Why Detroit hosted the first-ever vinyl industry conference this week: In a world where you can get virtually any song at your fingertips within seconds, vinyl records have somehow managed to survive, and even thrive. In the past 10 years or so, the format made a big comeback. To celebrate, the industry converged in Motown earlier this week. Colonial Purchasing Co-Op put on its first ever vinyl conference, Making Vinyl, on Monday and Tuesday at the Westin Book Cadillac hotel in Detroit. Organizers said the goal was to bring together key players in the industry to discuss the resurgence of vinyl and “the circumstances leading up to this astounding comeback that took everyone by surprise.”
Gordie’s Music preparing to play its final tune in Victoria, Vintage guitar and vinyl shop closing the doors after 20 years in business: Gordie’s Music, the city’s source for vintage guitars and vinyl records, will close later this month after almost two decades in business. Originally from Saskatoon, Gordie Budd landed on the island in the late ’90s and opened his guitar shop in 1998, offering lessons, repairs and rentals. He says he always dreamed of owning a record store, starting from scratch with a small crate of vinyl in the corner. As the popularity of analog saw a resurgence with a younger audience, Budd says the collection grew until one day he looked out to rows and rows of records and thought, “I own a record store.” “True audiophiles never left vinyl,” he says, and true customers never left Budd. When the News stopped in to visit, an old regular walked through the door and called out, “I’ve got two questions! Is it true? And, who do we shoot first?”
Dudley’s Records: Spinning vintage vinyl in Torrance: Bill Dudley has been spinning vinyl since he was 15. He’s been working either as a D.J. or in his own record stores for years. Now, he brings that passion for music to the South Bay with Dudley’s Records. The store opened on Friday the 13th in October in Torrance, but is already drawing crowds…Dudley’s previous store locations were in the Portland area, where he moved after needing a break from his radio work. “It was 1980, and I took $8,000, and opened a store when I got tired of the radio business. No one sold 12-inch singles or ’45s at that time, so that’s what I started with. At first I was mostly selling to club D.J.s and then kids started coming in, high school and college-age patrons, so I started carrying heavy metal, new wave and dance music in two different stores. At one point, I had three stores in the Portland area,” said Dudley.
Vinyl Lives: Bric-a-Brac Records & Collectibles Keeps Chicago Colorful and Groovy: On the corner of W Diversey Ave and N Kedzie Ave in Chicago’s Logan Square neighborhood sits a colorful little record shop by the name of Bric-a-Brac. The store’s logo is a bright yellow triangle wearing sunglasses and a big smile, a welcoming character resembling a tortilla chip that appropriately reflects the eclectic and playful decor of the shop. Calling themselves “your one-stop shop for all the necessities that no one really needs”, Bric-a-Brac specializes in new and used vinyl and cassettes, vintage movie posters, toys from the 80’s and 90’s, and all kinds of pop culture knick knacks. On a more serious note, the store also carries a large selection of music from local acts and maintains a bustling schedule of in-store performances.
Indonesian DJ curates Australian indie-pop vinyl compilation: Indonesian DJ-slash-vinyl collector Bayu Aditya has curated an Australian indie-pop vinyl compilation titled I Won’t Have to Think about You. The vinyl was produced in collaboration with Moopie, the founder of A Colourful Storm, a recording label based in Berlin and in Melbourne, Australia. Slated for release on Nov. 17, I Won’t Have to Think about You comprises 12 rare Australian indie-pop, twee-pop, jangle-pop and dreampop tracks from 1982 to 2017. Moopie told The Jakarta Post via email that Bayu was the one who came up with the idea to create the compilation, adding that it took them around one year and a half to complete the album.
The Archive of Contemporary Music Holiday Record & CD Sale, December 2–17, 2017: There’s no such thing as TRUTH in this political climate, but we think it may snow in Dec and this will be our largest sale ever! Twice a year we hold a record sale here at the ARC, usually early in June and December. Each year approximately 200,000 recordings are donated to the ARC. We sort through these, make sure we have the two best copies in our collection, then sell off all third copies. Our sales improve the permanent collection, free up space on the shelves and put a great many lovely and hard to get items back into the hands of music lovers. Please consider donating LPs + CDs — to help us build the collection and give us extra copies for our sale!
The Big Debate – How To Order Your Records: Grappling with the ideological equivalents of fracking or placing a nuclear bomb in the San Andreas fault isn’t easy, but someone’s got to do it, and this week I’ve been considering one of the greatest questions of all – how should one order one’s records? Carl Cox has his in chronological order. High Fidelity’s Rob Fleming opts for a biographical approach. Most record stores simply use the alphabet as their organisational yardstick (solo artists by surname, of course; ‘the’ is generally overlooked for ‘The’ bands). But which way is the best way? I like the genre approach. It’s how my own collection is roughly organised and it seems to be the most convenient when you’re having a mix, and as long as you’re not excessively pedantic about whether Willie Bobo should reside alongside the Latin Jazz as opposed to the Boogaloo then it doesn’t raise too many catalogical issues.
Here’s The Perfect Record Carry Bag For Taking Your Vinyl On The Road! Looking for a record carrying bag? Maybe practical & chic at the same time? Well then, here’s the perfect bag for you! DJs and producers really know how hard is to carry vinyl, especially when they have to travel around the world very often. So that’s why record collector and designer Daniel Spijker has launched KURO – The Record Collector Bag. “The idea was born out of sheer frustration of not being able to safely carry around records in the same bag I use for work, travel and everyday commuting. I tried and tested so many bags out there but they always felt like a compromise,” says Spijker…It features different leathers, cotton twill interior, flexible, removable dividers, a large front pocket, adjustable shoulder strap and more. Not only is it stylish, but the structured style of the bag makes it ideal for carrying up to 30 LPs, plus 7″ singles a laptop, tablet, etc.
