I knew something would wind me up enough to get back into the blogging swing, and it has.
In case you missed it it's independent record shop day (or some such title). We are all to shed a tear at the closure of so many independent record shops because of the growth of people buying their records in supermarkets, or online, or downloading it.
Well I for one couldn't care less, frankly if the people running these shops hadn't been such arrogant elitist tossers then maybe a few more of them would still be in business.
According to Jarvis Cocker (why do they always trot out Jarvis cocker? To the best of my knowledge he had one hit single, once, admittedly a pretty good one, and has been dining out on it for the past decade. I might take more notice if the said Mr Cocker stood a little closer to the razor and cut, or at least occasionally washed his hair and had more then one suit)ANYWAY according to the said Mr Cocker record shops are the places where we might walk in and hear a piece of music and if we have the courage to ask the assistant that music might just change our lives.
1. In record shops the music is always so loud you cant hear yourself think, never mind remember what you went in there for in the first place.
2. I have never ever heard anything in a record shop that I would even consider walking away with for free never mind actually paying for.
3. Talk to the assistants? They usually have spiky black (or entirely shaved) hair and so many facial piercings it looks like they had an unfortunate (but not unfortunate enough) accident while constructing a nail bomb. And treat you with such utter contempt (assuming they can be bothered to drag themselves away from their 'mates') that you could almost be their parent.
I always leave after buying nothing and with thoughts of conscription (or vivisection) foremost in my mind.
Why should I put myself through that? Amazon don't care if I want Nine Inch Nails, or Abba or even the damn Cheeky girls. I get exactly what I want without sneering or perforated eardrums.
Yup I am getting old and am told often I'm a grumpy old man, but record shops? RIP :-)
I agree 100% with you Graham. I don't even know if there are any shops left in Orlando that you can purchase vinyl. Hell, CD's are even getting harder to find.
ReplyDeleteWe have a large electronics chain in the states called Best Buy. They used to have a pretty good CD collection. Over the past year, their inventory has dwindled to probably 25% of what it used to be, and 95% of what they do carry is rubbish.
Yeah, I do all of my purchasing on-line now. Not downloads mind you. I can can count on one hand the number of tunes I have downloaded.
I feel that today's generation is really missing out on the whole "album" concept. They hear a song that they like, download it, and they're done. They will never hear what other songs they are missing out on. I've found that my most treasured music usually are "deep cuts" that have never made it to the airwaves.
In this respect, I'm glad I'm a child of the 70's.
Arrogance in shop clerks comes from stupid management. Stupid management deserves loss of business. At least that's my logic. Any manager who is not aware of what's going on in his/her shop is going to lose it.
ReplyDeleteDitto - Sil!
ReplyDeleteA few years ago I went into a shop where, as you so correctly described, were the 19-21 year old people with hair dyed black and spiked or combed solidly straight to their heads. Piercings up the ying yang - and not a moment to spare for the customer! Or else they couldn't hear me when I asked for help. It was LOUD!!!
The only record stores I have really enjoyed were - oddly enough - in Mexico. There the Mixup stores (as the chain is named) offer a wide choice of music, lots of listening stations with full CDs by genre and a staff willing to open anything and play it for you on demand either over the PA or in a private set of earphones.
ReplyDeleteTheir selection is both broad and at times statisfyingly quirky. You have to have your quirks or you never hear a new track.
Simple plan - but effective. I bought quite a few disks there and the stores are as busy as any I have seen. Sigh...