Tower Records has relaunched

The revival of Tower is as relevant as the revival of Columbia House as a high prices retail etailer was.

You probably forgot about that one...

 

https://www.columbiahouse.com/

 

A bit of Nostalgia for the old folks.

 

In Living Stereo?

 

I predict that the pricing will be fine, but everything else will be half-assed.

 

The Store on Sunset Bl. in L.A. will always be my favorite. The one in San Jose, CA. was also good. My 2nd favorite Tower Records store where I spent many a lunch hour was at the corner of El Camino & San Antonio Rd., in Mtn. View, CA.

That location came closest to the store on Sunset Bl. The original stores on Broadway & 16th St. , were always crowded. One building had books, tapes, CD's and movies and the other store sold vinyl only.

Never had a bad experience at a Tower Record store.

When they started having money problems, that's when customer service took a turn. Hard to keep good staff when you're trying to compete with the Internet, other record stores, a lost interest in vinyl in general and still make payroll.

You could buy CD's and books online from Amazon and that's what the public started doing. People were going to Blockbuster and the Blockbuster clones for their movies. Hard to compete and still remain a profitable business in that kind of business environment. The employees mostly college kids, knew it was just a matter of time and started looking for other jobs.

 

Yes- that's it.

 

For ten dollars each, no less! As the "introductory" price! What a world, what a world...

 

Yes

 

Cool, but I don't think the timing will prove to be in its favor ...

 

They used to have a separate building just for classical music next door.

 

I spent many a Saturday morning at the Greenwich Village store. Used to drive in and be able to get a decent parking spot. Took 25 minutes total.
Would stop at Ray's Pizza on the way back (New Yorkers know this place). Nice memories.

 

They're far from being "the only shop in town." There's a few indies left in Dublin - Freebird, Spindizzy and The Rage. Plus a number of Golden Discs. All of whom provide better service and a nicer attitude.

 

Yep, and that space was also a "clearance annex" for a brief while. I scored a bunch of Japanese imports there for about five bucks a throw in the late 90s. Good times, good times!

 

That was definitely what I was thinking. That store was also on Broadway as was the one on East 4th. But the "temporary" store I mentioned was in the mid-70's (between 73rd and 74th, I.I.N.M.,) along Broadway when the Lincoln Center store was being refurbished and rearranged.

 

I used to live at 73rd and Broadway - must have been before I moved there. At that time there was an HMV at the corner of 72nd.

 

I guess I worked at a crappy store and was a crappy employee.

 

As someone who all but lived at the NYC Tower back in the day, what a treat it was to visit Tower Dublin. Nice selection, fair prices. And it fun to walk out of there with my new vinyl in a yellow plastic Tower bag.

 

Remember the last CDs I ever bought from Tower......
Scorpions Taken By Force....and Tokyo Tapes..used to be sort of hard to find...
Seattle Center store was way better than the one in Tacoma....

The last records I ever bought from them were Soundgarden Superunknown and Pearl Jam Vitology....That's back in the 90s in Tacoma

 

But that kind of sacrifice builds character. Never forget that.

I sure do miss the old Tower. During my college days in the 70s there were two record stores in Westwood Village that I plunked down my earnings from a part-time library job - Vogue Records and Tower. The last time I was at Tower was 1997 at the Sunset Blvd store - the three surviving Doors were there to sign their Box Set.

 

yea, me too! loved my NYC Greenwich Village Record/Book/etc. shopping days! Damn, I miss them...

 

I fondly remember finding Japanese CDs of America in stock at Tower Records ...Hearts & Holiday! CDs...still have them.

 

I agree...it's sad...they went backwards which IMO this will fail...

when this happens they will add CDs! LOL...

 

The Tower in Shibuya is cool, but I would also highly recommend going to Disk Union in Shinjuku, or at the very least go to the branch in Shibuya.

I've never been, but I hear Recofan in Shibuya is also good.

 

I've been there four times. If you ever have the chance (after coronavirus), go there.