Retail Nostalgia

Sometimes, I can't help but reflect on those good old days of retail, where no one ever talked about adult stuff like "collective bargaining" and "health care." (More on those topics later.) I had two wonderful retail jobs in my life: Evergreen Park Grocery and Michigan Wherehouse Records. Evergreen Park Grocery is on the north side of Higgins Lake, and I spent the mid-to-late '80s (and even some early '90s) there as everything at one time or another: bottle bitch, gas monkey, deli douche, bakery gent, and ultimately behind the main counter, selling booze and condoms to the rich and poor alike.

But the bulk of the '90s were spent at Michigan Wherehouse Records, first in Mt. Pleasant and then in Ann Arbor for a few short months. Those were amazing times in record retail, especially in the early '90s, where a midnight sale by INXS (!) could draw crowds out the door. But as other pursuits took time and bucks away from music, the sales evaporated. And I can't find a better long-term snapshot of the boom and bust of music retail than here. There are even some sweet-ass charts, in case you hate to read.

Do I still pine for those days? Well, it was six years ago this week that Record World in Petoskey closed the doors forever, ending my long reign at music retail, so I would say that it still holds a piece of my heart. But you can't argue with the numbers, and it would be foolish to think that music retail, outside of niche markets, could ever be the cultural force it once was. But man, it rarely felt like a job, and that's something to cherish.

Comments

NBC -- Never Believe Contracts

Whatever side you're falling on in the recent NBC late-night "deck chairs on the Titanic " shuffle, you have to admit it's been good comedy for all parties involved. While Letterman and Craig Ferguson have been sharp (especially Letterman, who has been gleeful in his "I told you so" vitriol), the best bits have come from Leno and O'Brien. Evidence: It's hard to follow all the angles here, but two things are clear: NBC violated Leno's contract (guaranteeing the 10pm slot), and NBC didn't violate O'Brien's contract (which made no time slot guarantees). So it's not hard to see who the loser here will be. O'Brien won't get the show he wants, Leno will step into a hollow echo of his past success, and tens of millions of dollars will be up in the air. Only Jimmy Fallon will continue to gestate his talent relatively unmolested, and his security is merely a function of the low expectations of his time slot. Meanwhile, CBS (a

"The Silver Gun" by Robert Palmer (1983)

I mean...Urdu? Seriously, Urdu . On an already eclectic and worldly album -- Pride , from 1983 -- "The Silver Gun" closes a chapter in Robert Palmer's career by singing a song about a horse in a language spoken daily by over 100 million people. The liquid bass line and propulsive electronics set out a bedrock for Palmer to ping phrasings rather out of place in Western music, askew astride even the peripatetic minimalism of the rest of the record. Somehow, in the middle of Michigan's Appalachia, I had this on vinyl a few years before the CD era officially commenced. It was an album of effort -- even the cover, a pointillism-and-bronze work, had Palmer's head barely above the water -- but the stitches didn't show to my pre-adolescent eyes and ears. In a career marked by zigs and zags, Pride and "The Silver Gun" were most certainly Other, and for a kid that felt like he didn't belong much of anywhere, it was nice to have those discrete feeling

"I'll Drive You Home"

Upon reflection, I’ve had a fortunate life in the area of work. As a freshly minted teenager, I would visit Evergreen Park Grocery and dream of someday working there like my father did, and at the age of 14, I got $2/hour to live out that dream, such as it was. From there, I yearned to try other occupations, from record stores to teaching, and I’d be chuffed to tell Young Erick that both of those things happened in due course. ( Oh, and Young Erick, one of them got you to meet David Bowie, and one of them got you to own houses and cars, so I’ll let you ponder on which one was better. ) I even got to DJ a bit here and there, and while it never hit the heights of a professional radio gig, it was certainly better than the summer I played preset cassettes on my boom box for a nerd camp dance while my unrequited crush stayed in her room. What I never crossed off my professional life list was acting, either regular or voice, but while I still yearn for that big breakthrough -- seriously, ask

THIS is a CLOSE-UP?

Search This Blog