But, as a college student, I was friends with a clerk in my local record store, and spent lots of time discussing new import singles, scoring free promo materials, and browsing the used CD selection to check out his recommendations, and having the input of a kindred spirit was wonderful. In graduate school, I had a weekend ritual jaunt through Boston/Cambridge record stores to check out their inventories and talk with the proprietors, and it was a great way to learn about new music and discover unknown classics.

I went to Record Theatre in Buffalo for Record Store Day and picked up some of the singles, and a couple of used CDs (Pet Shop Boys!), and it really did feel like a homecoming to that world. More than the recommendations or staff interactions, it’s about a community of people who enjoy music (including the local musicians), and I’m sad to see its demise, especially when it must also contribute to the lower interest in music overall in the culture. But, ultimately, given the price difference (sometimes more than $8-$9 per CD) compared to online venues, it’s hard to continue shopping there for all of my music needs.

Of course, candle manufacturers do not charge stores $13 for a product that the public expects to buy for $10. Probably because candle manufactures don’t require airplanes and cocaine to manufacture candles.

I also plan on traveling about an hour on Saturday to enjoy Record Store Day.

Surely, a good record store is a haven for most of us. Even if we have no inclination to buy something at the time, walking into a physical record store, and seeing how close the Beach Boys are stocked next to the Beatles, and moving around, just taking our time, thinking about nothing, seeing what’s out there is an entirely inimitable experience that can’t be compared to sitting at a desk and looking. Text messages are fine, but they aren’t conversation.

Record stores are good places. They keep records there. They have the White Album probably. Its a place that can just as easily be a GAP. Its the idea of the place, as a place that makes it worth saving.

No one, me included, said that it did.

As for the record store outliving its relevance, this is surely true for most people who, you included, are free to not care. What I find puzzling is that you’re wasting your time commenting about something to which you profess such ambivalence. If you object to being asked to care about something, the obvious course of action on your part would be to show a backbone and actually refrain from caring.

I couldn’t care less if a large number of the people who show up at my local record store on Saturday are trolling for items they can sell on eBay at a profit; not do I imagine that the people responsible for keeping the place open do. They’re probably interested in paying their rent more than anything else. If this helps them do that, great.

viva record stores! record store day i can take or leave.

It seems to me that like the twit who wrote that article, you never liked record stores in the first place; and are thus basing your criticism on a culture that you’ve never actually participated in. Kind of like my grandfather bemoaning the lack of melody in hip hop.

Do record stores have an innate right to be propped up by consumers? Obviously not. Those of us who want to see them stick around for as long as they can aren’t being bled by anyone. We are simply being asked to show support for something we like.

Amen to this. Hovering CD-store employees were a large part of what drove me to blow all my $$$ on Amazon.com during the early part of this decade.

Amen to this. Hovering record-store employees are part of what drove me to spend a lot of money on Amazon.com in the early part of this decade.

I do, on the other hand, have genuine nostalgia for a period that lasted about ten years; when I moved to Boston in my early 20s, got a job in Harvard Square, and could browse through half a dozen record stores during my lunch hour. The essential element here — aside from all of these stores having an awesome selection — is that the employees left me the fuck alone.

I’ll venture a guess and say that the person who wrote that article never liked the idea of buying music as much as he likes writing an article based on a half-realized assertion. If he really liked buying music, he never would have needed a self-appointed expert to guide him through a record store. He would have browsed. That’s the fucking point.

Yeah, you can’t ask 30-somethings w/aspirations and/or responsibilities to linger around as record store clerks for a pittance, but there was always a generational turnover.

I have absolutely no data to back this up, but I’m pretty sure that there’s a good chunk of the former record buying public that got their recommendations from a trusted record store clerk/buyer–I should know: I was on both sides of that interaction–who now can’t be bothered buying online, unless it’s a quick song off iTunes or replacing a beloved CD for $2 off Amazon. If that.