My first impression of the last record store at which I will ever work was, shall we say, not the best. When I moved to Petoskey in August '98 for my NCMC job, I looked around the town and found an actual record store downtown called Record World, which was pretty exciting for a music fan like me. However, while they had a decent stock and what appeared to be a solid staff, the prices were a bit on the higher side, so I ignored RW as a shopping destination and instead made periodic trips down to WHR #9 to work and buy stuff. (I also got the run-around from the RW folks when I tried to put up some point-of-purchase material for a Love And Rockets street team of which I was a part, so that didn't engender warm feelings and good cheer, either.) But when WHR closed their doors in '01, I bit the bullet and offered my services to Record World as a part-timer soon after.
Record World was an outlier in my record store experiences, as it was just one store where the owner was the manager rather than part of a chain, which gave it more of a mom-and-pop vibe. The "pop" was owner Larry Rochon -- a.k.a. "The Silver Fox" -- a former employee of Motown in the the '70s (who supposedly was issued a Cadillac and a pistol for his Detroit territory, which was 8 Mile and below), and Larry was delightful as a person, which made the job a joy. He had a free-wheeling sense of humor as well; once I found out he was a huge fan of the Rolling Stones, I took every opportunity to faux-shit on that band of "old has-beens and never-weres," which became a running joke between us. He had two types of laughs, both of which were bellowing and infectious, but only one of which was genuine, an affectation that I both understood well and appreciated greatly.
I can't remember when I first started there -- early 2002, perhaps a bit earlier? -- but I can certainly remember when I finished there: mid-February 2005, when Larry closed the store that had been his baby for over two and a half decades. I'd never been a direct part of a record store closing before, as I was no longer part of the day-to-day in WHR when they suddenly shuttered their doors, so it was painful to watch the slow erosion of Record World over a period of about eighteen months, and I was amazed that Larry let it continue as long as he did. Well, not so amazed when one considers his investment in the people and the community.
I was invested in that place as well; I started off getting a small hourly wage for my part-time work, then I pulled back to $20 a week, and then I believe I didn't get paid at all towards the end. (Shit, I'd still be working there for free were it still open.) When Larry announced the closing, we had the predictable wave of vultures looking for deals and well-wishers who hadn't been in the store on the regular for quite some time. I couldn't blame them, however, as even Larry had largely pulled back from the store operations, leaving the buying to me and the banking to the one lone full-time employee left. With Amazon and downloading, legal or otherwise, the role that Record World had filled just didn't exist anymore.
It's been over a decade since I worked at any kind of record store, but I wish I could say that I don't miss it to this day, that I have moved on from that desire and wish. There's a small part of me that thinks a small record store could work in Petoskey today, with records and used and new CD's and books and posters and so on, especially given the relative resurgence in vinyl sales over the past few years. But I know that it won't be me to have anything to do with such a store, and while it's always a bummer to have one of your childhood dreams lay firmly in the ground, I accept the fact that the global experience of music -- and the culture of buying music and shooting the shit about music in a physical space -- has forever changed in the 21st Century. And just like a full head of hair, those old ways are never coming back for me.
But just like I remember the hair on my head, I'm glad to have had the experience of working at a record store one last time. I'm just sad that it ended with a whimper, with half-empty bins like a yellowed smile missing some teeth, petering out like the last swig of a warm Coke with the end of summer closing in. Larry deserved better.
Record World was an outlier in my record store experiences, as it was just one store where the owner was the manager rather than part of a chain, which gave it more of a mom-and-pop vibe. The "pop" was owner Larry Rochon -- a.k.a. "The Silver Fox" -- a former employee of Motown in the the '70s (who supposedly was issued a Cadillac and a pistol for his Detroit territory, which was 8 Mile and below), and Larry was delightful as a person, which made the job a joy. He had a free-wheeling sense of humor as well; once I found out he was a huge fan of the Rolling Stones, I took every opportunity to faux-shit on that band of "old has-beens and never-weres," which became a running joke between us. He had two types of laughs, both of which were bellowing and infectious, but only one of which was genuine, an affectation that I both understood well and appreciated greatly.
I can't remember when I first started there -- early 2002, perhaps a bit earlier? -- but I can certainly remember when I finished there: mid-February 2005, when Larry closed the store that had been his baby for over two and a half decades. I'd never been a direct part of a record store closing before, as I was no longer part of the day-to-day in WHR when they suddenly shuttered their doors, so it was painful to watch the slow erosion of Record World over a period of about eighteen months, and I was amazed that Larry let it continue as long as he did. Well, not so amazed when one considers his investment in the people and the community.
I was invested in that place as well; I started off getting a small hourly wage for my part-time work, then I pulled back to $20 a week, and then I believe I didn't get paid at all towards the end. (Shit, I'd still be working there for free were it still open.) When Larry announced the closing, we had the predictable wave of vultures looking for deals and well-wishers who hadn't been in the store on the regular for quite some time. I couldn't blame them, however, as even Larry had largely pulled back from the store operations, leaving the buying to me and the banking to the one lone full-time employee left. With Amazon and downloading, legal or otherwise, the role that Record World had filled just didn't exist anymore.
It's been over a decade since I worked at any kind of record store, but I wish I could say that I don't miss it to this day, that I have moved on from that desire and wish. There's a small part of me that thinks a small record store could work in Petoskey today, with records and used and new CD's and books and posters and so on, especially given the relative resurgence in vinyl sales over the past few years. But I know that it won't be me to have anything to do with such a store, and while it's always a bummer to have one of your childhood dreams lay firmly in the ground, I accept the fact that the global experience of music -- and the culture of buying music and shooting the shit about music in a physical space -- has forever changed in the 21st Century. And just like a full head of hair, those old ways are never coming back for me.
But just like I remember the hair on my head, I'm glad to have had the experience of working at a record store one last time. I'm just sad that it ended with a whimper, with half-empty bins like a yellowed smile missing some teeth, petering out like the last swig of a warm Coke with the end of summer closing in. Larry deserved better.
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