SelectaDisk Berwick Street

http://www.nme.com/news/oasis/38563

Fuck

That I did not know re: WTS(MG). Been down that street enough times.

Why did they start selling DVDs? Bad karma.

Why did they stop selling CDs I wanted to buy morelike

You and you alone, it would seem

The stock control over the last few months, as I said on the other thread, has been crap, if not nonexistent.

Boring corporate pseudo-indie junk seems to be the only thing they're interested in getting in now. That and the same old tedious discounted crap. Totally useless. They got complacent and/or scared and deserve to shut.

And another thing, and I know it's an obvious and pointless thing to say to record shop staff but for fuck's sake cheer up.

I have bought some interesting stuff there in the past, notably a "dark ambient" field-recording from a dude called Necrosphere in some old Siberian missile-chambers.

The staff were a BIT dour but they did recommend me Murcof.

I hadn't been in in a while but was there recently, they still had lots of good stuff

I loved Selectadisc - great stock, and I got armfuls of 90s techno compilations there for 30p each on one occasion circa 2000 because they weren't cool any more - but on my one visit to its Sister Ray incarnation they pissed me off (had never really taken to the old SR) by trying to charge me 4.99 for a 7" listed on their "new arrivals" whiteboard at 1.99. When I complained they made lots of grumbling noises and admittedly they did let me have it for 1.99 but then went and wiped the price off the whiteboard.

Err, still, I'm never in London so it's not my place to have an opinion. Are there any record shops left on Berwick St? Last time I went I think this was the only one, as Reckless had just closed down.

Reckless re-opened, sort of, under a new name, but that shop wasn't opened last time I was there, so I fear it might have gone belly-up too

Revival Records is the new Reckless. Open when I passed thru a coupla weeks ago but I only went in the MV exchange.

"in the past," "circa 2000"

Revival Records is definitely going but pretty useless.

Wonder how long the Soul Jazz shop will last. If/when that goes MVE will be the only reason for going there at all, and even that's not much of a reason.

It is currently the only fully independent record shop in London's West End.

even taking into account the above exchanges, is this even vaguely true? in the whole west end?

Not sure what they mean by fully independent

this is sad. they used to sell my fanzine in selectadisc... Loved that store.

fully independent = full product range?

rock to metal to electronic to post rock to drum n bass to industrial to house etc

Never mind, there's still Fopp in Covent Garden...

I never have much reason to buy stuff in Sister Ray, apart from the occasional novelty 'Wow - I'm shopping in a real store' purchase. Shame to see it go though, regardless.

And I could be wrong here, but I imagine the M&V Exhchange is less likely to disappear anytime soon. It's different business to what Sister Ray are doing, isn't it?

Where on this thread does it say otherwise?

Ah. Er... *cough*. Sorry. I misread above.

Is Beano's still clawing it's way back from the grave?

Yes, still in Croydon but it's been ages since I saw anything worth getting there* - CD stock tends to be overissued promos and overpriced bleeding obvious stuff and the vinyl's generally listless

*then again due to relocation and consequent phobia of that corridor of South London I haven't actually been in Beano's for ages either so it could all have changed by now.

On a brighter note, right across the street from Sister Ray/Selectadisc a promising Comic and Book Exchange has just opened, it's pleasingly shonky inside, looks like a good place for a rummage.