Proper music shops

I purchased all the early Fleetwood Mac titles there along with many of the underground British Blues Boom artists. I spent thousands there and years later it was all released in the U.K. and available through mail service vendors in America. I used to order from Jem Records in the 70's and 80's. Marty from Jem who used to sell imports from the back of his station wagon opened Jem Imports in South Plainfield and North Plainfield N,J. It was the best way to obtain Gong, Hawkwind, and Guru, Guru titles. Unless you ordered from a record shop that dealt with Marty. Better to order from the source though. Archie Patterson who was associated with Green World on the west coast was part of the same early movement as Jem. Their goal was to sell underground progressive music. Whether it was electronic, krautrock, space rock, or what was labeld then as Progressive Rock like PFM. These guys broke down the barrier at a time when this kind of music was well known in the U.K. but, hardly available in America. These 2 guys were extremely vital to the change in business.

Plastic Fantastic in Ardmore P.A. sold mainly used copies of rare (or rare then), progressive European albums. I bought the Beaver & Krause collection there in the 80's. Third Street Jazz and Rock in Philadelphia was a wonderful shop with 2 floors. Upstairs you had Jazz, Downstairs were actual collections of Blues music and Progressive Rock. Imported versions of Guru, Guru on Atlantic Records and plenty of Klaus Schulze. They sold the import cd's of Jade Warrior on the German Line label. They were supposedly phased wrong and I passed on them. Goblin, Eloy, and many others were available week to week. When Wayside Music entered the picture, it was then more possible to obtain Univers Zero, Conventum, and just many bands from countires unthought of by Americans. Steve F. made it possible for fans of progressive to obtain even a wider spectrum of prog like Pulsar, Art Zoyd, and he also stocked many albums that were released by Mexican musicians. Then I became aware that there was an electronic scene in Mexico. Also many Mexican prog bands that blew me away!

 

the larger stores are full of gems

 

I got to see some magnificent ones ...  for imports and strange stuff ... in my time:

 

Tower Records on the Sunset Strip ... for the longest time was the haven for imports and weird stuff, and one day they decided that the imports they would get would only be Beatles and Rolling Stones and it was over.

 

Moby Disk in Van Nuys. The ultimate progressive and import heaven for the longest time. Still one of the best. Can't tell you if they are there or not.

 

Warehouse in Westwood (UCLA) ... had a couple of floors and was huge on jazz, classical, and soundtracks and off kilter stuff.

 

Rasputin Records ... Berkeley ... eventually split into two stores because they were too big ... way too big. But you went there with a list of things, because if you didn't, you would spend 12 hours in that place and have a stack of things in your hand that was taller than you are! And your wife or significant other would kill you!

 

Music Millenium ... Portland. The ultimate independent store, still fairly good, though slimmed down and they failed to get into the website business in time to make a go of it.

 

Between those and a couple of folks over email, I got most of my needs. Never found a good European distributor that had the music as a priority, but Archie Patterson (Eurock) still is the best at the odd stuff ... which I can't afford! Meaning I never get to hear the new things!

 

I heard that the Tower Records in NY was massive ... but their prices were not for me!

 

 

I used to have the best of several  worlds living half way between Leicester and Nottingham, in Loughborough. Alas the local indie records shops (3) went 3 summers ago - Ainsley's in Leicester died before then - as did the knowledgable guys behind the counter. But at least Ultima Thule was still there, the last time I looked a few months ago, although Alan Freeman has  talked of moving. Nottingham's Selectradisc died just over 2 years ago, and this a couple of years after they stopped buying in  second hand vinyl. There was an interesting rock specialist up an alley towards Maid Marion Way near the Bell Inn but that didn't last long in the 90's - and a heavy rock speciallist up one of the shopping alleys opposite the Odean cinema, does it survive?. So it seems both Leicester and Nottingham only have HMVs and their limited stocklist, whilst there is an even worse collection of safe releases at WH Smiths. Loughborough's local record shops were partly killed by cheap CDs on the internet, illegal copying and  the final straw, Virgin encouraged into our new shopping mall, rent free for a year. However, Virgin went bust replaced by Zaavi's who quickly when internet-only and then eventually HMV have taken over. I only go into HMV to check out the discounted DVDs, getting no pleasure sorting through the CD racks full of the obvious - a lost pleasure which kept me amused and priomed for surprises for hours most weeks in the past on entering the indie shops. ....Although I did manage to pick up Nigel Kennedy's Shhh! album very cheap two weeks ago - with a surprisingly good interpretation of Nick Drake's River Man, believe it or not sung by Boy George.

 

But I noticed something, HMV are selling the obvious safe CDs a lot cheaper than they did 10 years ago - presumably indicating their equivalent  in the 90's were overpriced (encouraging copying for instance????). But then the sort of CDs I might buy are still overpriced in HMV, when they are slipped in.