RIP Bleecker Bob

The one linked in the link on the first post.

Just called my buddy who used to hang out there with me to tell him the news. He said "remember when he threw me out of the store?". I said "he threw us out all the time". Charlie said "but I was BUYING something ".

 

Yeah, Second Coming on Sullivan had great stuff in '87 particularly. Boot LPs and cassettes especially.

Bob's had moved on to T-Shirts and smoking accessories being priorities. That's what the tourists and NYU kids were buying.

I wonder what his lease situation was.

 

The BB prices were flat out unreasonable too.

 

Bob was a really good guy, a funny, sweet & krusty oulde sole for certain. Ergo... RIP Bob, hope to touch bass at some point in the hopefully FAR distant future.

 

I knew them both quite well in the early/mid 80's, having been a customer of both, then a salesman to both, then working for JD. During that time I don't remember them having much contact. Different approaches to their stores, and they were far enough apart geographically that they weren't really in competition. I actually liked Bob more, although he certainly had the side that everybody knew about him. But I never had a problem with him, and when he found out I was from Boston and a Red Sox fan we got along fine.

 

Museum!

 

Was JD from Spain? Midnight kept siesta hours, that's for sure. It was closed more often than open. If was a rocker living in the Chelsea, you'd have all your needs taken care of, with the guitar shop downstairs and the record store across the way.

All the hipper NYC stores ran into problems when they started manufacturing (makin' copies) their own line of CD-r'd non-official releases, though. It became a cottage industry, and the last frontier in brick 'n' mortar retail - the backroom duplicator devices. That led to the big busts.

Never happened to Bob.

 

France.

We kept regular hours (12-7) when I worked there in the early 80's, although there were days when those of us who worked there had to wait for him or his wife to show up late to open. He didn't give a spare set of keys to anybody(he trusted no one) and he was a notorious night owl (so he slept late). Perhaps it was in later years after things started turning bad for him? I had a falling out with him after I left so never stayed in touch.

And you're right about the bootlegs. JD hated paying prices that he thought were too high for them,so he started booting the bootleggers.

 

He opened a store in LA on Melrose that lasted more than a decade. So I got a taste of the prices and the rude employees. He seemed to hire a ton of Brits at this location who knew their punk rock pretty well. They looked like Lemmy of Motorhead, but were more punk influenced.

I snapped a few deals off their collector's wall, under priced because they knew their punk and new wave better than their classic rock. I saw Johnny Marr in the store buying a $275 Rolling Stones LP off the collector's wall.

I have no warm fuzzy feelings over their rough 'n tumble style of customer service. But the deals I got for rare ones missed (way underpriced) by those metallic punks are still with me to this day.

 

The documentary was very sad.

 

The record biz is a tough way to make a living!

 

R.I.P. Bob...one of my Village stops...

 

How old was Bob?

 

75

 

Thanks...

 

yes, he had high prices, but ppl paid them so he was successful...worked for him. : )

 

What do you mean? It is, or it was, or it's always been?

It's currently just about impossible in fact.

It used to be an easy way to make a living.

 

I am friends with several record store owners today and it is a tough way to make a living. It is almost impossible to find inventory when everyone is out there looking for records. There are more people scrounging for records today that ever before and I am one of them. Rents are too damn high and it can be hard work hauling records.

 

It was not hard during Bleecker Bob's prime era.

 

Was quite surprised to find that Uncut magazine included him in their monthly obituaries in the March 2019 issue.

Clearly consider him a notable figure, don't think they include record store owners very often.

 

I am one of those former record shop owners. It is/was a very tough way to make a living but it was also a blast. I used to travel quite a bit in order to stock my shop with hard to find records we specialized in. The travel was great and after I closed up I realized how much harder I worked when traveling to the UK as opposed to just opening my shop every day. Hauling vinyl all over London. Finding the right shops to trade with.
I miss it every day.

 

No doubt it is a blast. Not too many would do it if they weren't having fun. Those guys that stayed at Bleeker Bob's all those years must have enjoyed it, at least a good portion of the time.

 

Here is a 30+ minute doc on Bleecker Bobs closing. You are right.

 

I was in there during an evening after work - back between 2000-2006 - and out of nowhere I hear a rising wash of sound - it was TARKUS(!), freaking out the squares! I never heard that song sound better since.

 

The squares? Dig it, Daddy.
That ELP is the living end. Coolsville.