Dyelirium

Not too long ago, I was watching one of my favorite flicks Empire Records – AGAIN. I love that mid-nineties slice of fluff centering around one day in the lives of some not-so-mundane employees of a record store. I sat thinking of how, once the goofy plot and unbelievable happenings were stripped away, I identified with this movie.

It was actually many of the small details that struck a chord with me, which include, but are not limited to:

• Working at a record store instantly made you cool.
• The advent of cd’s killed musical discovery as we knew it if you were a true music snob.
• A solid mix tape could always solve a suffering friend’s problems.
• Both your best friend and your sworn enemy worked with you.
• Someone was undoubtedly smitten with someone who had no clue.
• Most of us had at least one job where 90% or more of the employees were under the age of 21, which meant that the inmates were most certainly running the asylum.
• It was a fact that at least one person you worked with was more fucked up than you.
• We all had one fellow employee that always made the best ‘special brownies’, knew where to get the best drugs and/or had an older brother or sister that was more than willing buy you booze.

Oh, how I could go on with the parallels that could be drawn from that movie with respect to my life. Sadly, I never obtained the coveted job working at a record store – not even close. I spent my early working years slinging pizzas at a local restaurant, but it wasn’t all that different from working at the mythical Empire Records, well, other than you were definitely NOT all that cool for working at the local pizza joint.

It wasn’t from a lack of trying. I begged and pleaded with the manager of the local record store to give me a job, but the bastard wouldn’t cave. He dug my appreciation of Classic Rock and growing obsession with Metal and was more than impressed with my knowledge of Brit Mod-Rock outfits like The Alarm and post-Punkers Bauhaus, but he just didn’t want a girl working there. Sexist.

It didn’t stop me from going there several times a week though. I repeatedly leafed through the albums to see what was next on my list of must-haves. I craved the newest shipment of “imports” from the UK. I still have the badass Hanoi Rocks and The Alarm imports that manager put aside for me. I spent way too much money there and don’t regret it a bit.

Record store were so much more than just a place to buy music. It was where I met some really cool people I would have never met had it not been for the common interest we all had – music. It was a social event. It was a hang out. It was somewhere to go where people got you.

The first sign of change was the corporatization of music stores. The loss of local joints to big, sterile Blockbuster Music’s and Sam Goody’s was criminal. It ruined the experience. Then, later, technology dealt the death blow. When it all went digital, people stopped leaving their houses to buy music – myself included. The mp3 player became the only medium that mattered. You could pick and choose what you wanted to hear instead of experiencing a whole album. The little pockets of discussions and debates were history. We stopped interacting with each other – in person- with regard to music.

I mean, sure – you can say, “Hello, Diana. There are still record stores out there.” My answer to that is, yes, there are, but they are seen as buildings full of retro memories, teaming with musical archeologists searching for vinyl relics of a bygone era. Going to a vintage record store these days is like listening to Hair Nation or The Boneyard on Sirius/XM…it’s just an attack of nostalgia.

So, tell me peeps – what do you remember about record stores? What did it mean to you? Did it mean anything? Got a cool memory or story? I’d love to hear it. Record Store Day is approaching people. If you don’t know what it is, look it up and celebrate with a nice slice of vinyl.