Wednesday 25 November 2009

RIP Record Savings

Around 1996 was when I first discovered the joy of an indie record store. The relaxed atmosphere, the difference in personality to bigger mainstream shops, and most importantly... the discoveries that could be made.

I spent the majority of my teens visiting as many indies as I could, to try and educate myself on everything that was out there. I personally have over 1800 CD's and I really hate the modern era's inability to understand the beauty of actually saving up and BUYING albums... The pride in the holding the physical item in your hand, that you have earned. The beauty in that medallion of music. Anyway... I digress. It was in indie stores that I learned of my voracious appetite for music of all types. Mainstream stores like HMV etc never gave me the same ability to discuss and learn about new things from an 'expert'... nor did they allow me to select something I simply liked the look of off of the shelf and have it played while I looked around. Record Savings allowed me that freedom, and I basically lived in that shop.

In fact, I spent so much time there and learned so much, they offered me a job. I worked there for about 3 or 4 years. Ordering in stock, buying and selling secondhand CD's, and continuing my education. Also I learned the joy of influencing people to try new things. I'm a very extroverted person and enjoy talking to people about my passions. So I found the job to be really fun... every single day. Not many people can say that about their jobs.

A few years back, the sales of CD's started to decline as people began downloading music or just listening to it online, and this resulted in me being made redundant. Since then I have continued to shop at Record Savings with the vain hope that it would continue forever. It was one of the last true indie record stores in the country and I hoped it could last.

In the last few months I noticed they got less and less new releases in, and then today I found out that it had closed as of earlier this week.

Truly the end of an era, and quite saddening for me
.

1 comment:

Paul Readman said...

Yes i noticed that on 21st November the door was closed for good. Paul told he was getting fed up and the tile business was improving alot, which is his first business. What i did not know was that the lease was up on it. The last independant record shop in 22 years in Banbury, i still can't believe it. i'm doing a once a month charity stall for help the aged on the Banbury market at the moment as well as the radio shows so i'm going to do something about this as in selling music. I actually feel a little deflated, unless someone buys the place out or opens another one? i hope so. i would if i had the finance