A funny thing happened to me in the record store ...

The thread about shopping for close-out bargains at Borders made me think of this: Do you have any favorite stories about experiences in record stores? New lifelong friends you made while shopping, or maybe future girlfriends you met in the store? Or maybe dates that you made, that went peculiarly awry? Like, in my case, the girls who heard Kraftwerk in the store and talked about how they ought to play it at the party that night, and ended up inviting me to said party ... and how I foolishly took them seriously, and brought the album and put it on the stereo?

I always flirted with the girls who worked in the Borders cafe. They're gone now, but I'm thinking of buying a chair from there so I'll always have a piece of the Borders experience.

i remember chatting with a girl who had that punk rock girl looks.
i looked like some regular 17 year old kid who was a jock.
she was holding the replacements tim album. i told her thats the greatest band in the world. she didnt want to be bothered and thought i was some dumb jock either being sarcastic or someone who had no idea who the replacements are .
she told me to get lost that i didnt even know who they were and to go listen to my bruce springsteen album{i had in my hands a copy of the wild innocent e street shuffle}
this place was a limited music store also. so i picked up a guitar and started playin here comes a regular.
needless to say she said just cause we like the same music doesnt mean i like you.

No girl story here and I know I've told this story before on here, but...

There was a used/collectable record store in OKC. The owner's name was Alexander -- a very tall man who dressed like a metal god with black vest and white tuxedo shirt and had long, stringy black hair. He regularly performed and ran karaoke shows with his unnaturally high voice and was an amazingly nice guy. My brother and I always hung out with Alexander and sat at karaoke with him, and also listened to his attempts to play metal originals on an acoustic guitar while we shopped.

He developed cancer and had no insurance, but refused to close his store, even when the bills were piling up. The Feds came by and told him they were going to close the store and confiscate everything in two weeks unless he paid his back taxes.

Instead of closing, he decided to sell everything in the store for 2 bucks apiece. Everything. He waited a couple of days before putting a sign up so regulars could hit the pickings first. My brother had taken off work early that day, gone by and then called me at work to tell me what was happening. When I showed up and asked him what was up, he told me he said he meant everything was 2 bucks -- he wanted people to enjoy the records rather than the feds. He even opened the door to the area behind the register and said "Dig in." We did. I'll always remember walking around his store, picking something up that was expensive, and putting it back, out of guilt. He asked why and told me not to worry about it. My brother and I walked out with stacks and stacks of amazing stuff -- Zappa originals, Apple pressings, DJ copies of records and concerts, even an autographed Little Richard album. We went back during the next two weeks, but didn't buy anything -- best to leave something for the other people who went there regularly.

Eventually, the feds did close the place, he went into bankruptcy, and had nothing but his karaoke gigs for money. Some of us held charity gigs to raise money for him, and in one nice bit of luck, he won a lawsuit with the Feds, who hadn't properly, legally informed him of what was happening in enough time. He used the money to open another record store.

The other store actually lasted a couple of years -- he catered more to the metal crowd and carried more new releases, and he eventually died in the back of the new store, his cancer having relapsed. I hadn't been in a couple of months, my brother had been in two days earlier, and had caught him coming out of the back room after a bout of chemo nausea, his wig no longer on. He'd forgotten to lock the front door before he headed to the back.

I'll never forget feeling both the "kid in a candy store" giddiness and deep appreciation for Alexander I felt that day. I got that he was a man committed to the idea and joy of music collecting -- the awesome feeling when you spot something long sought for in the back of a "Just In" rack. I get that feeling every time I go into a used record store. I used to try and communicate to my students how amazing it was to discover something in a used store -- something that's a little bit gone now that you can find anything on the internet now. Every time I go into Guestroom Records in Norman of OKC, I get that feeling again. The guys who opened it are former film students, who use Ebay to buy huge batches of CD's online and then resell them for profit on Ebay again. But they kept the brick walls and cement floors at both locations, and that helps with the nostalgia. Good to see the idea still going.

Sorry. It's 9/11 and I'm worried the world has changed too much.

One Thanksgiving when we were in college (so right after we started TP) Dave Schulps and I were in Village Oldies (aka Bleecker Bobs, but no one called it that then and Lenny Kaye was the clerk we worshiped, so fuck Bob and his dogs) and met Bob Dylan, who was shopping for Lee Hazlewood records. Dave and Lenny gave him some critical advice (I was useless on that subject, still am) and that was that. One of the great moments in my life and all I did was sweat and try not to freak out.

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... and Lenny Kaye was the clerk ...

While in high school, I worked in a record store in eastern Pennsylvania and got to ask Lenny Kaye if he needed any help. His exact words were something like "Ah ... no thank you."

Perhaps that'll be my epitaph?

AH ... NO THANK YOU.

Yeah. Like it. Like it a lot.

I've told the story here about openly criticizing an album cover for being ugly, without knowing that two of the band members were standing right there in the store behind me.

One day in the late '80s, I was browsing in a record store when a female voice asked, "Excuse me, can you help me find something?" I looked around, and a very cute young woman with curly hair was smiling up at me. She looked like a slightly heavier version of Bernadette Peters.

She said she was shopping for a gift for her younger brother. She mentioned a couple of songs he'd recently heard and liked. I helped her find what she was looking for. She selected two CDs and thanked me; I said I was glad to help. We stood there for an awkward moment, until she asked, "Ummm, can you ring me up at the counter?"

I blinked a bit and answered, "No, I can't."

"Why not?"

"Because I don't work here."

Her jaw dropped. "Well, then why did you help me find these?"

"Because you asked me to."

A long pause. Then she erupted with laughter. She laughed so hard, she was wiping tears from the corners of her eyes by the time she was done.

I can't remember why she mistakenly thought I worked at the store; in fact, I don't even remember if she gave any reason for this. But I did seize the opportunity to ask her out.

Actually there have been more than a few times where I've been at a record store and ended up being mistaken for an employee there (even when I'm not holding any CDs or dressed in any way that even implies "works at record store"). Don't know if it's because I have that intent a look on my face when looking for records or what.

Delvin, did the record store chick accept? Did you go out with her? Details!

This has happened to me many times as well.

That has happened to me more than once. Some people just can't accept that people would, a.) help out just to be nice and, b.) be knowledgeable enough about music to provide decent info without *having* to know it.

Rebel's story reminded me of this one. It didn't occur in a record store, but ...

When I was going to college in Alabama, I was walking through the quad one day, and a guy with a saxophone was talking to a couple of girls sitting on the steps of one of the dorm buildings. Eventually, he started to play his sax (presumably to impress the girls).

I recognized the riff he was playing, instantly. He was playing The Clash! I was pretty stoked to meet another Clash fan down there in Mobile. As I walked in their direction, I started to sing, "It is the city of the de-e-a-ad ... It is the city of the de-e-a-ad ..."

He stopped and looked at me. I still remember the look of outrage and contempt in his eyes. Looking back, he may have just thought I was trying to horn in on his effort at making time with the girls. But at that moment, I took his expression as, "How dare you know about The Clash?!"

when i worked at Sam Goodys (in the cassette department, oh the shame of it all) i used to wait on Lauren Bacall from time to time.

There's no way you can post that without telling us what Can tapes she was purchasing at the time. I assume Flow Motion and Landed.

I grew up in Miami and frequently visited Yesterday and Today Records, a popular record store in Coral Gables. In the late '80s-early '90s, there was a local band called Nuclear Valdez that was kind of a big deal around town...they had a deal w/ Epic and received some play on 120 Minutes. One of the band members worked at Y&T Records. I was in there one day with a friend of mine, and I pointed out that they guy working the register played in Nuclear Valdez. My friend responded that he thought they sucked and couldn't believe the guy was working in a record store when they had a record deal and videos on 120 Minutes.

I went up to pay for my items and struck up a small converstation with the guy. My friend came over a minute later and proceeded to start messing with him...asking if the store had the latest album by (insert made up band name). The guy of course didn't know any of these bands and was sincerely apologetic that he hadn't ever heard of them, but would check on it. My friend kept it going..."What, you've never heard of ___? What kind of music store are you guys running here." One of the made-up names wasn't even a word but just a grunt of some sort. When the guy said, "Can you say the name of the band again?" I nearly bit through my tongue trying not to laugh. I felt bad that my friend was being such a jerk since the Nuclear Valdez guy was pretty cool. I was also a regular at the store and was friendly with the owner and some of the others who worked there. Anyway, this carried on for a few minutes until I said goodbye and walked out. My friend thought it was all pretty funny. Looking back on it, I guess it was funny, but was definitely uncool.

Darin Gray from the Dazzling Killmen used to work at one of the local record stores, and I was in there one morning and asked him a question about Faust (he was listening to Faust IV at that moment), and he said "I don't know, but I've got a friend who would." and promptly got on the phone and dialed a number and then began speaking to "Jim" who he'd obviously just woken up to ask this question and who seemed to be a bit confused in his half awake state.

And it was right around then that I realized to my mild consternation that Darin had called and woken up Jim O'Rourke to answer a question I could've easily looked up on the internet when I got home in ten minutes.

I sometimes wonder if this was what was going through O'Rourke's mind when he allowed Wilco to do the 15 minutes of white noise on A Ghost is Born. He probably told Tweedy "Sure, it'll annoy people, but you know what's really annoying? Getting roused out of bed to answer a question about Faust for some jackass in Granite City."

To make matters worse, he didn't know the answer.

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"... you know what's really annoying?"

That he didn't know the answer.

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Those who do not know the answers are not allowed to complain. That goes for all of us.

Um. What was the question?

> Delvin, did the record store chick accept? Did you go out with her? Details!

Yes, and yes.

There was at least one other occasion when I got mistaken for a record store employee. Except it was a grizzled, older guy with a beard, and when he realized I didn't work there, he simply apologized and went up to the checkout counter. After he paid for his purchases, the old coot came back up to me and asked, "So, umm, uhhh ... you wanna go smoke some weed?"

No, and no.

One other experience comes to mind. I was visiting one of my usual vinyl haunts (which is long gone), and the sister of one of the regular store staff was in there. Since I was a regular in the store, that particular staff person introduced me to her sister ... and the girl started talking to me like we were old friends. Except I doubt she had many friends who qualified as "old" ones, because all she did was complain.

Toward the latter half of her rant, her sole subject to gripe about was men. And each new item in her catalog of complaints began with "But what really gets me about guys is ..."

The crowning complaint was: "But you know what really, really gets me about guys? I mean, seriously, the worst thing? It's that I've been on The Pill for two years non-stop now, and in all that time, I haven't met even one single guy who's worth taking it for!!"

The only cool thing that ever happened to me in a record store was in a tiny independent in Woodstock, NY, in the early 1990s. David Johanssen came in and asked the clerk, "Do you have B.A.D. II?" He was wearing horn rims and had Merchant-Ivory/Edwardian hair (with the long bangs). Really skinny with a pot belly.

the record store owner of music box, wpalm bch, fla was owned by a john brooks. i had just returned to the states from korea and things with my ex-wife were a mess. the court hearings, divorce lawyers, kids and expenses, i was ready to just toss it all and run.
but instead, john talked be out of it. plus the place had great records. still, meeting billy miller (norton records) was extremely cool.



Post Edited (09-17-11 12:13)