The Death of the Record Store - An End to Nostalgia

All of my record stores are gone. The Sam Goody where I bought all of my Slayer albums and one of the store clerks introduced me to underground metal has left one of the bigger malls in my state. The Camelot Music where I used to work for the store discount and so I could use the catalog is long gone, now an urban logo clothing store. The Tower Records where I bough Death's "Human", and Mercyful Fate's 'Time" and "Into The Shadows"? That didn't last past high school, in which I graduated in 2000.

I will miss the record store hunting experience. Thumbing through hundreds of CDs just to find one gem. I also will miss the physical entity of a CD. The liner notes with the lyrics and the artwork. I will miss when I'm in a random town for whatever reason and checking out the record store just in case they had something I might want to buy. I will miss the way my eyes lit up when I was in Norway, and for the first time in my life I had tons and TONS of CDs that was in my taste and I had to limit myself on how much to buy because I wanted everything.


Initially, I resisted the change from CD to digital music. After all, I had about 600 albums laying around that represented a lot of money and a lot of time.

The digital age has given me something that the old experience never could. An endless supply of music that I wouldn't be able to find anywhere, ever. CD out-of-print? No problem. Band you found on the sampler CD that doesn't seem to exist in the store's catalog? Someone online not only knows what you're talking about, but has it as well and is a big fan. Who's that band that you saw once on Beavis and Butthead that you can't remember but you know that you liked that one song? There's a list telling you what it is and you'll be able to have it before the toast pops out of the toaster.

What about if you're like me and you like Celtic music? I bought a sampler CD and there was a band on there called "Four yn y Bar" whose song called "Dacw 'Nghariad" caught my ear. The CD notes had very little information about the band. What does this beautiful song mean? What are the lyrics and what do they mean? click click click click...

Four yn y Bar = Four in the Bar (obviously meaning the unit in which beats are measured in music)
Dacw ‘Nghariad = There Is My Love
I have access not only to the lyrics, but also a translation and a phonetic transcript in case I want to learn to sing along. The many joys of being able to experience an old song in a new way is fantastic. The mystique of not knowing is nothing compared to the empowerment of knowledge.

It's fun to remember traveling with a hundred or so albums in my suitcase so that while out-of-town so that I would still have a great selection to go through. It's better walking about with a Zune large enough that it holds my entire collection. It's fun to remember organizing albums in the CD holder in the probable order in which I would want to listen to them on a long trip, then curse myself for being so foolish as to think I could predict my music listening mood. It's better seting up playlists large enough where I don't have to be distracted while driving.

It's also fun to think of thumbing through one's own collection, spinning the CD spinner and knowing just where each album was that you didn't have to look and just pull it out by feel. The extra space in the room is better and worrying about keeping track of such a large collection is different, but much easeir. Finding those limited edition Ulver EP's was also a kick. It's better knowing that nothing is limited anymore and knowing that you can find it, if you look.


This is the just another end of an age in the musical world. There used to be a time when new music was so infrequent that the release of a new album was considered a major event. A regular pastime would be to go over to someone's house and to just listen to an album or two. This is not to suggest that both the former nor the latter do not exist today, the frequency and the impact has diminished greatly. It's hard to believe that either will ever exist again at the same levels because music is so personalized, and so openly available, and I like that.

I often hear the sobbing of people who miss the artwork of CDs. This lamentation was also heard when the switch from LP's to Cassettes was made. Miss the artwork of your favorite bands?

http://www.cover-paradies.to/?Lng=IT

The old school was fun. The memories are great. This is better and I'm not very sad to see these stores go. Eventually MP3's will automatically come with artwork, credits, liner notes and lyrics. Eventually someone will figure out how to make digital music much like it was in the past and package their album digitally as they once did physically. In time, perhaps, each track will come with a different piece of artwork to give each track an individual identity. Who knows? Maybe they're already doing that and are already planning a new spin that will make us all but forget the fact that in buying an album once meant something to us and holds us in a grip of nostalgia.

The only difference will be... we can't hold it and don't go somewhere to get it.