The demise of retail music stores.

[Hardbopjazz]

I used to take pleasure in a trip to one of the large music outlets such as Tower Records and even Barnes and Nobel and browser through the jazz section. There use to be an enjoyment pulling a recording out of the bin and looking it over and making a mental note if this would one that I would buy today. The enjoyment was even greater in the days of albums. But those days seem to have gone the way of the Dodo. Outside of J&R Music World in NYC, CDs, at least for jazz, has become an online product. Yesterday I was in my local Borders Book store, and perused over to the music area. The jazz section was dwindled down to 6 tiles, and one I would not consider jazz. Anyone else miss the days of large selections in retail stores? How is the situation where you live? I doubt it is any better.

[paul secor]

One previous thread: http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php...=record++stores

But maybe not a bad thing to start a new discussion.

[mtodde]

I buy a lot of music online but I also miss the excitement of going to Tower and looking through the jazz and planning what I would buy next. There was an emotional element that is missing. When I go to any used store some of the excitement is there but I tend to spend too much money because you don't know if something will be there on your next visit.

[mikelz777]

I love going to Half-Price Books to search through their jazz selection. It's very random and definitely hit-or-miss but I've picked up some real gems there for some very nice prices. The unpredictability of their ever-changing inventory makes finding something you like that much more rewarding and exciting.

On occasion if I'm in the area, I'll go to Cheapo Records to check out their huge jazz section. Unfortunately, they aren't as cheapo as I wish they were and 9 times out of 10 I can probably get an item cheaper via the internet even with shipping. My last 3-4 trips there were for empty jewel cases because they have the best price in town on them.

[John Tapscott]

What I really miss are those large retail stores which had large, separate jazz sections with knowledgable managers and or staff. You could go into those sections and spend an hour or so talking and listening with staff and other customers (since they tended not to be overly busy except on the weekends). So I guess what I miss is that "social" aspect of jazz listening and collecting, those memorable times when the manager called you into a little cubbyhole of a room which said "staff only"" on the door, opened up a drawer and said, "Here's something I know you'll want. I put this aside just for you." And now since everything is available so easily on the ' net, there's no more of that "Look at what I found" surprises to pull out and play for your jazz friends. I think the 'net has taken away some of the excitement and and joy of collecting. I also think spent just as much $$ in those days on recordings as I do in these internet days.

[robviti]

being slightly older, i find it interesting to hear people fondly remembering the days when the big record stores were well-stocked and modestly-priced. i also have such memories, but when i think of "the good old days," i remember a time before the towers and hmvs came to town, a time when you'd go to a relatively small record shop to find the latest releases, a shop that more often than not was independently owned by enthusiastic post-college kids or better yet, someone older with a lot of knowledge and experience who told interesting stories about "the greats." i enjoy the perks of online buying, but damn, i pity the kids of today who will never know what it was like 30-40 years ago.

[Neal Pomea]

It's like the difference between browsing the stacks of a library and researching with online databases. When I was in graduate school I did my research in a "brick and mortar" library. Now I teach students and faculty how to research in an "online" library. I enjoy the convenience but it just isn't the same. For me it still misses the serendipity of the unintended find in the stacks.

Lots of music is going to be lost because it never made it CD much less iTunes and such services.

[paul secor]

mtodde mentioned "excitement"; John Tapscott mentioned the "'social' aspect" of collecting; and It Should Be You mentioned "the serendipity of the unintended find". I miss all of those things. What I think I miss most is the social aspect. Ordering online has some advantages, but it's basically isolating. It doesn't replace the times when I'd get together with a couple of friends and hit the record stores in NYC or Cambridge, compare finds, and talk music for hours.

[BruceH]

I agree very much with the last three posts. Maybe it's the caveman in me, but I like physically looking at and touching things. And yes, when online catalogs and databases came to my college library in the early 80's I was disturbed by the "at-one-remove" aspect and the lack of serendipity. Also, back in the late 70's and early 80's there were still quite a few independent record stores even well outside the big cities. Shopping there was different. What they lacked in space and stock they more than made up for in personal attention and expertise.

Ah well...

Edited March 27, 2009 by BruceH

[A Lark Ascending]

I've got used to the change...and am now relishing the time released on a Saturday that I used to spend travelling to/from and then browsing in record shops.

I don't know what it was like before the mid-70s in the UK but outside of London and one or two big centres the choice of jazz was never that wonderful here in the 70s, 80s, 90s. Seemed to come and go pretty randomly (I recall travelling to London in the late 70s to buy import copies of what would now be considered 'core' recordings like 'Miles Smiles'; or waiting a month for copies of 'A Love Supreme' and 'Africa Brass' to be located from an order).

For me the possibilities opened up in the late 90s with the ability to buy online from anywhere in the world (apart from anything else it revealed there was more to jazz than just the USA and Britain!). I still have access to a greater range of music today than in my early listening days...though not in physical shops which have all but disappeared here.

So I'm content with the new model. I've actually grown completely impatient with physical shopping of any sort!

Edited March 27, 2009 by Bev Stapleton

[AndrewHill]

Not really adding anything new, but I really miss perusing bins and finding gems or a disc that I wasn't planning on buying. I would sometimes make a trip out of it and hit 5 or so stores and I would be out all day. Those days are long gone execpt for the occasional trip to Half Price or the Exchange. In Pittsburgh though, there's a store frozen in time called Paul's CD's, with the post-college owner playing non-commercial music with a small crowd hanging out at the front counter with coffee and talking non-stop about music-all kinds of music. I couldn't believe my eyes and ears: there are actually stores still like this? And this place actually has a REAL jazz section, stocking FMP's, ESP's, CIMP's, Emanem's, Hat's, Leo's etc, etc, which takes up the entire wall of the store! I'm not in Pitt so much anymore but man, whenever I'm in town, that's the first place I usually go to. Truly a rarity these days.

[ejp626]

mtodde mentioned "excitement"; John Tapscott mentioned the "'social' aspect" of collecting; and It Should Be You mentioned "the serendipity of the unintended find". I miss all of those things. What I think I miss most is the social aspect. Ordering online has some advantages, but it's basically isolating. It doesn't replace the times when I'd get together with a couple of friends and hit the record stores in NYC or Cambridge, compare finds, and talk music for hours.

It's interesting, but I never have felt a social aspect to record/CD buying. Is this because I went to Ann Arbor which had decent used CD stores but they weren't so far away that you had to make a special trek to get them (and without a car I wouldn't have gone to a couple of the really good at the time stores in Detroit)? Is it because I simply never had enough friends (at all, but certainly enough interested in jazz music) to go out in packs hunting jazz? Is it because I have always been a bit of a loner and don't coordinate with anyone outside my immediate family, and the decline of jazz stores has nothing to do with it.

[A Lark Ascending]

It's interesting, but I never have felt a social aspect to record/CD buying.

I remember it as a late teenager/student. At that age everyone buys records.

But after that I've always found it a pretty solitary affair; and shop staff too busy (or disinterested) to spend long chatting.

[John Tapscott]

I guess the "social" aspect was important to me since I first met several long-time friends in the jazz sections of record stores.

Edited March 27, 2009 by John Tapscott

[A Lark Ascending]

I guess the "social" aspect was important to me since I first met several long-time friends in the jazz sections of record stores.

Might be a national thing...we Brits tend to ignore one another if we haven't been formally introduced by a chaperone!

[ejp626]

It's interesting, but I never have felt a social aspect to record/CD buying.

I remember it as a late teenager/student. At that age everyone buys records.

But after that I've always found it a pretty solitary affair; and shop staff too busy (or disinterested) to spend long chatting.

I hear you but even at that age, I bought stuff almost completely on my own. I'd occasionally talk about the pop stuff with others and even trade cassettes, but never shopped in a pack. Maybe it would have been different if I had grown up in New York or Chicago.

[Neal Pomea]

I guess the "social" aspect was important to me since I first met several long-time friends in the jazz sections of record stores.

Ha ha! I met my wife, in a roundabout way, through a record store when I had a chance meeting with a fellow who, as it turned out, was roommates with her brothers. He recognized me from a concert we both had attended and struck up a conversation. So you could say that music brought together my wife and me! Our first dates were all at dances hosted by the fellow in the record store.

Anyway, I've come to prefer clothes shopping and other kinds of shopping online, but I still miss the record stores! It just might be more social in the U.S. Can't say.

[A Lark Ascending]

It's interesting, but I never have felt a social aspect to record/CD buying.

I remember it as a late teenager/student. At that age everyone buys records.

But after that I've always found it a pretty solitary affair; and shop staff too busy (or disinterested) to spend long chatting.

I hear you but even at that age, I bought stuff almost completely on my own. I'd occasionally talk about the pop stuff with others and even trade cassettes, but never shopped in a pack. Maybe it would have been different if I had grown up in New York or Chicago.

It was never in a pack - just one or two close friends who were also music obsessives. Since university I suppose I've never had close friends who share my musical interests. They tend look on them as rather excessive.

[danasgoodstuff]

having worked in two of the world's great record stores, the Electric Fetus in Mpls & music Millennium in Ptld, I will certainly miss them if they really all go away. And if they do, it will be because of rents as much as anything. I met many wonderful people, including my current wife, there...

[CJ Shearn]

I miss going to a record store and finding an OOP title or import. If I go to a local store here like Music City an indie that's been around 25 years it's fun to browse the jazz section. That's where I got the Herbie Nichols BN box. I found a Benny Carter Impulse! vinyl there with Van Gelder in wax so it was probably an original pressing or close to.

[BillF]

I guess the "social" aspect was important to me since I first met several long-time friends in the jazz sections of record stores.

The move from shopping in stores to online shopping is just one aspect of the present day drift from a communal society to a society of more-or-less isolated individuals.

[Jazzmoose]

For me it still misses the serendipity of the unintended find in the stacks.

Oh, yeah...

On the other hand, where I live now, the biggest and broadest musical selection in town is WalMart, so you're not going to hear me complaining about online shopping for quite a while. For those of us in small towns, the good old days are now, as far as music shopping. I have this place (and others) to clue me in to stuff, various merchants...yeah, I miss the music stores, but I miss a lot from the big city.

[BruceH]

mtodde mentioned "excitement"; John Tapscott mentioned the "'social' aspect" of collecting; and It Should Be You mentioned "the serendipity of the unintended find". I miss all of those things. What I think I miss most is the social aspect. Ordering online has some advantages, but it's basically isolating. It doesn't replace the times when I'd get together with a couple of friends and hit the record stores in NYC or Cambridge, compare finds, and talk music for hours.

It's interesting, but I never have felt a social aspect to record/CD buying. Is this because I went to Ann Arbor which had decent used CD stores but they weren't so far away that you had to make a special trek to get them (and without a car I wouldn't have gone to a couple of the really good at the time stores in Detroit)? Is it because I simply never had enough friends (at all, but certainly enough interested in jazz music) to go out in packs hunting jazz? Is it because I have always been a bit of a loner and don't coordinate with anyone outside my immediate family, and the decline of jazz stores has nothing to do with it.

I've always been a bit of a loner, too. But if you grew up in Ann Arbor you are one lucky dude.

[A Lark Ascending]

I guess the "social" aspect was important to me since I first met several long-time friends in the jazz sections of record stores.

The move from shopping in stores to online shopping is just one aspect of the present day drift from a communal society to a society of more-or-less isolated individuals.

I don't think that's really so. More a piece of Sunday supplement paranoia.

In my experience most people seem able to enjoy the benefits of the net...and still go out and mix with others in real life,

[ejp626]

mtodde mentioned "excitement"; John Tapscott mentioned the "'social' aspect" of collecting; and It Should Be You mentioned "the serendipity of the unintended find". I miss all of those things. What I think I miss most is the social aspect. Ordering online has some advantages, but it's basically isolating. It doesn't replace the times when I'd get together with a couple of friends and hit the record stores in NYC or Cambridge, compare finds, and talk music for hours.

It's interesting, but I never have felt a social aspect to record/CD buying. Is this because I went to Ann Arbor which had decent used CD stores but they weren't so far away that you had to make a special trek to get them (and without a car I wouldn't have gone to a couple of the really good at the time stores in Detroit)? Is it because I simply never had enough friends (at all, but certainly enough interested in jazz music) to go out in packs hunting jazz? Is it because I have always been a bit of a loner and don't coordinate with anyone outside my immediate family, and the decline of jazz stores has nothing to do with it.

I've always been a bit of a loner, too. But if you grew up in Ann Arbor you are one lucky dude.

I guess I could have been more specific. I grew up in Kalamazoo (a lot more boring) and only bought music starting my last year of high school. I probably had 5 CDs and 20 tapes. My music buying started at UM, though it didn't really get out of hand until 2000 roughly.