Defeated by the megastore...again

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Usually I try to shop at the smaller independent music stores when I'm looking for music, especially fairly obscure stuff, but since I'm downtown and just a few blocks away from two of the biggest music megastores in the city, I occasionally wander down to see if I can find something. I think today was the last time though.

I've found over the past few years a disturbing trend at these stores to split genres into smaller and smaller subcategories: what used to be "pop/rock" is now pop, alternative, punk, metal, industrial, electronica, etc., which inevitably makes it harder to find anything that can span genres. Unfortunately, to fill up some of these sections at the HMV downtown, they seem to be pulling in a whole pile of stuff that not only isn't fully in the category, but isn't in the category at all. I spent a while once trying to find Kraftwerk in electronic and pop, only to have to head to the other side of the store to find it in industrial. Today I searched almost every section of the store looking for Ryuichi Sakamoto or Yellow Magic Orchestra, only to to be told he was filed in "new age".

Now that they've split pop away from the other stuff and put it on a different floor, I've decided that I'm just not going back there, because it takes too much time pingponging between floors trying to find something, and I always walk away frustrated, and inevitably without any CDs in my hand after all the searching. People wonder why CD sales are down at retail, and maybe that's one of the reasons: people can't find the fucking CDs when they go into the store. Some days I yearn for a layout where everything is in alphabetical order regardless of genre. Bah.

Anyhow, that long preamble is really me begging for your opinions: do you prefer a store layout where everything is micro-categorized? Would you prefer it all in a big clump? Or are you seriously considering just saying to hell with retail and ordering it all online, instead?

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 16:39 (twenty-one years ago)

This has probably been talked about before though?

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 16:45 (twenty-one years ago)

At least with anything remotely rap/hiphop/dance you know its in the BASSment.
That HMV is pretty ass.

― Mr Noodles (Mr Noodles), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 16:52 (twenty-one years ago)

being genrephobe and proud, naturally I sympathise, Sean

a lot of independent shops (in UK anyway) are worse than the megastores though

there's no excuse, really.

― zebedee (zebedee), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 17:00 (twenty-one years ago)

Obviously you haven't been there in quite some time, my friend, because the BASSment is gone gone gone. Now it's all on the second floor and spread hither and yon. I fucking HATE their new layout, making an ass store even asser.

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 17:01 (twenty-one years ago)

One love, one genre, let's get together and feel alright (in that we know we'll find El-P between The Elephants and ELO).

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 17:04 (twenty-one years ago)

all in a big clump actually but if you can't find a record where you thought it would be then why not ask?

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 17:16 (twenty-one years ago)

Because the clerks at these stores are usually even dumber than the filing system, Julio. I asked where to find Sakamoto and Y.M.O. at the information counter and was greeted with a blank stare, followed by, "uhhhh, what's the name of the artist?", then: "oh, I can't find where the artists are unless you tell me the name of the album".

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 17:31 (twenty-one years ago)

and I always walk away frustrated, and inevitably without any CDs in my hand after all the searching. People wonder why CD sales are down at retail, and maybe that's one of the reasons: people can't find the fucking CDs when they go into the store.

Amoeba in Los Angeles/Hollywood is the epitome of the dogshit giant boxstore, although it is billed as something quite superior. It
suffers from micro-niche-itis but that isn't actually its worst feature. Combined with the endless arrays of CDs drawered in a manner in which it is not at all easy to scan for band names (or serendipitous buys) if a premade slot doesn't exist for the act, it's insufferable. It is plagued by crowds, narrow aisles and queing. And you get to pay for parking, too, unless you want to circle
the block until a street space opens up.

It's fairly described as an annoying and stupefying pile of vaguely OK-sorted crap requiring a good deal of patience to attack. When I was younger I might have thought it was neat.

The dull-witted occasionally rave about it in the local pubs --
particularly in stories aimed at showing the wonderfulness of
opportunity for music buying in LA County -- but it's really a
cruel trick to recommend it an average consumer who'd be
better off going to his or her local BestBuy.

― George Smith, Wednesday, 15 October 2003 19:01 (twenty-one years ago)

you'd be better off buying from the labels themselves than going to amoeba los angeles. it is often too difficult to find anything worth buying there and when you do, it's way overpriced. the best part is when they have a band play there on the stage but don't carry any of their music.

― deangulberry, Wednesday, 15 October 2003 19:13 (twenty-one years ago)

Hmm. I think the SF and Berkeley Amoebas file under under a few sensible main categories. I'm quite surprised the LA one doesn't share the same filing system. In any case if I ever have questions the staff are all helpful and knowledgeable.

x-post: and overpriced?? They're always a couple dollars less than the megabox store downtown. Why would the LA store have a different pricing stucture? Although I guess it may...

― Sean (Sean), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 19:16 (twenty-one years ago)

That L.A. Amoeba does have a big problem in re: finding stuff, but Best Buy ain't got a used section whereas L.A. Amoeba has the bomb used section

― J0hn Darn1elle (J0hn Darn1elle), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 19:26 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah, that's a big part of my complaint, sitting in the back of my brain but not articulated in the original post: if I'm gonna spend that much time trying to actually find the damn CD, I'll do it at the used store where it'll be half the price, and where I might actually find other interesting things while I'm looking.

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 19:42 (twenty-one years ago)

I like it when they use more ambiguous genre names like "dark wave"

I prefer as many subgenres as possible, even ones that are totally incorrect, because chances are I'll want to search through everything anyway. the way I shop is I got through until I find something I want. I don't go through to try and find something specific.

― A Nairn (moretap), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 19:53 (twenty-one years ago)

I haven't regularly shopped in a retail store in probably four or five years. Everything I get is via Amazon, Half or eBay, Forced Exposure, True Blue. I sporadically shop from a couple other online places, and a couple times a year make the rounds of the local independent retail stores (most frequently, probably DustyGroove every couple months).

I just don't enjoy the experience of going into stores anymore. It takes too much time, and now in the post-vinyl era there really isn't any thrill left anymore.

― Mr. Diamond (diamond), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 19:54 (twenty-one years ago)

I was pretty disappointed by the LA Amoeba store on my recent trip out there on Labor Day weekend. I have fond memories of the Berkeley Amoeba, and I was hoping for a similar experience. Despite being huge in terms of square feet, the selection wasn't really that impressive - it was okay, but not as great as the huge size of the store would lead you to expect - and anything halfway decent was usually priced to match. I guess you might luck out and find something in the dollar bins, but you'd have to wade through an exhausting amount of worthless dreck. The trip gave me a newfound respect for the tiny NYC record stores that somehow manage to cram a great selection into a very limited floorspace.

― o. nate (onate), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 20:40 (twenty-one years ago)

we know we'll find El-P between The Elephants and ELO

And how many alphabetical filing conumdrums does that open up?

Shall we argue about all that again?

― Jim Robinson (Original Miscreant), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 20:48 (twenty-one years ago)

Dudes, the L.A. Amoeba is great. You are all bewildering me.

The CDs are organized just like any other record store I've ever been in that has several really broad categories. I've never had to pay for parking in their lot or garage. Their used section is terrific. Amoeba's always overflowing with stuff I want to buy - often available used.

I mean, c'mon - comparing it to Best Buy?!

― Sam J. (samjeff), Wednesday, 15 October 2003 21:33 (twenty-one years ago)

I think the micro-categorization is just annoying to the customer, and at the big HMV, they staff music morons who haven't heard of anything (or so it sometimes seems), so to me, if a store is going to have a number of music sections, at least have a staff that is semi-trained in finding stuff.
Also, though I love shopping at Soundscapes in Toronto, I do find that it can get difficult to find stuff in there since they have all of the special categories laid out, and then went a step further and put some CDs in sections by label.

― Jonathan (Jonathan), Thursday, 16 October 2003 01:32 (twenty-one years ago)

smallfish in london has the worst categorisation. there are totally arbitrary genre distinctions ('us electronica'? how about a 'german electronica'?), and then the entire section is just sorted alphbetically by artist name. seeing as smallfish is the sort of shop that only covers a relatively narrow spectrum of music, it would be better to split it into micro genres, basically by label. the sort of people that shop there are people that know the labels and what the correspond to, but if you cant remember the name of the producer then you have to search through 100's of recoreds.

the best categorisation is in shops like blackmarket/uptown:
grime, old skool/4x4, then breakbeaty stuff. everything on the wall. with only 30 records in the entire shop. then you dont have to bend over all the time.

― ambrose (ambrose), Thursday, 16 October 2003 07:25 (twenty-one years ago)

I generally find that indie stores are MUCH WORSE at micro-genre-ation. OK, they tend to come up with much more interesting sub-genres (La Decadance!) and chances are, the records will be more interesting, but still. I *hate* going to Rough Trade and having to go and ask some question like "where do you keep the Mum records?" not knowing if they're filed in a genre (electronic? ambient?) or in a country section (Icelandic) or in their label - especially if I have to admit that I'm so uncool I don't *know* their label.

This can make record shopping an unneccesarily intimidating experience. However, if the record store has nice and/or helpful staff, they will tell you things you didn't know: "I don't think their new album is out yet, but did you know they were on such and such a remix album? You might like that..." which is a bonus.

― kate (kate), Thursday, 16 October 2003 08:08 (twenty-one years ago)

I was at a store yesterday that divided everything up into the genre names used by The Wire (a "critical beats" section, "avant rock", "modern composition", etc.)

― Mike Ouderkirk (Mike Ouderkirk), Thursday, 16 October 2003 08:13 (twenty-one years ago)

I haven't really shopped in a big chain store in ages, and I recall feeling Sean's frustration the last time I did. When I was in Toronto, I completely gave up on HMV, even though it was my promised land when I was a young'un. It also helped a lot that I lived a couple minutes away from Soundscapes, and I knew the staff, so I could just chat about new stuff and they would point me to it, although their system was pretty good anyway.

Here in London, I did venture into the big HMV once, and bought a bunch of stuff that was on sale super-cheap (Pale Fountains album for a quid!), but other than that I've avoided the chains. I admit, though, I haven't really gone out to explore what I assume are London's many and varied indie stores...

― Rob Bolton (Rob Bolton), Thursday, 16 October 2003 09:45 (twenty-one years ago)

I've noticed increasingly in these places that a greater effort is being made to try to get people to buy DVDs than CDs - they are less and less about selling MUSIC. I don't know whether this is a good thing or not but I'm thinking it's a good thing.

― Dadaismus (Dada), Thursday, 16 October 2003 09:59 (twenty-one years ago)

fair enuff sean.

I do most of my shoppping at independent stores, which also have a second hand rack. and the staff know what's there.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Thursday, 16 October 2003 10:05 (twenty-one years ago)

er, become a music journalist and just have the CDs you want sent to you free of charge? ;-)

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 16 October 2003 10:11 (twenty-one years ago)

That HMV used to be okay, pop/rock/"metal/punk" on the 2nd floor, classical/jazz/world on the third, movies/charts/singles on the first and the aforementioned BASSment. Then they bought the location next to them and all hell broke loose!
All of a sudden its indie, punk, metal, world, pop, rock, industrial all trading spaces, jazz, modern jazz, classical and blues shift around and I didn't even know that the BASSment was dismantled and DVD section and its VHS section kept changing floors.
Still for some reason since the bankrupcy I still find it more useable the disjointed Sam's next door.

― Mr Noodles (Mr Noodles), Thursday, 16 October 2003 14:44 (twenty-one years ago)

I prefer going to the counter and saying "I like X, could you recommend me stuff?" and they scurry off and present you with a couple of cds, which you listen to and then say things like "this is good but it needs more A" or "too much B for my liking" and they scurry off and find some more. (Admittedly this works best with electronic music, but meh.)

― damian_nz (damian_nz), Thursday, 16 October 2003 23:11 (twenty-one years ago)

i went to hmv yesterday to look at the sale bins but i had to leave, b/c they were playing "ebeneezer goode" andf i couldn't stand it.

i don't much like micro-genre-isation, b/c a lot of stuff i like either gets squeezed into some category that it won't fit into really well (=hard to find b/c of this) or squeezed out entirely. That said, I went to this store in newcastle i hadn't looked in for a while, and the guy behind the counter there went and pulled out a basil kirschin cd, coz he reckoned i would like it and i remembered years ago owning his "worlds within worlds" album and digging it. I was really impressed w/that (I didn't buy it tho, b/c i'd blown all my money at hmv sale heh.)

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Friday, 17 October 2003 07:57 (twenty-one years ago)

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