Secrets of the City

If I still had my turntable, I would. I loved vinyl, and I mourn its passing.

Of course, I’m the old guy.

Quaint.

If you’re going to rent a space to store all the records you plan to sell online, you might as well go the extra mile and get one that can double as a “record store” and/or a whorehouse. Shuga Records does sound sort of sexy after all.

The album cover photos and art was great on the old LPs. Anything cover by Milly Jackson would freak you out. Or “Weasels Ripped My Flesh,” by Frank Zappa and the Mothers.

Loved the Parliament covers, too. Especially, the “Clones of Dr. Funkenstein.”

Milly Jackson would feel right at home at a whorehouse/record store.

Case in point.

Yeah, how can the music world live without these?

http://rateyourmusic.com/list/djlanda/the_100_worst_album_covers_ever/

Check out Millie Jackson’s “Back to da S$#t; Number 4 with a bullet.

Wow. Whoever put the list The Rat linked to REALLY hates Prince’s album covers.

Great link, Rat. Warning: some are NSFW, all are very funny.

I think it’s great! This is secretly my dream…opening a little record store. I’m all for it.

Yeah, open a vinyl record store, dispense serene wisdom to your customers and go broke.

In Northeast.

Good for him.

Yes, Max, you are the ONLY one still buying vinyl. If this store goes under, it’ll be all your fault.

I bet Bill McGlaughlin, who hosts St. Paul Sunday buys vinyl.

Vinyl is the fly fishing of music collection. You can bore people to tears talking about it.

I buy vinyl. Lots of vinyl. I swore a while back I’d never buy another CD. I download what I listen to on my computer and buy vinyl copies of everything else.

Vinyl sales in the UK surpassed CD sales a while ago. There’s vinyl at Best Buy now. Vinyl is back. It’s not “quaint” — it sounds better, the art is bigger, its usually MASTERED better, and if you love music, it should be your preferred delivery method.

When I was 5 or so, I got a record player for my birthday. I have amassed quite the collection of kids’ albums on vinyl. I still also have the record of the McDonald’s rap that came in Sunday papers for a context. You guys remember that, right?

But still, I’m not sure how successful this store will be (and I’m just talking about breaking even) given that vinyl is such a small niche market these days (even if the numbers are increasing).

i still buy vinyl…although i should clarify that i usually get new albums in vinyl since all the hipster bands put it out. (ie iron and wine, mates of state, sufjan)

I’m friends with the guy who runs it, and the point of the store isn’t to make money. 95% of their business is online, so this is more a way to have a public face for a business that’s been active locally for five years. And to give visibility to local musicians and artist, etc. Shuga sells a lot of rare LPs online, but the bricks-and-mortar shop will have cheaper records, some new stuff plus a lot of local bands.

You still gotta pay rent.

I read recently that the sale of new vinyl increased by something like 48% in 2008. I buy all of my new music on vinyl, along with the occasional mp3 off iTunes. Couldn’t tell you the last CD I bought.

I still buy some vinyl. I think it’s a superior format, and not just sound-wise. I’ve lost several CDs to rot and a lot of mp3s to a faulty hard drive. Any issues with losing records are easy and cheap to avoid. That said, I usually buy CDs and sometimes mp3s.

Shuga’s prices are ludicrous — charging hundreds of dollars for dollar-bin dreck may be sustainable on ebay but I don’t think it will work so well in a retail outlet.

I suppose this might work if they can sustain all of their income from eBay and get incremental sales from the store front. Aardvark didn’t last very long in NE.

My friends started an eBay business selling used vintage womens shoes and a few years ago opened up a full vintage clothing store front on 29th and Johnson and are doing quite well.

Rewind is the name and it is the place right next to Crafty Planet.

If they had a space to warehouse there stuff, and they just opened this up to the public, it wouldn’t be that much of an added expense.

I think the added expense would mostly be in setting up a company and getting a tax ID number and such. I hope it does well. I have a very nice woodgrain Marantz turntable that I got out of the trash about 15 years ago that had the instruction manual and everything it just needed a new belt and needle from the Needle Dr.

That said I don’t buy a ton of albums but do like to buy limited edition 7″ singles occasionally. I have some fairly rare Lifter Puller Singles.

Maybe it’s because people think vinyl sounds better. I sure do. What a novel concept, people buying an audio recording because it sounds better than the (more convenient) digital formats….Have not purchased any downloads or CD’s in close to a year since I went back to vinyl.

Rat: Have you ever fly fished? For my tastes, I’d much rather walk a river than sit in a boat….

“the bricks-and-mortar shop will have cheaper records”…

Cheaper? Try trashed.
Visited the shop already and found the records ranged from unplayable to partially destroyed to utterly ruined condition. Since when was it cool to ask money for warped records? It’s never been cool to sell the same records you can find at Cheapos or Salvation Army for $3 for three times that amount.

The guy running the shop seemed nice enough but, damn, digging through the bins was such a waste of time. It was hard to find a record that either didn’t have a cover that wasn’t falling apart in some manner or didn’t have massive scuffs and gouges in the grooves.

The shop is a waste of space when he could be doing more than just trying to unload dirty scratched up records at $10 a piece.

I was told when in the store about the ebay shop so I figured he had the good stuff there. Ouch! His prices are easily two to three times the going rate.
How about a new sign on the shop: Shuga Records for Sucka Customers