyl had its grand opening on September 1.
Charleston, SC | New record store opens on John Street: Charleston Music Hall concertgoers may have recently noticed a new record store a few doors down on John Street, called Record Stop (43 John St.). Opening up the week before the Charleston Music Confab hit town, the small, boutique-like shop is the second Record Stop for owner Bruce Berg, who opened up his first record store on Long Island, NY in 1974. After retiring and relocating to Charleston in 2015, Berg decided to bring the concept to his new home. Record Stop is also a family business in that Berg’s son Jeff and son-in-law Mike Gomez together run the show in NY as well as own and operate Monostereo Distribution & Record Label services, working with local names like Jump, Little Children, Stop Light Observations, Atlas Road Crew, Mark Bryan, Young Mister, and Drivin’ N Cryin’.
Sudbury, CA | Do you collect vinyl records? They may be a thing of the past for the music streaming generation, but on Sunday in Sudbury, there was a strong vinyl vibe at a music collectibles show where vendors and those looking to buy were sharing their love of LP’s. Records spinning on a turntable at the collector’s show in Sudbury helped to set a nostalgic mood. Jay Leblanc has been buying LP’s for 30 years and found some vinyl treasures he’s been looking for. “I find the whole vinyl experience the sound is better. If you have a nice vinyl with not too many scratches, it comes off through the speakers just as clean as a CD and the overall experience of having an album in your hand and the big cover with artwork.” said Leblanc.
Minneapolis, MN | Semisonic dusts off ‘Closing Time’ demo to tout 20th anniversary album reissue: It’s not the new album that the band’s members have been offering tantalizing hints of for what feels like most of the 2010s now, but Semisonic has announced plans to reissue its best-loved ‘90s record to mark its 20th anniversary. A deluxe edition of “Feeling Strangely Fine” will be released Oct. 19 with four bonus tracks and new artwork and liner notes. The repackaging will include a first-ever vinyl edition of the record, originally released at the height of the CD era in 1998. All four of the additional tracks were unreleased songs only available on overseas CD singles. Among them is the wistful hidden-gem “Long Way from Home,” which the Minneapolis trio revisited during three sold-out live performances of “Feeling Strangely Fine” at First Avenue and the Turf Club last December.
Belfast, IE | For the record . . . let’s consider some radical remedial action for city centre: In March it was reported that sales of vinyl records and CDs had, for the first time since 2011, overtaken those of digital music and streaming. It remains to be seen how sustainable that trend is but when even supermarkets are stocking classic albums in their vinyl format it is clear that the old medium has made a comeback and it looks like it is here to stay…While the digital revolution did change music shopping forever, the return of vinyl shows that trends can be reversed, and people will adapt their retail habits when the product and the marketing is right. Its a lesson the retail world would do well to apply across the board in the battle against online shopping.
