I saw All Things Must Pass, Tower Records movie

Well for a lot of us, it WAS a magical place. That is, if you think of record stores in general as magical places. They consistently had the best inventory in the world and, before the internet, that was very important to adventurous music listeners. I've been lucky enough to visit Tower stores from London to Singapore and I've found a lot of things I never would have known existed otherwise. Tower Records contributed mightily to my personal musical education so I am indeed very sentimental about it. But that's just me.

As far as the decline is concerned, I agree with pretty much everything people have said so far, but there is no question that Russ and the management team were culpable. When it was clear that change was in the wind, they did nothing to move with the times. Their prices stayed very high and their staff became less knowledgeable as they came to rely more on non-music novelty crap. Toward the end, you could walk into a Tower store and swear it was a Wherehouse. It was sad.

 

I'll have to look for this. I liked Tower well enough and would be thrilled to have a multi-story record store these days, but back then I considered them somewhat WalMart-like, threatening to put smaller shops out of business.

That didn't stop me from writing reviews for their in-store magazine--did anyone else here do that? They paid unbelievably well for just two or three sentences. My conscience finally made me quit when the editor made me rewrite a Tull review because "it sounds like you're criticizing them!"

My other, earliest Tower memory is renting "Ciao Manhattan" from them when a friend got a VCR. I had to put down $65 in cash as a deposit for the one-night rental.

 

watched this the other day.

an interesting documentary about the store, and also about the music industry, with a somewhat sad but predictable ending.

i am a huge music fan, and have been collecting for at least 30+ years or more. although in some ways i don't 'collect' music
the way i used to in the past, more on that later.
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the conclusion i came away with at the end, was that despite establishing a good business model, and having entertaining people running it,

Tower Records doomed themselves to failure at the end, and they totally deserved it.

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going back to my habits, i didn't have much money when i was younger, so i could only afford a few singles or albums from time to time,
mostly bought a big name music stores.

once i became a teenager, i could afford more, but still stuck to music stores in malls.

then i hit college, and thanks to friends, and living in a large town, there was a whole new world of indie music stores to explore.

at this point i had only had small access to imports (this was during the 80's), but after finding these new stores, there was tons of music to explore, old and new.

our town didn't have a tower, (in texas, only austin had one that i knew of)... so it would be a rare occasion if i went there.

i started collecting records and cd's like crazy in the mid 80's, and spent hundreds every week. i got to know the shop owners, and spent several hours every
weekend looking for more, with the occasional trip during the week if there was something new out.

fast forward to post-college, when the internet was taking off, i started finding online stores, and of course ebay. i never looked back.

from then on, i would hardly ever go to a brick and mortar store to buy music.

from then on, it was basically online stores, and ebay. i saved a lot of money, as the vast majority of the music was used.

i started getting into digital music with file sharing and napster, and other programs.

i still bought music, but nowhere near what i used to in the past.

then i took a break for a few years ...... and then discogs came along, and a whole new world of music came out to be discovered.

despite some bumps and hitches with digital music, i now have more music available to me, along with online stores, ebay, and discogs
which have given me more music than i can ever imagine getting, or listening to.

to me the demise of physical stores doesn't bother me, as to me the music itself is the ultimate goal, and now having access 24/7 to pretty
much any kind of music is a situation that can't be matched.

going to stores might have been fun, and good way to kill time in the past, but now i can skip all that, and just explore, discover and acquire
music at my own pace, and on my own terms.

later
-1

 

Wow!! That's amazing it's still standing with the signs up. I wonder who owns the property now. Very sad that there's no music buying going on inside of it...

 

Did Tower Records ever sell used vinyl? I didn't see anything like that in the video footage. If not, it seems like a missed opportunity business-wise, and sort of surprising from my perspective as someone who is accustomed to every record store selling used vinyl. Of course, my passion for vinyl began in 2008, so I missed that era.

 

A decent % of used vinyl in stores that I saw in the 70's/80's would be promo stamped which was "unlawful to be re-sold". Tower wouldn't want any part of that.

 

You kinda wonder if someone will rent and reopen it with vinyl music sales going up.

 

The labels would have had a huge issue with that. So, no, they never sold used merch. And the stores I went in seemed full; don't think they would have had the room. Would have been awsome though!

 

The rent is probably too high to make it feasible.

 

I wish the movie would have explained exactly how it is that Tower still exists in Japan, and what if any piece of that business Solomon has a stake in.

 

The Japanese, despite having even more robust Internet/wireless systems than we do in the USA, still prefer physical product.

A friend who taught there explained Japan still has an artisinal/craftsman culture. Even in his little suburban development, every house was unique, almost a work of art. And their favorite little family restaurant had stereo equipment that would make anyone here proud, just for background music!

 

I would think that they simply bought the name/brand from Solomon or something like that when he liquidated the US stores. Just a guess, though.

 

Yes. In 2001, the Tower Books here in Chico changed to "Tower New and Used." They had some used LPs and CDs but were never any competition to the great store a block away, Melody Records. I got a few albums there, but I liked it a lot more when it was Tower Books.

Used music central - Business - July 12, 2001 »

 

The Tower Japan business was spun off as a separate company when founded. So when the U.S.-based Tower went under, the Japan business was unaffected as it is an entity unto itself. Don't know about who has a stake in it - but the stores thrive as physical product is still desired greatly in Japan.

 

No, the Japanese Towers are totally independent of Solomon, as are the ones in Mexico and the recently closed Israeli stores. SOlomon was the one who directed the expansion, but these all became independent over time.

 

I've just watched the documentary, they say that they had to sell the Japan stores when things started going really bad, as they were the only ones that were still profitable at that point.

Great movie, by the way.

 

They didn't sell used and when he came back with R5 he didn't until the end and by then it was too late. it was also right before or maybe at the beginning of the vinyl resurge so might have seemed less obvious than now.

 

Interesting point. I feel bad that Target and Best Buy jumped in and then got out about six months too soon.

 

Kinda funny on a semi-related note, just received the new copy of Rolling Stone in the mail, 60 pages including the cover. Kinda makes me yearn for the days of Tower's in-house, monthly and free, publication, Pulse!

 

That was the first thing I thought of, damn, this thing is thin!

I never did enjoy Pulse much, tho. Except that it was free.

 

Here's a link to a well-written piece on Tower Records history, including a lot of photos I'd never seen before...

Remembering Tower Records

 

Pulse paid cartoonists and artists very well. A check from them saved my butt once one cold Christmas.

 

Excellent site - thanks!

 

Funny how my mind works....was reading this thread and suddenly remembered that I was in Tower Records in Dublin during July. Maybe my memory is suspect but its current location (top of the Easons' store on O'Connell St) isn't where I remember it before the collapse. I have this vague memory that it was in or around Temple Bar? Am I wrong?

 

Gibson Guitar's Bankruptcy Puts WeHo's Tower Records Building at Risk - WEHOville

I thought this would happen....