Philly Record Shops

611 for house and dnb and the "classy" end of dance music.

relapse for metal.

tower for everything else.

is sound pollution still open?

philly phuckin suxx as a record town.

http://www.melaman2.com/oldies/letters/O/orlons.jpg

Tower is ridiculously pricey. Check the Sound of Market first before buying at Tower.

Also, someone who used to work at 3rd Street Jazz opened up a store called aka Records which is either on 2nd or 3rd (2nd I think), right above Market. They are mostly good for rock and indie (very broadly defined), but have a respectable sampling of other things as well. They have a lot of used CDs, as well.

I hardly ever get to South Street these days. There must be other small shops not mentioned here.

What type of things are you looking for?

Funk-o-Mart on Market Street for Latin (I know no one is asking about that, but I'm going to mention it anyway). It's not a huge selection but it's the best(for that) in center city. Otherwise you have to go to Centro Musical (sp?) in the barrio, and I haven't made it there yet myself. (If I ever do, VISA owns me.)

611 Records is TEH WORST dance music record store I've ever been in. Almost nothing 'new' is actually 'new' (in fact some of it is a few years old), and much of the 'old' stuff is crapola. I guess that it is Josh Wink's sort of place though, so the suck of the place shouldn't surprise me. Also, my sunglasses were jacked by someone there today. Additionally, this conversation with the clerk, who was listening to...(get this) LAKE FUCKING WOBEGON:

ME: [holding up Isolee remixes of What You Say, perhaps the newest record in the entire store] Has this been selling well?
GUY: I don't really know. It's new.
ME: Uh...well...[I bite my lip and don't say that it came out over a month ago] I was just wondering because I don't think it's particularly good.
GUY: Do you like minimal?
ME: Yeah. I mean, I like Villalobos and Isolee a lot. But this just doesn't fit my tastes, I guess.
GUY: Yeah, I can understand that. But it can work when you're DJing and just want a bit of a rest.

Guy had obviously never listened to the record. I did for the 20th time or so, and can say that it is more blatantly dancy, but certainly not as effective as a song as the original. Anyway, that store is crap.

First and last time I was in Halcyon, it was also a Sunday afternoon. And a girl was spinning a pretty sweet minimal techno set for at least two hours. This guy at 611 was playing NPR and horrid downtempo stuff. Just a note of comparison.

(Whatever happened to that 'More like Suckadelphia' thread?

I am SERIOUSLY disappointed to see no one mentioned a.k.a. music, WTF Philly?!

To me aka has too much of that stereotypically oppressive indie vibe.

in terms of indie rock stuff, AKA is your best all-around bet. tequila sunrise was supposedly awesome but it shut down within weeks of opening [dont know why]. i do like going to the record exchange.

off the beaten path: west african record stores along baltimore ave, that one place on girard that's a barber shop/record store with lots of soul and funk, val shively's in upper darby, a couple places in the vicinity of germantown and lehigh

the record store on 9th street in bella vista was just bought by a colleague at wprb, so in the coming months it will be all sorts of awesome.

i still miss third street jazz and rock!

Was not overly impressed with AKA music, but maybe it was an off-day.

Spaceboy's used selection was horrible but I was very impressed with their new selection and prices.

Record Exchange had a bigger selection than I expected, but was terribly expensive.

Repo Records had the best prices of the four, but I didn't find anything I wanted.

Huh???
Tequila Sunrise is awesome, and it's open! The best record (vinyl) shop in Philly. They have free in-stores there sometimes. It's very tiny, but they select their records carefully.

http://www.tequilasunriserecords.com/

I'm curious to know what happened

I'm curious as to how many Philly record shops are still around. I couldn't find Spaceboy. Are they gone? I've noticed some of the smaller stores near Upenn are gone. AKA and Sound of Market had better hang on.

Yes. Spaceboy is gone; don't get me started. Repo (ugh) still should be there. AKA is my new favorite place, and 611 Records is good, although when I went there last July looking for the "Waters of Nazareth" single they had no idea who Justice was.

AKA is awesome. A friend noted that everything feels like it's at The Nice Price. Repo and Philadelphia Record Exchange are good for vinyl. I don't really fuck with the specialty stores on 4th between South and Bainbridge, and I heard some shady shit about Noise Pollution. There's a new place in east center city but I haven't checked it out yet.

oh yeah, and I haven't checked out Tequila Sunrise yet.

oh and I guess Sound Of Market is the "new" place I was talking about. Fuck it.

"Fuck it" meaning "I've lived here for two years but I haven't done much exploring."

go to passional at 704 s 5th.

thanks but no thanks

in opposition to my comments above, 611 has an okay selection of stuff, just nothing new worth getting really hot over. but if you want old house or techno and know yr shit, it's pretty all right.

tequila sunrise didn't impress me. and god, repo is fucking disgusting. it used to be such a great store, back when it was still at its flagship in Bryn Mawr. two rooms exploding with music, great taste and better prices, friendly, non-hip, extremely knowledgeable workers, lots of great in-store sets. man, those were the days, back in middle school.

<i> it used to be such a great store, back when it was still at its flagship in Bryn Mawr. two rooms exploding with music, great taste and better prices, friendly, non-hip, extremely knowledgeable workers, lots of great in-store sets. man, those were the days, back in middle school.</i>

This is how I remember it, but then I haven't been in about 8 or so years -- what happened? Is the Bryn Mawr location still open?

I also remember Plastic Fantastic (not too far from Repo) being ok for digging through lots of old stuff, but I'm not sure if that's even still around.

I grew up on the Main Line and used to think Repo records was SO cool -I totally haunted that place with my friends in the early 90's and bought great shit, like Art of Noise tapes for 99cents each because I liked the covers.
Plastic Fantastic was cool too, there was a rumor that the lady with a poodle who worked there used to be a man.
3rd street jazz and rock was the best store though, when it closed I kind of lost all hope for Philly.

the bryn mawr Repo eventually went to one-room, became more of a used record store for a few years, then closed down. college kids around the area not buying music. shocka, right?

There's a newish used CD/vinyl (tapes/books/DVDs/etc.) place on the 2000 block of Sansom. Kind of small but they have an okay selection, at a glance.

What about Beautiful World Syndicate? I've never been there, but have heard very good things.

beautiful world syndicate isn't bad, just kinda far from the record buying publics on south st. [fading fast] or around old city. i think i wrote an RIP to bryn mawr repo upthread.

[also: the woman at plastic fantastic was transgendered.]

BWS is a bit off the beaten track, and to be fair, i think it worth mentioning that it is a bit pricey for the good stuff (ie- soul, funk) and has tons and tons of awful harcore/punk/grnd shit from the late 90s that the dude could never sell at church shows.

AKA is all right. Especially if the noise/psych/crazy thing is your thing.

is that psych like 60s/70s, psych like la-di-da dr. dog horseshit, or psych like comets on fire?

i'm going to philly tomorrow, though this thread has totally depressed me about my prospects of finding anything good. 60s and 70s psych reissues... anywhere?

where would someone be most likely to find a copy of the jim ford anthology cd? or should i just toss that hope out the window?

Has anyone been to a Philly record store lately? I'm just waiting for AKA to fall victim to the R5 Productions ticket sales curse.

I'm heading to Philadelphia next week. Can anyone recommend record / music shops? I'm bought some stuff from Beautiful World Syndicate online that I'm picking up. I'm going for a family wedding but should have a few hours spare.

this is the one i go to (closest to where i live):
http://mainstreetmusicpa.net

Great, thanks. It might be a little far from where I'm staying but if I get the time I'll hear there.

Philly people: go visit my (best) friend's new record store in Fairmount

https://www.broadstreetreview.com/features/media-veteran-gabriel-coans-next-venture-is-a-new-record-shop-in-fairmount