Anybody still go to record shows?

I go to the one in Charlotte still but I don’t spend much time browsing. Usually the same vendors with the same stuff. Great for newbies but not me. I won’t even look at the records if they are not priced. I do get a table and sell some stuff every once in a while. As I mainly want to unload my 45s to free up space they don’t sell well at the shows unless I sell whole boxes at a time. I do enjoy the hunt but the market has priced me out of records for the time being.

 

I go with three objectives when I go. I walk in with between $100 and $150 and go to the $1 bins at two dealers I know first and then any others in the room. I'm looking for records in good condition without too much stress over the cover condition. Mostly Classic rock that I either already have or don't care about that I'll clean up, put in new outer and inner sleeves and sell at a table I have in a crafts show for $4, and secondly any albums that I don't have and really want or am curious about. After those two objectives are accomplished I'll see what I have left. Often I'll pick up 50-100 this way. Then I'll check out the slightly more expensive ($2 - $15) records for anything I've been looking for (Blues, Bluegrass, Soul, R&B) or didn't know I'd been looking for until now. I'll make some offers and if they are willing to come down on the price I'll buy a few. As far as those tables selling records for $25-$70 or more, they can keep them. There's too much great music out there in the dollar bins to spend stupid amounts of money for, especially when you might get home and the pristine looking vinyl turns out to have a major loop, skip, or tons of surface noise. As often as not I'll see the same records I just paid $1 for with an asking price of $5, $10, $15 at these other sellers. That's why I do the $1 thing first. A record is worth exactly what someone is willing to pay for it. It is just that there are too many people with more money than patience.

 

Haven't been to one in years. Most of the album I'm interested in, don't tend to show up at dealers as shows in this country, and I've seen all the Kansas and Dave Matthews Band albums I care to pass on.

Back when I was running my own online station, I could go to our local monthly show, and maybe pick up a title or two on my "casually-interested" list, in case I needed a title for airing I didn't need to pay too much for.

When the station went down, I realized I still had stacks of discs to audition, and haven't yet worked my way through them all, because I don't need to cherry-pick tracks for a format I'm not doing anymore. And my own personal want-list was getting ignored. I sometimes go online for a used-disc feeding-frenzy once a year or so, but I don't have that hunger to discover now that I have more than enough music than I have years left to enjoy it. I still have specific artists I want to get music from, but I know from experience, I won't find them amongst the used stuff we see around here.

And besides - I shower regularly every day now, and I'd just feel out of place-!

 

Our record show down here got cancelled because of the virus. Oh well for this month i guess :/

 

The one in Raleigh is Sunday. I had planned on going but the governor asked that people not gather in groups of over 100. Even before that, the idea that all those people would be handling records I would be handling, coughing, etc. combined with my age (61) and being the caregiver for a disabled wife that falls into several of those at risk categories had convinced me that I better stay home. I was surprised to get a e-mail reminder that the show was still on and that the $2 admission had been lifted. That sounds ill advised to me and I wonder how many sellers will be absent and how many people will be in attendance?

 

There aren't many left in the UK. I used to sell at record fairs. I had a specialist cd and vinyl business that sold rare underground UK prog and krautrock.
We always did the big show at Wembley. That was incredibly fruitful.
The Internet and piracy killed much of the trade at shows. I got out when I saw it coming

 

That is sad to hear. There are regular circuits that pass through my area. One comes four times a year to Raleigh (about 45 minutes away) and another comes to Carrboro (about an hour away) twice a year. I think that is fairly common all over the US but not sure.

 

The record fair circuit was very vibrant in the UK until around maybe 15 years ago.
Another problem for traders in the UK that trade prices increased massively around 2001.
Some labels prices for cd shot up to £20 trade. They were impossible to sell.
Bootleg labels such as germanaphon sold very poor quality products for much less. The fairs started to have these sellers. At my last Wembley show I had a fake cd seller removed. He was selling stuff like germanaphon. When I complained to the organiser he offered me a refund on my pitch fee. I refused and insisted they were removed or I would inform customs and excise immediately. They were removed
Many Organisers turned a blind eye to fakes being sold. This also Brought about the end of the regular circuit