Aron's, Platterpuss, Rhino, Penny Lane, Second Chance Vinyl, Bleeker Bob's, House of Records, Moby Disc, Tower, Poo-Bah, Rockaway, and Record Surplus.
These were the places to pick up used records back in the day. You used to be able to drive around town on a Saturday afternoon and scoop up all kinds of records for $1.98 each.
Of that list, only the last three remain. Of course, the best store of all time, Amoeba, was added to the mix about 10 years ago.
What's happened since then is kind of odd. 99 percent of the population would never play a record, or even a CD. But the 1 percent that likes records has decided they are valuable, and thus a good quality copy of a vintage record is no longer $1.98, but $20 or even more.
But it's still fun to go around and scoop up records. They still sound warmer than any mp3 or flac you're going to buy, you get the sleeve and the artwork, and of course the pride of ownership. You just have to be more selective since it's going to cost you.
I was driving down Santa Monica Blvd in Santa Monica and noticed that Record Surplus, long a fixture on Pico, had moved! I recognized this graphic of an exalted guy playing records from the old shop:
For years, they had the "last record store" tagline, and it actually came close (before Amoeba) to them actually being the last one. They were never the best spot (they had a lot of worn down records and lacked the quality selection of Rhino or Poo-Bah) but they had turntables and it was easy to park. Plus it was kind of massive in there.
Well the new Record Surplus is much, much smaller. It's cool it's still there, but kind of depressing that it's so diminished.
I did, though, pick out three pretty good LPs, and they were less than I would have paid at Amoeba. A Prince record (too risque a cover to put on here), a Duke Ellington album, and a Buddy Holly record.
All three sounded great - especially the Prince record which had amazing fidelity and appeared to be hardly played.
