Record shops you have known and loved

Yep. Proper attitude place @Pulsatio7 Record exchange in MCR used to turn up some goodies. Great to hear a couple of you maybe even knew Kenny at Spin Inn, and dredging the point even further maybe listened to Stu Allan who’s shows I recorded from Blackpool, hunched over a radio and cassette, rocking out late school nights with the sounds of limited pressing US imports.

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My personal 7 from heaven

  1. Princeton Record Exchange- now a hopeless morass of rinked Yes albums this was once my playground- I’d hear something on KISS or WPRB and if I could figure out what it was I could find it here. It was a couple years before I had really figured out where the stores were in the city or had the balls to sneak out on the train to go to them and the record exchange made sure I had G. Rap and BDP.

  2. Chelsea Flea Market- my disco and jazz collections started here. Pretty wild to think about but you could hit the lottery and find a bunch of preludes or west end joints here for fifty cents. When I found “Help Is On The Way” at the flea for a couple bucks you couldn’t tell me I wasn’t the digging king of the world (I wasn’t).

  3. Roosevelt and other record shows- Amazing records abounded. Mostly at prices I couldn’t afford and I didn’t know what the fuck they were anyway but seeing Q Tip and Evil Dee and DITC walking from booth to booth DIDN’T EVEN SEEM REAL!

  4. A1/Sound library- listing these as one because Rob/Steve/Jared helped start an entire era of break and disco collections and turned hip hop collecting in to the top notch pursuit it deserved to be plus they were always super cool about trade. Got so many seemingly mythical things here like the legitimate pressings of Stunts Blunts and Hip Hop and Low End Theory and mostly did it by trading stuff I copped out of state or in basements.

  5. Vinylmania- I wish I had even one one-hundredth of my knowledge and interest in dance music when I started going here back in the day. That said it had a more utilitarian function that ultimately made it ultra important when I was a little kid and not really free to run around the village on my own: it was in easy walking distance of my grandparents apartment and if they were in the right mood they’d walk me over there. I remember getting Eric B Is President there accompanied by my grandmother in her full length mink. The staff could have been absolute dicks but instead they acted like they saw weirder stuff every day which they undoubtedly did.

  6. Fat Beats- Joe and Ryan and Eclipse started a musical revolution. Even though a lot of the music didn’t stand the test of time they also sold and distributed a ton of stone cold classics that the established labels simply weren’t interested in touching. I went there every day and it was as much a club house as a store. Crunchy staff abuse of toys or people who didn’t act right was legendary.

  7. Beat street and music factory (all locations)- because you might just fuck around and find a whole box of something rare sitting on the floor. Happened to me so many times I can’t even count.

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Yeah, the ‘Electronics’ part of the equation was definitely best avoided!

I didn’t know any of the staff in Spin Inn, i was too young & just occasionally spending pocket money in there, i remember some of the DJs from Sunset Radio used to shop there, remember seeing Leaky Fresh holding court in there.
Deffo used to listen to Stu Allen, Sunday nights i think, Bus’ Dis on Key 103, used to chat about the show on Mondays at school lol, whenever i hear Twin Hype reminds me of him, still have a tape of his Best Of 1989 show that i borrowed of a mate of a mate & never gave back.
He later went more into Hardcore & then maybe Happy Hardcore after that??

Back onto record shops does anybody remember Manchester Underground?
It was around for a few years in the early 90s, down some stairs in the Corn Exchange near where Konspiracy nightclub was.
I bought my copy of The Low End Theory in there.
Also used to love Fat City, first in Afflecks Palace, then on Oldham St, for Hip Hop & Reggae 45s, I remember being in there when Lord Finesse from DITC was buying some stuff.
Beatin’ Rhythm on Tib St was great for 45s, Northern Soul in particular, saw a few famous faces digging in there, including DJ Cash Money & Noddy Holder from Slade on the same day.

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They did some pretty impressive jewellery also!

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I didn’t know the name of it until now but I used to stop in Paul For Music on Cambridge Heath Road a couple of times a week after university lectures on the way home. Got lots of 80s house and electro compilations there as they were affordable for a student. I miss second hand record shops like that the most.

Seems obvious but Real Groovy in AKL
Southbound is top. Occasionally I would go to Flying Out as well.

Groove Attack in Cologne goes without saying
Chez Emile in Lyon is also killah

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Gold chains galore

Get a dookie rope, buy some bootleg disco 12s, have your mixer set on fire

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JAT Records & EGS Records in Wakefield in the mid-late eighties. JAT was dark, had sticky carpets, loads of arcade games in the back room and was pretty intimidating.

Crash and Jumbo in Leeds, Spillers In Cardiff, Fat City and Piccadilly in Manchester, Vinyl Junkies, Reckless, All the vinyl exchange branches, Selectadisc, Sounds Of The Universe, Phonica, Honest Jons and Dub Vendor.

Rough Trade West at lunchtime has to be my guiltiest pleasure though. If a certain member of staff is in I don’t need to be specific - I just get given a stack full of stuff to sift through.

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Says a lot but I want to put a word in for Cheapo Cheapo records on Berwick St. Dusty basement and I used to love going through the new arrivals on the stall outside on a Saturday.
And any brand of Record & Tape Exchange, but particularly the one on Goldhawk Rd where I used to buy New Chicago house for £2 a pop.

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:100:. So many good finds in that place.

I assume MVE in Greenwich had, at some point, a massive Balearic-head working there, as I saw a copy of Jonny Panic and the Bible Of Dreams labelled as something like “7th greatest record of all time”. I mean I do think it’s a bit of an unheralded classic but even so.

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Reedys in Blackburn buying indie records in the early 80s, Spillers in Cardiff buying hip hop and early house mid 80s, then Eastern Bloc, Piccadilly and Manchester Underground for Italian house early 90s before I moved to Brighton and found Inner Rhythm, where I managed to blag a job. Did my first day there on roller skates behind the counter, much to Darren’s bemusement! There were some good shops in Brighton at the time - Ugly up the road, and Rounder. I moved to London and then it was a circuit of Black Market, Catch-A-Groove, Quaff, Uptown, and the Record and Tape Exchanges. Red Records in Camberwell(?) too. I really miss going to shops. I pop into Phonica and Sounds of the Universe sometimes these days when I’m in town, but I haven’t really got the time to devote to shopping anymore, so online it is I’m afraid. Working in a record shop in the nineties was the best job I ever had.

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Cheapo Cheapo was amazing! The prices were low enough to take punts on stuff and I came away with some gems and a few stinkers :slight_smile:

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Also have to big up The Groove Merchant on lower Haight in San Francisco. Cool Chris is maybe the nicest record store proprietor of all time (and Josh B the nicest employee) and a trip out there is never complete without seeing what’s on the wall, what cool ephemera he’s holding on to and perhaps if there’s a box of special rare shit behind the counter or perched on top of the toilet in the very cramped bathroom. Definitely the first place in the US where I ever saw Brazilian records that didn’t look like they’d been in a dog fight.

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Record Rack and Tweekin’ in San Francisco, Vinylmania, Sonic Groove, A1 and Dance Tracks in NY, Vinyl Junkies and JP during the Nu Disco years, Gramaphone in Chicago, Records (the shop on the DJ Shadow LP) in Sacramento.

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Forgot about Rock & Soul! A gold mine in the 90s.

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was that the place which always used to have stock copies of the Bob Chance LP? Great shop

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Yeah that sounds about right. Always good for “quirky” records but also clean copies of staples and classics.

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