Indie Stores on The Edge . .

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Indie Stores on The Edge . .

Postby withahip » Sun Oct 28, 2007 8:51 pm

http://www.buffalonews.com/185/story/194147.html

It is in many ways the perfect storm. Recent events locally show how it’s playing out. Home of the Hits, a longtime favorite, closed its doors for good last year. New World Record, a fixture on Elmwood Avenue for 17 years, opted for a larger, lower-rent store at the edge of the city in a strip mall at Delaware and Hertel.

A top-heavy industry edifice is wobbling in the wind, and clearly headed toward the unforgiving pavement 100 stories below.

Consumers grown weary from years of exploitation at the hands of the music industry are finding a crack in the foundation and beginning to take advantage of it, quite successfully. Artisans responsible for creating and providing the goods that industry has always depended on begin to explore avenues that no longer include that industry.

These elements have combined to create a maelstrom. The record business is going under. What does the dissolution of the industry mean for the long-suffering bastion of popular-music integrity, the independent record store?

“It feels like we’re the last men standing,” says Scott Rankie, assistant manager at Record Theatre’s University Plaza location. “By now, we can see the tangible effects of the whole filesharing thing, and obviously, business has suffered as a result. I still believe that there are people who want to use the whole ‘free music on the Internet’ thing as a research tool, and that people still want the whole album experience, with packaging, and liner notes and the whole deal.

“But it’s probably a minority that is really still interested.”
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Postby Dr Cheese » Mon Oct 29, 2007 3:12 am

I am guilty of downloading the odd track or two (ahem) but it's a fact that when I go and actually purchase a cd, with money and everything, I always treat it with a lot more respect than something I've downloaded. I find I take time to get to know it and as a result usually end up liking it rather than listening to it once or twice in the car, deciding it's really not that good and tossing it into a cupboard with a contemptuous sneer for the folly that is modern music. Editors take heed!
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Postby Dr Cheese » Mon Oct 29, 2007 3:13 am

I'm not quite sure what the point of that last post was but I've said it now so tough. 8)
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Postby JackT » Mon Oct 29, 2007 7:29 am

Dr Cheese wrote:I am guilty of downloading the odd track or two (ahem) but it's a fact that when I go and actually purchase a cd, with money and everything, I always treat it with a lot more respect than something I've downloaded. I find I take time to get to know it and as a result usually end up liking it rather than listening to it once or twice in the car, deciding it's really not that good and tossing it into a cupboard with a contemptuous sneer for the folly that is modern music. Editors take heed!


My copy of Loveless was purchased as a download. For Xmas I'm getting me a "real" one.

There's a lot of debate about the future of the music industry. There are similar debates about video (HD-DVD, BRD, DRM etc.) Some people say it will all be downloads. I think that will, in fact, be a large part of it, but I think it will be more for streaming & casual listening. I will always want official hardcopies of certain music.

Unfortunately, the little record shop is doomed. (Sorry.) It will have an honored place in Heaven next to the Carbon Paper Store and the Buggy Whip Emporium. Bye Bye record store! Bye bye bored & slightly obnoxious record store guy! We will miss you.
"He was a mongoose, rather like a little cat in his fur and his tail, but quite like a weasel in his head and his habits."
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Postby Red » Mon Oct 29, 2007 9:48 am

i just noticed your icon, jack!!! :lol: :lol: :lol:
pfft!
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Postby snowbunny » Mon Oct 29, 2007 8:32 pm

LOL, thanks for pointing that out, Red!

Independent bookstores are going the same way, of course... even more than record shops, I appreciated the staff recommendations on books...
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