Best and worst record stores.

Was not impressed by my first and only visit to a record store in the Detroit metro area today. Some of the records were decent prices, but lots of common pop and rock Lp's in mediocre condition were marked unreasonable high. A copy of Rush's All the World's a Stage with a badly worn cover (severe ring wear, sloppily-taped seam splits) and both discs in only "good" (not good at all) condition had a $16 price tag. Some of the better record stores around here would have put in a dollar bin or thrown it away. The owner was cleaning a stack of records at the counter with an off-brand window cleaner and a rag. (It looked soft at least, and she did use a circular motion while wiping). We talked about music a little; she claimed to have seen Led Zeppelin 37 times. I am skeptical.

 

There used to be one downtown Sacramento near the capital; I think it was The Beat but I may have that wrong. Not sure if it's still there. Seems like that area is mostly occupied by hotels, nightclubs and mass shootings.

 

Beat up Rush albums for $16, welcome to 2022 all over the place.....well, whatever is left of "record stores". I'd have to go to SLC and Vegas to get to L.A. for the incredible amount of cheap great vinyl in the late 80's, early 90's. 80% of the stores are long gone. Bury Second Spin/Famous CD store on Tropicana for loot on crappy CD's then hit J-Mar's, Big B's, Record Surplus. Those days are over.

 

To me, the quality of a record store depends on what you are looking for. I mainly collect CDs and cassettes, so that's how I personally judge how "bad" or "good" a store is. My experiences are a bit limited since I only started going to record stores a bit over a year ago, but I'll attempt to rank the ones I visited.

The best is undoubtedly Princeton Record Exchange due to its massive selection of cheap used CDs, and it's not too far away from where I live. I've made 4 visits so far, and I'm going to start visiting every 6-7 weeks because it's now the only store worth going to (more on why below).

Sweet Repeat Records in New Hope is a very small store (it downsized many times) but it's very good for its size, and I've had many good CD and cassette finds there in the past year-or-so. I made my fifth visit just a few days ago, and I just decided to stop going there for now. I think I'm starting to outgrow the store's small CD selection, and the tapes are getting pricier.

There is a very small place called The Wax Hut in the town I live in, and closeness is the main reason I kept going there. The CD selection is very minimal, and the cassettes seem to have zero turnover (the same ones there every visit). There is a budget $3 vinyl selection with good-quality stuff (not Perry Como fare), and I've used that to fill up my small vinyl shelf. However, I really want to limit my spending on analog formats, so I've been holding off that store for a while.

Last summer, I visited Positively Records in Levittown and was disappointed by the lack of cassettes (despite a sign outside advertising them). I spent a long time looking through boxes of $2 budget CDs, and mostly got greatest hits compilations. The other CDs for sale are $5, so I'm not sure if I'll go back.

I had a rather mixed bag experience at Main Street Jukebox in Stroudsburg. While the cassette selection was great, the used CDs were overpriced ($5 for Lou Bega...). I also wasn't fond of the owner, who gave me a really hard time for carrying a reusable shopping bag around the store. I won't be returning here since it's over an hour drive from my house.

Certainly, the worst experience I had was at Newtown Book and Record Exchange, but in terms of the actual store because the owner (and sole employee it seemed) was a nice young lady. The CD selection was very bad and overpriced, and ditto for the cassettes ($3-4 for an Herb Alpert tape...). I didn't even bother checking the vinyl, and I left empty handed and never went back.

 

I work right down the road from the Princeton Record Exchange, so that is a once a week stop for me on my lunch hour.

Positively Records is hit or miss. I don't go that often (maybe 5-6 times a year), and the turnover isn't as good as Princeton. I was still able to pick up a few CD's there when I went two weeks ago.

I didn't even know that New Hope had a record store.....I'll have to check that out when my wife and I stop there this summer.

 

$4 for a used Herb Alpert cassette. Oh please go back and write down the vinyl prices. I'm sure Van Halen 1984 VG- is $27.99.

 

How was the selection as far as Genres?? Was the owner nice about giving you a "hard time", meaning did he ask you to check your bag at the counter? Or just a bad attitude , all the way around???

 

Since I don't collect much vinyl, I didn't even look in that section. There was a decent amount of rock CDs there, although I don't pay much attention to other genres. The prices for used CDs there start at $5, which I think is very unreasonable as a Princeton goer. I saw the Cars' Heartbeat City there (which is the only CD of that album I've seen so far) and I was thinking about buying, however the disc was missing! I don't know if it was stolen, or if there was a "behind the counter" type system for the discs---which I would hate. The cassette tape selection was great and reasonably priced, though, which was the only redeeming thing about the store to me.

After hanging out in the store for about an hour, the man behind the counter (the owner I believe) told me I wasn't allowed to have reusable bags in the store, and made me give him the bag, which held my current cassette selection. I felt scared since nothing like this has happened to me before, and was motivated to check out and leave the place ASAP. I wasn't finished shopping though, and I was disappointed when I left the store and realized that among the confusion, I accidently got 2 tapes of Phil Collins' Both Sides

Afterwards, we went to an antique mall called "The Olde Engine Works" and thankfully there was a huge media booth there with a big selection of reasonably priced CDs. A different booth, however, was asking $10 for the Elton John 1997 Candle in the Wind Single

I discovered Main Street Jukebox during my family trip to the Poconos last summer, through a 2-page magazine ad boasting it as the last "real" record store in the area. Since it's a 60+ min drive, I very likely won't go back. An LP of Duran Duran's Rio was being played over the store speakers when I walked in, and that gave me the sense that maybe they would finally get their overdue R&RHoF induction. Several months later, I found out I was right

 

Thanks
and yes
that is all too common with used
cds
in my area

empty jewel box for display
cd at the counter
in a manila envelope

I am about 2 hours away, might not be worth the
drive

 

CD at the counter! This isn't 1993 when CD's were hot.

 

My favorite still-open record store is the good old Sound Garden in Baltimore, MD, although I don't visit that often, mostly because it's located on a rattly, cobblestone street that's often at least partially blocked off for some sort of neighborhood hipster party.

But the store itself is great. Decent prices, good selection, staff that seems to actually care.

 

There's a record store around the corner from my in-laws' house in Buffalo that's much the same (not going to name names, because some of my remaining friends in the Buffalo area swear by this place, but I don't know what they see in it). Super-common records all sealed up in unopenable plastic bags marked for $25-30 each. They seem to act like these things are art-pieces or status symbols rather than, you know, records. They were made to listen to, not display.

 

Whatta joke, sealed up like gold. It is getting worse by the month.

 

I took a tour of Tacoma's record stores recently (they are all located on the same street) and to my great disappointment there is no such thing as a dollar bin in the entire city, even Half Price Books has completely gotten rid of their once amazing clearance section and even 45s start at $2 each now. Hi-Voltage is the main store in town; huge selection and great vibes but the prices were high and the condition of most the vinyl was bad. Even overstock copies (and there were a lot of certain titles) under the bins were pushing $30! This experience was repeated with most of the other shops, at least Hi-Voltage prices all their stock, and has working AC.

 

High Voltage is the norm just about anywhere. The duffers hit the floor and Discogs/eBay the rest.

 

Bluegrass, Country, and old time music is a major Great Escape specialty. Also, they do the other genres well. Also, being a music industry town, easier to find nice records in top condition (or at least used to be).

 

Shows me that there are now enough entrants into the vinyl revival (I definitely see more record stores now than 10 years ago and obviously with vinyl being a bigger part of those stores). So this means owners are maybe having to think a bit creatively in terms of their marketing hook. I share your disdain for that practice as I pretty much insist on inspecting any used vinyl.

 

edit

 

Just hiding the condition.

 

Another gem of a record store in the Portland, Oregon area is Mississippi Records. I've been there a couple of times recently and they're selection is pretty incredible for how quaint of a shop it is. Friendly folks at the counter too.

 

How about Siren in Doylestown, plenty of cds, vinyl and cassettes

Also D-town Guitars, Plumsteadville, Pa

The vendors at the Golden Nugget, River Road, Jersey side

Spin Me Round, Easton, PA and the main pawn shop on the circle in Easton, PA

The head scratcher with Sweet Repeat was all the overpriced hammered vinyl and underpriced perfect vinyl, lol.

Frenchtown, NJ also has a hippie clothier/music store

Also Revilla in Somerville, NJ for vinyl

 

It is not member countries. The USA is divided into states. 50 of them.

 

How about Toronto? Any top examples there?

 

Wax 'n Facts in Atlanta has been reliable for LPs, though either their CDs turnover quickly or they just aren't getting the volume of trades that they used to, they've been around since 1978 or so.

 

Some great ones are gone, but Sonic Boom is the biggest, one of the best and one of a ever-dwindling number that still carry CDs. Elton John visited there a couple of years back.
Rotate This is pretty good with a good selection, reasonable prices and a decent return policy. Kops Records isn't bad. They have 2 locations. Decades ago I was chuffed when I visited a record fair in Walthamstow, England and one of the vendors had lived in Toronto and knew the owner, Martin Kopp (who's a great guy to talk to, very enthusiastic about records). She Said Boom is good too. Pandemonium has a large selection. The owner, Neill Cunningham, is a friend and served as the model for the cover of Rush's Power Windows and was in a video from that record.
I've been fortunate to visit some of the great stores around the world that were mentioned in this thread including Red Eye Records in Sydney, Sound Garden in Baltimore and Lucky Records in Rejkjavik.