Record Store Day

Sorry for the paucity of posts recently.  Things are pretty crazy at the moment, between the usual work stuff, starting to sort my house out for the move, preparing endless reams of documents for my work visa...  Even this post is, strictly speaking, a day late.  Record Store Day was of course yesterday. 

On Friday I enjoyed reading this article on The Guardian music blog about readers' memories of record shops.  My own memories of record stores are of there being a suprising bounty of stores in the West Yorkshire area.  Wall of Sound in Huddersfield, Crash and Jumbo in Leeds, and a particularly rich seam of shops in Halifax, of all places.  During our A-Levels, my two best friends and I had Tuesday afternoons free from lessons.  Every week, we would sign ourselves out (destination: 'library', yeah right) as soon as the bell went for lunch, and hightail it into the centre of Wyke to get the bus to Halifax, where we'd wander around the independent stores in the Piece Hall and visit the town's four record shops.  It's been a while since I was in Halifax, but last time I visited two of the four were still holding firm against the tide of internet shopping.

Here in Leicester, I've been visiting Rockaboom since I moved to the city in 1996.  New releases tend to be cheaper than HMV and, even if they're a bit more expensive than Amazon I always think it's a price worth paying for the continued existence of the store.  They always have a good selection of back catalogue stuff for a fiver, too, which is good for filling the gaps in your collection.

Nowhere, though, comes close to Amoeba Records in San Francisco.  A huge building at the top of Haight Street, not far from Golden Gate Park, it is well worth a pilgrimage.  With an enormous range of CDs, vinyl, t-shirts, posters and DVDs, it was only the knowledge that I'd have to carry everything home that stopped me from buying half the shop.  As it was, I came away 8 CDs heavier, including some great mid-90s finds (Liz Phair, Belly) for 99c each.