― Modal Fugue (Modal Fugue), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 10:13 (seventeen years ago) link
x-post: Ya damn right!
― Rodney (Rodney J. Greene), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 10:15 (seventeen years ago) link
― Modal Fugue (Modal Fugue), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 10:17 (seventeen years ago) link
That's for sure.
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 13:07 (seventeen years ago) link
― Rodney (Rodney J. Greene), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 20:15 (seventeen years ago) link
― Rodney (Rodney J. Greene), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 20:17 (seventeen years ago) link
http://iranzoo.tripod.com/Golden-Jackal/jackal-3.jpg
― Nu-Edward III (edward iii), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 20:33 (seventeen years ago) link
― Rodney (Rodney J. Greene), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 20:42 (seventeen years ago) link
http://www.patria.org/pdp/ORDER/RA/JACKAL.JPG
― Nu-Edward III (edward iii), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 20:54 (seventeen years ago) link
― Rodney (Rodney J. Greene), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 20:58 (seventeen years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 21:04 (seventeen years ago) link
and I came away with nothing, it was too distracting. I'm going back over the weekend I think.
― Cap'n Guthrie (retardo1), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 21:15 (seventeen years ago) link
I made away with:
Comus - Song to Comus (import with everything the band ever recorded on two CDs - only worked out to be $13, which is a steal)Flux of Pink Indians - Strive to Survive/Neu SmellDaughters - Hell SongsAgent Orange - Living in DarknessTrae - RestlessJFA - We Know You SuckBlack Halos - Alive Without ControlBlack Lips - Let it BloomHellacopters - Payin' the DuesDwarves - The Dwarves are Young and Good LookingThe Frogs - Bananimals
Best stack I've come away with in months.
Anyone know what the chances of the sale going to 50 or 60% are?
― The Fucking Cunts Treat Us Like Pricks (50 Bourbon St), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 22:07 (seventeen years ago) link
I've noticed a bit of that too, my guess is things were just coming out of storage or something...
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 22:08 (seventeen years ago) link
Sounds like it's happened at individual stores already, based on the comment about the Pasadena Tower -- probably they're just judging how quickly stuff moves.
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 22:11 (seventeen years ago) link
― Baron Von Jigglesworth (Baron Von Jigglesworth), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 23:25 (seventeen years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 23:26 (seventeen years ago) link
― kv_nol (kv_nol), Wednesday, 29 November 2006 23:47 (seventeen years ago) link
― Rodney Von Bushwickin The Barbarian Mother-Funky Stay High Dollar Billster (Rodn, Wednesday, 29 November 2006 23:59 (seventeen years ago) link
― Baron Von Jigglesworth (Baron Von Jigglesworth), Thursday, 30 November 2006 00:17 (seventeen years ago) link
I also noticed restocking, included large quantities of certain disks (The Real Tuesday Weld being one such band). And I'm sure those ComSat Angels weren't there when I went over a week ago.
― nickn (nickn), Thursday, 30 November 2006 05:52 (seventeen years ago) link
― kv_nol (kv_nol), Thursday, 30 November 2006 13:43 (seventeen years ago) link
got lots of great stuff at the blockbuster closing sale on south street too. they just kept backing up trucks to the door and unloading old videos. last day was like 99.9 percent off or something. but by then you only had tai bo and benny hill comps left.
as far as the tower on south street, ugh, they should have nuked it years ago. it was a black hole for years. so gross and bad. not at all what it was like when it opened. it just deteriorated more and more as time went on. the one that opened on broad was was a little better. just cuz it was new and all. still pretty lame though. magazine section was halfway decent.
― scott seward (121212), Thursday, 30 November 2006 14:06 (seventeen years ago) link
― Al (Alex In Baltimore), Thursday, 30 November 2006 15:41 (seventeen years ago) link
― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Thursday, 30 November 2006 16:26 (seventeen years ago) link
― Dr M (Dr Morbius), Thursday, 30 November 2006 16:37 (seventeen years ago) link
I went last Saturday and got some good stuff .... couldn't find any rap albums I wanted for the 70% discount though. picked up some dance imports and two older Oneida CDs.
the imports aren't that great of a deal yet, the 40% off knocks them down to the price of a regular CD at Best Buy ($12 or so).
― dmr (dmr), Thursday, 30 November 2006 17:44 (seventeen years ago) link
― Al (Alex In Baltimore), Thursday, 30 November 2006 17:58 (seventeen years ago) link
For $30 I picked up:Schoolly D-A Gangster's StoryOneida-A Place Called El Shaddai'sIce Cube-Greatest HitsNo Limit Greatest Hits
― C0L1N B... (C0L1N B...), Thursday, 30 November 2006 20:59 (seventeen years ago) link
― nickn (nickn), Friday, 1 December 2006 03:45 (seventeen years ago) link
― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Friday, 1 December 2006 03:49 (seventeen years ago) link
― GAWD PVNCH (yournullfame), Friday, 1 December 2006 04:57 (seventeen years ago) link
― Jonathan Williger (jonathan - stl), Friday, 1 December 2006 05:17 (seventeen years ago) link
-- Dr M (wjwe...), November 30th, 2006. (Dr Morbius)
its part of a stripmall type thing near the Georgetown/Foggy Bottom metro stop
― amon (amon), Friday, 1 December 2006 05:25 (seventeen years ago) link
yes.
― GAWD PVNCH (yournullfame), Friday, 1 December 2006 05:30 (seventeen years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 1 December 2006 05:31 (seventeen years ago) link
― Jonathan W (jonathan - stl), Friday, 1 December 2006 05:34 (seventeen years ago) link
― cornyrocker (DC Steve), Friday, 1 December 2006 15:15 (seventeen years ago) link
What I ended up getting: Various Artists, The House That TRANE Built: The Story of Impulse Records; Leonard Cohen, Songs of Leonard Cohen; Teena Marie, Love Songs; Terry Allen, Lubbock (On Everything); The Avalanches, When I Met You (a.k.a. the Gimix set. WTF?). In total, about $58,
What I ended up not getting: The Music of Islam, Vol. 13; Amadou & Mariam, Dimanche à Bamako ; Charles Mingus, Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus; The Go! Team, Thunder, Lightning Strike; Lee Morgan, The Sidewinder; Patty Waters, College Tour; The Rapture, Pieces of the People We Love; Gavin Bryars et al., On Photography; Richie Valens, In Concert at Pacoima Jr. High; a DVD documentary on William Eggleston; a four-hour Colt Studio porno based on Brokeback Mountain (nb: I have never bought/rented/borrowed/stolen a porn video in my life, seriously); and some few others by the artists listed in the first para above.
Waah.
― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Sunday, 3 December 2006 05:34 (seventeen years ago) link
― jonathan - stl (jonathan - stl), Sunday, 3 December 2006 05:49 (seventeen years ago) link
Kind of weird how that few dollars makes that much of a difference. But then again I'm a poor college student.
― ... (50 Bourbon St), Sunday, 3 December 2006 19:58 (seventeen years ago) link
― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Sunday, 3 December 2006 20:00 (seventeen years ago) link
― maura johnston (maura), Sunday, 3 December 2006 23:21 (seventeen years ago) link
― tremendoid (tremendoid), Monday, 4 December 2006 00:57 (seventeen years ago) link
― tremendoid (tremendoid), Monday, 4 December 2006 00:59 (seventeen years ago) link
I wonder if the flood of available product is going to depress Amazon Marketplace prices even more.
― I Am Curious (George) (Slight Return) (Rock Hardy), Monday, 4 December 2006 01:19 (seventeen years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 4 December 2006 01:41 (seventeen years ago) link
went to tower in emeryville today, 50% off. there was a surprisingamount of good stuff.
i bought:
juana molina: son (last copy)new mojave threenouvelle vague: new oneliars: drums not deadthe knife: silent shoutmccartney: s/t and ramgravenhurst: some epthee more shallows: more deep cuts
$77.
there are a number of electronic things I'll go back and buy if they're still there and the prices drop as well
― akm (akmonday), Monday, 4 December 2006 03:15 (seventeen years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Saturday, 23 December 2006 14:28 (seventeen years ago) link
From the corner of Broad and Chestnut, the future of the record store looks bleak.
Amid the holiday rush, Tower Records' Center City store went out of business yesterday, two months after the once-revered chain was acquired for liquidation. In the final days the shelves were half-empty, the selections grim - obscure metal bands such as Rorschach Test and Backlash.
"It's sad, because I used to buy all my music here," said Andy Fortson, 21, of Mount Airy. "But they just can't compete with all the downloading and competition from stores like Best Buy. It seems like it's pretty much impossible to have a record store that only sells music."
So, like Tower, is the independent record store soon to be a thing of the past, as disposable as an MP3 file that can be deleted with a click? That would seem logical in an iPod culture where CD sales are down 5 percent this year and purchases of song downloads are up 66 percent, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
But the changes remaking the music industry tell a more complicated story, and while record stores face daunting challenges, some are finding creative ways to survive in a digital world.
The music retail wreckage this year isn't limited to the 89 stores in the Tower chain. The Center City store, thought to be one of Tower's busiest, had been an Avenue of the Arts linchpin since it opened in 1999.
The Musicland chain declared bankruptcy in January, prompting the closing of stores like Sam Goody in Ardmore. Independent outlets have gone under, too, such as Repo Records, down the road in Bryn Mawr, as well as hipster haven Spaceboy on South Street.
Not all record stores are suffering equally. Many local emporiums, like hip-hop- and R&B-heavy Armand's Records in Center City, and WXPN-centric Main Street Music in Manayunk, are struggling to get by. Others, like wide-ranging a.k.a. music in Old City and Repo's South Street store, which specializes in indie rock, are thriving.
"Consumers are attached to physically owning something," said Jim Donio, present of the National Association of Recording Merchandisers, based in Marlton. "We're a culture that likes things."
Though downloading is inexorably eating into CD sales, "it still only makes up about 5 or 6 percent of the business," said Billboard magazine's Geoff Mayfield. He blames Tower's demise equally on "lowball pricing from mass merchants," meaning stores like Best Buy, Target and Wal-Mart. Those stores often sell new releases for as little as $9.99 to lure Jay-Z or U2 fans who might also pick up a digital camera or a washing machine.
Independent store owners like Armand's Steve Ben-Moyal can't compete, because it costs them more to buy Nas' Hip Hop Is Dead wholesale than the $9.99 the hit album sells for at Best Buy in Plymouth Meeting.
"It's a struggle," said Ben-Moyal, whose second-floor Chestnut Street store was all but empty one afternoon this week. Business is down 70 percent over the last few years, he says, partly due to a new computer program, the Serato Scratch Live, that lets DJs use MP3 files instead of the vinyl LPs that were the backbone of his business.
Store owners face a laundry list of obstacles. There's a music-sharing culture in which 2.8 billion ready-to-burn blank CDs were sold in 2006, according to the Consumer Electronics Association, compared with about 588 million CDs of recorded music. There's competition from the likes of Amazon.com for baby boomers who are too busy or intimidated to venture into stores.
Then there's the disappearance of the college student customer - now, happily downloading MP3s. Dan Matherson said that doomed his Main Line Repo store, which had relied on Villanova and Haverford students. But business is up 10 percent at his South Street store, where indie singer-songwriters Sufjan Stevens and Joanna Newsom are big, especially since Tower and Spaceboy went belly-up.
The loss of younger buyers does not bode well for brick-and-mortar retailers - and that will only worsen if Apple launches its long-rumored iPhone early next year.
"When I was in high school, when I was being more directly financially supported by my parents, I would love to buy CDs from Repo," Gabe Yassky, 18, a Wynnewood resident who's a freshman at Bard College, said by e-mail. "But I've lost those romantic views I had. I mean, I just don't have the money now, and everything is digital."
Raheem Palmer, 20, of Southwest Philadelphia, who goes to the University of Pennsylvania and DJs as "R to da Izza," figures that fewer than half of the 15,000 songs on his iPod come from store-bought CDs.
"For kids growing up, who've never been to record stores, times change, and you've just got to learn to adapt," said Palmer, who started working at Armand's this week. "But at the same time it hurts, because the experience of just going to the store and seeing people and telling each other what kind of music they should check out is almost gone."
Donio, of the merchandisers' group, said thriving stores are selling more than just music - video games, action figures, MP3 players. That approach is typical of f.y.e., the chain owned by Trans World Entertainment, which tried to buy Tower in October for $133.8 million.
f.y.e. spokesman John Sullivan said this week that Trans World had bought the lease of the Tower store on Broad Street, and plans to open a store as early as February. He said this store - the chain's area flagship - would be more music-centric than most, with "a good classical selection" to rival Tower's.
Another approach that works at independent record stores, Donio said, is "the High Fidelity model, where it's more about the music culture in the store."
That's the strategy of Amoeba Records, the three-store mini-chain on the West Coast, whose stores offer such a vast selection of new and used CDs that they are regarded as a Mecca to music-lovers. Co-owner Marc Weinstein calls his customers "culture hounds" - as good a term as any for the customers at a.k.a. on Second Street, where business this week was buzzing.
"We really try to carry a vast array of different types of music, and try to be as completist as possible," said a.k.a.'s Mike Hoffman, a former Third Street Jazz employee who carries 35,000 titles in his Old City store. He said business is up three percent this year. "We really cater to music heads."
That means people like Kerry Kenney, 33, of South Philadelphia, who was Christmas shopping at a.k.a, his hands full with the Beatles' Love and the Bee Gees' greatest hits, Miles Davis' In a Silent Way box set, and the African experimental collection Congotronics 2.
"When I was younger, Tower was the place," Kenney said. "I don't download, or do any shopping on the Internet. I like to experiment when I shop, and pick up a CD and hold it in my hand before I buy it. I'm more old-fashioned that way."
http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/entertainment/16294886.htm
― arthritic hand golden fist (RSLaRue), Sunday, 24 December 2006 15:48 (seventeen years ago) link
VINYL RECORDS TO GO THE WAY OF THE DODO! NO MORE VINYL RECORDS!
― GAWD PVNCH (yournullfame), Sunday, 24 December 2006 15:52 (seventeen years ago) link
Anyway things I will miss about Tower:
1) Buying Riddim magazine. Now I have to find a Barnes & Noble who stocks it or buy it from VP's record wing.
2) The Market stores fantastic bargain bin which was a treasure trove for imports (esp. Soul Jazz stuff.)
― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Sunday, 24 December 2006 17:14 (seventeen years ago) link
I went over to the Tower in Santa Monica the Thursday night before they closed to see if they had anything decent at the 70% off discount. Not only did they have decent stuff, they had a lot of great metal CDs that nobody else was getting because they had never heard of the bands. After much agonizing, I trimmed my purchase down to about $60 worth of stuff. I brought it up to the front counter, and the guy scanned a couple things in and told me that the total was $27. I blinked. He asked me if I had anything else that I put aside, and I nodded quickly and rushed over to where I had left the discard pile. I brought that up front, he scanned the top CD, and gave me about $100 (after the 70% discount) worth of merchandise for $32.50. Since he was losing his job in two days anyway, and any profit was going to the liquidation company that purchased Tower, he had no real reason to care. What were they going to do, fire him? Hell, they cost him his job.
I went back on Sunday morning, since the store was closing and had everything at 90% off, and ended up getting another 27 CDs for $40. I called my friends to let them know, but just as they walked through the door, the guy up front announced that the store was closing and everyone needed to check out. Bummer for them.
My haul, all for a total of about $100 (including a couple CDs that I had purchased at the store earlier for a lesser discount), all brand-new and unopened:
April Wine - Stand BackAyreon - Actual Fantasy RevisitedBlackfoot - StrikesCandlemass - Essential DoomCandlemass - Doomed for LiveCathedral - the Garden of Unearthly DelightsCraft -Fuck the UniverseCronian- TerraDarkest Hour - Undoing RuinDaylight Dies - Dismantling DevotionDead Meadow - Shimmering King and OthersElDopa - The Complete RecordingsEphel Duath - Pain Necessary to KnowFandango - Fandangothe Flaming Lips - at War with the MysticsGenghis Tron - Dead Mountain MouthGuano Apes - Don't Give Me NamesHerod - Rich Man's War... Poor Man's FightHome Video - No Certain Night or MorningKalas - KalasLennon- Damaged GoodsLullacry - Volume 4Merzbow - Rainbow Electronicsthe Mission - ChildrenMotorhead - Ace of SpadesMy Ruin - The Brutal LanguageThe Obsessed - Lunar Womb (Reissue)Passenger- PassengerPentagram - First Daze Here TooPlanes Mistaken for Stars - Knife in the MarathonPoint-Blank - Point-BlankBrian Posehn - Live in: Nerd RageRaunchy - Death Pop RomanceRebel Meets Rebel - Rebel Meets RebelRed Sparowes - Every Red Heart Shines Toward the Red SunRed Sparowes/Battle of Mice/Made Out Of Babies - TriadRumpelstiltskin Grinder- Buried in the Front YardSamhain - Final DescentSatyricon - Dark Medieval TimesSatyricon - Rebel ExtravaganzaScar Symmetry - Pitch Black ProgressSuffocation - SuffocationThe Sword - Age of Wintersthe Start - InitiationThunder - ThunderTito and Tarantula - Hungry Sally and Other Killer LullabiesVoivod - KatorzWarrior Soul - Drugs, God, and the new RepublicWitch - WitchWizardzz - Hidden City of TourmondYob - the Unreal Never LivedYyrkoon - Occult MedicineZoroaster - Zoroaster
― Jeff Treppel (JTreppel), Saturday, 30 December 2006 06:14 (seventeen years ago) link
― the claudine longet invitational (get bent), Saturday, 30 December 2006 06:21 (seventeen years ago) link
Yeah, I was a similar beneficiary on what turned out to be my last day in this respect. I wasn't complaining.
Warrior Soul - Drugs, God, and the new Republic
Really, the only great thing on this album is the cover of Joy Division's "Interzone" with the howled "And we rock and ROOOOOOLLLLL!" bit at the very start. Completely ridiculous. That said I admit I can still hum the chorus of the title song after all these years.
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Saturday, 30 December 2006 06:27 (seventeen years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Saturday, 30 December 2006 06:29 (seventeen years ago) link
I was down in the area of the Costa Mesa Tower today doing some other errands -- no change on the outside of the building or anything yet, just looked forlorn.
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Saturday, 30 December 2006 06:31 (seventeen years ago) link
― jaq (jaq), Saturday, 30 December 2006 08:27 (seventeen years ago) link
― jaq (jaq), Saturday, 30 December 2006 08:40 (seventeen years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Saturday, 30 December 2006 14:58 (seventeen years ago) link
― LynnK (klynn), Saturday, 30 December 2006 16:05 (seventeen years ago) link
― Jeff Treppel (JTreppel), Saturday, 30 December 2006 21:27 (seventeen years ago) link
― Jeff Treppel (JTreppel), Saturday, 30 December 2006 21:36 (seventeen years ago) link
they closed the miami virgin sometime last spring, and now the space has got that dreadful 'bodies' exhibit from china. ha!
― friday on the porch (lfam), Sunday, 31 December 2006 00:07 (seventeen years ago) link
― friday on the porch (lfam), Sunday, 31 December 2006 00:13 (seventeen years ago) link
― maura (maura), Sunday, 31 December 2006 03:44 (seventeen years ago) link
haha. i would. plus i'd be sure to emphasize AMERICA when i said their name.
― GAWD PVNCH (yournullfame), Sunday, 31 December 2006 06:27 (seventeen years ago) link
Maura - Appreciate the offer, but I need that Warrior Soul CD to keep my copy of WCA's "Climbin' the Walls" company.
Someone should really start a "Warrior Soul/Wrath Child America Appreciation Thread."
― Jeff Treppel (JTreppel), Sunday, 31 December 2006 07:10 (seventeen years ago) link
― pdf (unperson), Sunday, 31 December 2006 17:34 (seventeen years ago) link
― Jeff Treppel (JTreppel), Sunday, 31 December 2006 20:11 (seventeen years ago) link