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Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

John Cougar Lunchbucket Oct 03 2017 05:00 PM

I didn't wanna turn Tom Petty is dead into another topic so copying this message I wanted to respond to: batmagadanleadoff wrote: I bought most of my albums and CDs at J&R Music World, the greatest record store I ever did see. In the late 70s (Damn the Torpedoes was a 1979 release), albums were $4.99 at J&R, maybe (I don't remember for sure) $5.99 for some new releases. Best selection, too. ---Best prices and largest selection. J&R had everything. Really. No $8.99 or $7.99 albums. I bought my very first albums at Sam Goody. What a piece of shit store that was as I'd come to learn as my music tastes and senses developed. Prices two to three times J&R's prices and the crappiest selection ever. Sam Goody sucked. We had some of those in the malls, along with Record World, which I think was better but also kinda sucked. [youtube]sAJjU2My4Bw[/youtube] I bought many of my albums at a small shop called Tracks on Wax in downtown Huntington where the chick at the register would say "All right! Coool!" when you brought up a cool album to buy and nothing if you purchased an uncool one, tho Tracks on Wax also had a curated assortment that made it easier to buy cool records than not. It was a major distribution point for WLIR's monthly magazine. A used/rare/import place called Titus Oaks, was also a great place. It was completely inconvenient to get to since we had to cross a busy six-lane street on foot to get there from the giant mall where Record World was located, which had direct bus access. Titus Oaks used to give away their promo posters which is where I got a giant Joe Jackson NIGHT & DAY poster, plus the less-popular Supertramp BROTHER WHERE YOU BOUND promo. I was kinda late to the Tower thing but in the 90s I spent a lot of time browsing and buying CDs from the Nice Price bin at their 66th Street shop. My college town had a variety of small broke indy record stores and no chains whatsoever. The one I liked was called I LIKE IT LIKE THAT. Another supplemented their music sales with water pipes and other smoking accessories. Today I can just say what I want to hear into my phone. Crazy.

batmagadanleadoff Oct 03 2017 05:07 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

J&R had everything. If it was in print, they had it. By the 90s, It had like three or four or five floors worth of records (and CD's, it being the 90s). There was a Titus Oaks in Brooklyn. It was out of the way for me, a special trip to go there. But I found some good out of print stuff there over the years, including, an out of print brand new still in plastic wrap first release Yardbirds album (the one with Clapton doing For Your Love, which, I think was the name of the album). I remember how thick that vinyl record was, like three times as thick as most of my other records. What a world that was, sacrificing a whole day to buy some music.

Edgy MD Oct 03 2017 05:43 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

We had a solid independent record store in Rockville Centre called Record Warehouse. Not great, but it was real, lots of dope paraphernalia behind the counter. You knew you were in the right place when you were 11, and knew that going to Record World at the mall was bullshit. They had a copy of Kinda Kinks there that was just the record that you'd stumble upon first every time you were there, but nobody ever bought it. I'm sure it's still shrinkwrapped in somebody's inventory somewhere. Taking the train into Manhattan and hanging around St. Mark's place introduced us to vintage clothing and to Tower Records. As comprehensive as it was, there was something corporate I couldn't trust. I mean, they had a house magazine that I read back-to-front (lots of Desert Island Discs stories), but it's not like they would ever tell you if something sucked. But they had imports, including the Specials records that none of us could find anywhere else, so they couldn't be ignored. There was a vintage shop in Baldwin we loved—run by this cut-throat, hairy-armed, sweaty anachronistic asshole named Fred. It was called MEMORY LANE, but it was "Fat Freddy's" to all of us, and we filled in our favorite 45s from the early years of rock 'n' roll, with his inventory largely crafted around the annual CBS-FM Top 500 of all Time. The perspiring proprietor loved to insist we knew nothing about nothing while he tried to gouge us on scratched Everly Brothers records. One day a middle-aged guy walked in with his life's collection. It was worth hundreds if not over a thousand, and Fred wouldn't offer him more than $75. ("I don't know what you think you've got there, but I'm telling ya, I'm giving you more than they're worth.") The guy grew depressed, shrugged and agreed to the price. Fred turned around to get the money out of the register, the guy looked at me and my friend, sized us up, and then subtly pulled four or five records — early pressings of Elvis, Roy Orbison, the Platters, or the like — out of the box he hadn't yet handed over. By the time Fred turns around, the records are in the guy's bag, he takes the money and skedaddled, and the store is like a time bomb for the next few minutes. We return to the back to our browsing, and five minutes later, I'm considering a copy of Hunky Dory, when the place explodes. "THAT GUY TOOK ALL OF THE ROCK AND ROLL!!" We cracked up, and Fred told us we weren't welcome back. But we were, because we were his best customers. By the end of junior year in high school, we had discovered Slipped Disc in Valley Stream and it was Nirvana. I mainlined the inventory of that place. I cooked it into a speedball and injected it into my eyeballs. I don't know that I ever needed a record I couldn't find there. My friend John Bua had the completionist's disease. If you were one of his bands, he'd have to have a copy of everything you put out. Every version of everything you put out. He didn't need the Japanese pressing "Girlfriend in a Coma," but he scoured the catalogs looking at the time stamps. If the single edition of something had a different time stamp than the album version, it was technically a different "version," even if it otherwise sounded the same. Dancefloor versions, remixes, etc. It was his thing. One of his bands was X, and in perusing one of his catalogs, he discovered a version of "Wild Thing" put out several years after their initial 1984 release. He called Slipped Disc and they were all "Yeah, we have it," and me and Sean headed down with him. He went through the 45s and came up empty. He returned to the counter, and they said, "Yeah, it's there—the baseball thing." John looked puzzled and went back to the bin, and discovered the the new release was the promotional single for Major League, with a goofy-assed picture of Charlie Sheen mugging on the sleeve. John was torn. It had a different time stamp, so it was a unique item, by his reckoning, but he couldn't bring this goofy Charlie Sheen thing into his house. He pulled the record from the sleeve, and it was on X's regular label, so he could have just taken it home and replaced the packaging with a generic 45 sleeve. But he knew, as a collector, that it was a sin to throw out original packaging. It was against his constitution. Me and Sean must've shopped for 45 minutes, while John agonized over his dilemma. To this day, I recall him beating himself up, but don't remember whether he pulled the trigger.

G-Fafif Oct 03 2017 07:57 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

Edgy MD wrote: There was a vintage shop in Baldwin we loved—run by this cut-throat, hairy-armed, sweaty anachronistic asshole named Fred. It was called MEMORY LANE, but it was "Fat Freddy's" to all of us, and we filled in our favorite 45s from the early years of rock 'n' roll, with his inventory largely crafted around the annual CBS-FM Top 500 of all Time. The perspiring proprietor loved to insist we knew nothing about nothing while he tried to gouge us on scratched Everly Brothers records. One day a middle-aged guy walked in with his life's collection. It was worth hundreds if not over a thousand, and Fred wouldn't offer him more than $75. ("I don't know what you think you've got there, but I'm telling ya, I'm giving you more than they're worth.") The guy grew depressed, shrugged and agreed to the price. Fred turned around to get the money out of the register, the guy looked at me and my friend, sized us up, and then subtly pulled four or five records — early pressings of Elvis, Roy Orbison, the Platters, or the like — out of the box he hadn't yet handed over. By the time Fred turns around, the records are in the guy's bag, he takes the money and skedaddled, and the store is like a time bomb for the next few minutes. We return to the back to our browsing, and five minutes later, I'm considering a copy of Hunky Dory, when the place explodes. "THAT GUY TOOK ALL OF THE ROCK AND ROLL!!" We cracked up, and Fred told us we weren't welcome back. But we were, because we were his best customers. Oh, I knew Memory Lane. Several visits for very specific needs, including my mother's funeral. When I felt compelled to mention that, Fred suggested he could do more business off of those. Sweet guy.

G-Fafif Oct 03 2017 08:21 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

The $8.98 business about Tom Petty insisting his record's price be kept in line resonates because I can't believe how many albums I bought for one song, especially during my compilation tape period, 1993-2004, when I decided I was going to be my own Rhino Records. There's little romance to it, but I was quite blissful when the Virgin Megastore and HMV were in their heyday, full of imported CD singles and other hard-to-find items that I suddenly decided I had to have. And frustrating time at work in Great Neck could have the edge taken off by a detour to the Tower Records in Carle Place. Tilben's, mostly a camera store, and Delman's, what we'd call an electronics store now, were my 45 dealers in Long Beach. Each had their own Top 48 or such lists printed up, which was my gateway drug to Billboard. I first lingered over the Hot 100 in (probably) a Sam Goody in the Green Acres mall. I knew there was a Top 40, but to learn there were sixty more? Wow! TSS in Oceanside was not to be underestimated, if only because we went to TSS for everything. Same shopping center included the Record Den, whose distinguishing characteristic was a poster of a several large-bottomed lasses and the title HAULIN' ASS. Classy. My very first 45s were purchased at Alexander's, the department store, in Valley Stream. No, I didn't necessarily value the nuanced retail experience. I was pretty transactional about music; I wanted what I wanted and I wanted to take it home. Downloading really changed my life for the better.

seawolf17 Oct 03 2017 08:23 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

It was always Mr. Cheapo's in Commack for us. Discovered Dream Theater there, more or less, and probably spent more money there than any other physical store over the years, even now. There was also Music Den in both Commack and in Port Jeff Station; those were good for a while too. Nothing quite like the Record Archive and the House of Guitars from when I was living in Rochester, though, both of which (as far as I know) are still going strong.

Edgy MD Oct 03 2017 08:34 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

I've been to The House of Guitars! I remember seeing a toilet seat signed by Liberty Devito adhered to the ceiling. Why don't I have a Liberty Devito toilet seat?! I can even tell you what I bought, both on cassette: [list][*]Hallelujah Anyway, the major label debut by Dancing Hoods. I thought it was terrific but it was broadly considered a failed transition album. Frontman Mark Linkous would re-emerge in the 90s with a unit called Sparkelhorse, before joining the long roster of grunge tragedies, but Hallelujah Anyway, presumably titled in response to the then-still-current wave of televangelical scandals. It remains a favorite and goes well with whatever you're drinking. [youtube]MFk0YPuC9pw[/youtube] [/*:m] [*]A still-months-away-from-breaking-album called Appetite for Destruction by some hair band whose name I've forgotten.[/*:m][/list:u]

seawolf17 Oct 03 2017 09:20 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

Edgy MD wrote: I've been to The House of Guitars! I remember seeing a toilet seat signed by Liberty Devito adhered to the ceiling. Why don't I have a Liberty Devito toilet seat?! omg seriously? he came over one time and was like "dude, i signed your toilet seat" and i was like "wtf, lib?"

dgwphotography Oct 03 2017 09:58 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

I had Merle's Record Rack at the Connecticut Post Shopping Center (now a the Connecticut Post Mall) Merle's is the first time I saw drug paraphernalia like rolling papers, bongs, and clips out in the open. It has since moved down the road into Orange,where it's still going strong.

d'Kong76 Oct 03 2017 11:04 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

I don't really remember having a go-to, best-place, happy-type relationship with a record store. Tower Records in Yonkers and a couple of probably long gone places in The Village were a total treat but most of my stuff was bought at some generic mall or shopping center place also long gone. I have two friends that are serious vinyl collectors/dealers. If anyone is ever looking for something I can put you in touch with them.

Fman99 Oct 03 2017 11:59 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

I'm sure I bought all my music at some mall shithole as a kid. Having said that, the best music store I was a regular customer of was (is?) Buzzo's music, located on Main Street in Geneseo. At a time where we were still buying everything on CD, Buzzo had a good range of old and new. He was a funny old bird, who was a Geneseo grad/drop out and looked like Jerry Garcia's dirtier cousin. It was kind of a shithole but it had character. I'm sure Seawolf dropped a few bucks at Buzzo's back in the day as well.

TransMonk Oct 04 2017 12:01 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

My dad managed a department store when I was growing up and brought home nearly every rock/pop new release each Tuesday. In high school, I bought CDs at The Exclusive Company which had a huge shop downtown and a couple satellite locations in the burbs. Now I visit Strictly Discs for vinyl locally. They have hundreds of new records upstairs and tens of thousands used downstairs.

Edgy MD Oct 04 2017 02:36 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

seawolf17 wrote: Edgy MD wrote: I've been to The House of Guitars! I remember seeing a toilet seat signed by Liberty Devito adhered to the ceiling. Why don't I have a Liberty Devito toilet seat?! omg seriously? he came over one time and was like "dude, i signed your toilet seat" and i was like "wtf, lib?" I guess we now know why Billy Joel fired the guy.

Ashie62 Oct 04 2017 02:42 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

Bought most everything at a trendy too hip to be square store named "Cheap Thrills" on George St. in New Brunswick. Manager was a Brian May clone. "Pete" who worked there was in a band that hit on Scott Muni's WNEW's Prisoners of Rock n' Roll contest. Place was white hot in 1977, long gone today. I delivered pizza back then and they got most of that cash $3.98 at a time. Great bootlegs also.

Edgy MD Oct 04 2017 02:47 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

seawolf17 wrote: Edgy MD wrote: I've been to The House of Guitars! I remember seeing a toilet seat signed by Liberty Devito adhered to the ceiling. Why don't I have a Liberty Devito toilet seat?! omg seriously? he came over one time and was like "dude, i signed your toilet seat" and i was like "wtf, lib?" I guess we now know why Billy Joel fired the guy. d'Kong76 wrote: Tower Records in Yonkers and a couple of probably long gone places in The Village were a total treat but ... Holy shit, how has nobuddy mentioned Bleeker Bob's? [fimg=500]http://www.brooklynvegan.com/files/img/music2/bleekerbobs.jpg[/fimg] [fimg=500]http://vassifer.blogs.com/.a/6a00d8341c18b253ef0168e62f575b970c-500wi[/fimg] [fimg=500]http://static.spin.com/files/styles/style620_413/public/130423-Bleecker-Bobs-Robert-Plant-Jimmy-Page.jpg[/fimg] [fimg=500]http://milk-magazine.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/15265020214_f379a8d670_o.jpg[/fimg] [youtube]4o8yjjoFocs[/youtube]

Edgy MD Oct 04 2017 03:10 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

When the guy goes over the counter in that Seinfeld clip, I think a copy of Remain in Light flies up in the air.

Gwreck Oct 04 2017 06:06 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

I think I've bought music at half a dozen of the places previously mentioned in this thread. There was one place though, Soundtracks, not previously mentioned, that was my go-to. I was far too young and not social enough to really meet anyone who worked there but I did come in enough to the point that several of the employees started to at least recognize me. And then I suppose it's really "your" record store once they're willing to put something aside for you because you don't have the money for it quite yet, or will offer a discount when they have something rare or special that they think you'd like. There was a time when I could specify at what store I had bought every album in my collection. I'd have to guess that still, even now, a good 30-40% were bought there.

sharpie Oct 04 2017 02:37 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

Many places over many years, some of them mentioned here. J&R really was the best of the lot. I did work at Wherehouse Records in San Mateo for a couple of months my senior year of high school (their radio ad: "Where? At the Wherehouse!"). Born to Run, Rumours, Horses and Siren (the Roxy Music album) are records I think about from those times. I do remember not really knowing how to help a customer when she asked what the best John Denver record is (I told her just to get the Greatest Hits). Had to take a lie detector test in order to get the job, gave discounts to my friends.

Edgy MD Oct 04 2017 02:46 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

What amazed me about Bleeker Bobs was how impressionistic the handwritten file cards were, and how impressionistic the selection behind that card was: Like, under "Elvis Costello (& the Attractions)" you could find solo work by Steve Nieve released on some fly-by-night label, and if you were lucky, old recordings of Elvis' father's showband. The place was built to dig deeper. It was fun to see Bleeker Bob's on Seinfeld, but they get it all wrong. They would have eaten up those records Kramer and Newman brought in.

HahnSolo Oct 04 2017 02:48 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

Records n Stuff, Westchester Square, Bronx was my go-to place as a teen. First albums that I bought with my own money I got at Harmony Records on Unionport Road off Tremont Avenue in the Bronx.

batmagadanleadoff Oct 04 2017 05:21 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split) Edited 1 time(s), most recently on Oct 04 2017 06:05 PM

sharpie wrote: Many places over many years, some of them mentioned here. J&R really was the best of the lot. Yeah. I don't see how anything compared or even came close to J&R so long as you weren't shopping for used or out of print records. With it's humongousness and unbelievable everything and the kitchen sink inventory, J&R had this corporate feel to it. It certainly lacked the hipness of a Bleecker Bob's, for example. But it was a mom and pop operation. A one-off. J&R started small, but was well run, wildly successful and at its peak, would grow and grow and grow to consume virtually that entire side of Park Row. Those corporate backed multi-million dollar music store behemoths that invaded Manhattan during the 90s --Tower Records and HMV -- didn't ever hold a candle to J&R. On another note, early on in my music collecting, I bought my Led Zeppelin I LP at the original Crazy Eddie's, which, if I'm remembering correctly, was nothing more than a record store. No electronics. If Crazy Eddie's record prices were "insane", they were insanely high. Like Sam Goody territory. This was way before I discovered J&R. I was just getting into pop music then, and asked one of the older and more musically seasoned kids in my neighborhood for some recommendations. He was a nutty kid and the best punchball player among his older than me crew. He recommended any of the first four Zep albums, giving me the necessary info to identify the "Zoso" album as LZ IV since it wasn't officially titled LZ IV and also threw in recs for The Who's Tommy and Electric Ladyland. I went with LZ I, which, after a few listens, I determined was too distorted, too heavy, too weird for my young and developing pop music ears. Back then, I was listening to Chuck Berry, the American Graffiti soundtrack and even a '45 of Helen Reddy's Angie Baby. Maxwell's Silver Hammer was my favorite Beatles song. Anyways, after a couple of listens, I put that LZ I album in with the rest of my collection and probably left it there for four or five or maybe even seven or eight years. I truly tried to like that album, if for nothing else, maybe to impress the older kids in the nabe with my mature musical tastes. But I couldn't. Which turned out to be so ironic because as things would eventually turn out over the years, that LZ I LP would end up being one of my favorite discs of all time. I've probably listened to those tracks about as much as I've listened to any other set of tracks in my lifetime. And Maxwell's Silver Hammer? That's the only song on Abbey Road I don't ever listen to anymore. If I'm listening to Abbey Road and am near the controls when it's that song's turn, I'll probably skip it.

Frayed Knot Oct 04 2017 05:47 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

For those of us non-city kids who'd rarely find themselves at the lower tip of Manhattan, what I remember most about J&R was the huge ads that appeared in the back of the NY Times Arts & Leisure section every Sunday morning where, among other things, you could buy via mail order bulk quantities of high-quality blank cassette tapes for maybe half the price you'd pay individually at regular retail stores. So in the days of taping friend's albums, making tapes of your own albums for your portable or car, or of starting to experiment with mix-tapes and the like, having a ready supply of cassettes was an important thing. And even if you couldn't afford an entire dozen, you split the order with a couple of buds so you'd each get 3 or 4.

RealityChuck Oct 08 2017 12:48 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

I lived on eastern LI and the nearest record store was too far to get to. But my father owned a small store and he started carrying records. Probably didn't make much money on them, but since they were all returnable, he didn't lost anything. So if I saw something I liked, I could order it and pay wholesale for it. When the started, I didn't have a stereo, so I bought Sgt. Pepper in mono.* Each week we'd get new releases. One was Urban Spaceman by the Bonzo Dog Band. A coworker said how great their previous album had been, so that was my second purchase. Of course, back then music news was hard to come by. I remembered reading somewhere about the issues with John Lennon's Two Virgins and how it came in a plain wrapper. Then, about that time, we got in an album with a pure white cover with the words "The Beatles" embossed on it. I thought for a bit that it was the Lennon album. Once I moved to Schenectady, I bought my music at Two Guys (similar to Kmart). There also was Apex Music Korner, an old school record shop. The prices were high, though. The only purchase I got there was Lambert, Hendricks, and Ross's The Hottest New Group in Jazz..** The store owner was very pleased at the selection. *I'm not sure what the big deal about it is. **It's since been retitled with just the names, and was at least ten years old when I bought it.

Lefty Specialist Oct 08 2017 11:11 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

Half my record collection came from Two Guys. $3.99 for new albums, $2.99 for anything more than a few months old. The one at the West Belt Mall in Wayne, NJ had a huge record room. And if it was a year old, they'd hole-punch the corner of the album and sell it for 99 cents. The only exceptions were evergreen groups like the Beatles and Stones and a few others, which always sold for "top dollar".

John Cougar Lunchbucket Oct 08 2017 01:27 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

It wasn't the store that mutilated the album covers but the record company: Those were albums returned from the first outlet to stock them then sold to another store at a discount. They were marked that way so that the secondary buyers couldn't also return them for credit. Some had holes drilled in, some had sawcuts, some clipped the top corner off. I hated getting albums that way but often were the only way you could find them.

RealityChuck Oct 09 2017 01:13 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

Oh, I loved the cutout bin. I could pick up records for next to nothing; the holes in the cover never bothered me. For awhile, I was a member of Record Club of America. As opposed to the Columbia Record Club, RCA did not automatically send you a record if you didn't tell them not to. Each month you'd get a catalog and you could order from it. They kept getting fined by the Attorney General, since their come-on was a free record, but you had to pay a 50 cent membership fee. The AG said this was fraudulent, but getting an LP for 50 cents was a pretty good deal. However, they were pretty shady. It turned out they pressed the records in their own plant, but didn't have permission to do it. Eventually, they shut down, but they were a good deal while they lasted.

d'Kong76 Oct 09 2017 01:37 AM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

I had a friend who used to get a lot of cut outs from a radio station worker he knew. The record company/distributor snipped the corner off to note the record was complimentary.

Farmer Ted Oct 09 2017 01:02 PM Re: Tell us about your record stores (Tom Petty split)

The go-to place at the local mall was Wee Three Records. I met and partied with the heir to the Wee Three kingdom in the mid-90s in Philly, therefore not shocked it tanked before the whole www thing. A local place called the Stereo Shoppe let you load up the turntables with headphones and zone out for an hour which was cool. A lot of my collection was "borrowed" when I worked in the radio biz.