Love, Hate and Tower Records

[BeBop]

Hypothesis: The median age for people who don’t like Tower Records (particularly in their bricks and mortar manifestation) is below that of people who like Tower.

Theory: Old geezers like me recall the day when Tower was the ONLY place to buy anything other than Top 40/Pop. (Think of Target as a music source today.) Want a nice Blue Note Connoisseur or a slab of 180gr. vinyl? Looking for some Fats Navarro or Ganelin Trio? Just hoping to expand your horizons? The Tower ‘deep catalog’ was the answer. Oh, there were a few alternatives in Berkeley, New York and Chicago. But for Fresno, Stockton or Davis, CA or the burgeoning jazz mecca of Nashville…

Sure, Tower’s gone downhill since then. But, like Starbucks, look what they’ve brought us – Alternatives! And their woes, I believe without any specific knowledge, were caused by less-than-perfect management decision-making in the midst of a shifting market (Internet shopping; downloading; games, videos and other music alternatives; et cetera).

And while the (capitalist) part of me that would dance on their grave and point her finger at management must temper her enthusiasm in light of worse situations facing Wherehouse, Musicland/Goody and others. And, the (artist) part of me feels some compassion for management who kept that catalog as deep as possible for as long as possible.

Okay, Tower sucks. But I thank them for what they did to suck.

[7/4]

I almost never go to Tower anymore.

[Dan Gould]

I agree with Bebop. Before the Internet, I lived for the opportunity to return home and make a visit to Tower and HMV in New York. It was practically the only way to get Japanese BNs and a whole lot more. Before the album cover art books came out, I often spotted unfamiliar import BNs at Tower and had that thrilling, long lost sense of wonder as I examined the cover and the tray card.

Tower was pretty darn good in its day, but that day has past ...

[Tjazz]

Glory Days

[Jazzmoose]

In my area, with Streetlight and Rasputin's (not to mention the holy shrines up in Berkely...), Tower is a bit redundant, but yeah, when I first found it back in the early 80's, it was a godsend. Younger consumers should thank their good fortune for the fact that they never had to shop for music at K-Mart or Target. (And even Target was better five years ago; it's gotten even worse...)

I remember back when getting any choices at all meant joining a record club, either the "bend over and take it" Columbia House type, or the weirdly strange (or is that strangely weird..) Records Unlimited.

So yeah, BeBop; put me down as another bit of evidence for your hypothesis!

Edited June 11, 2004 by Jazzmoose

[BruceH]

I'm another BeBop follower.

I remember when the the Boston Tower opened; that place was like heaven for a while. Unbelievable amounts of catalog right out there where you could see it. (This was before online buying don't forget.) For 3 or 4 years I made regular pilgrimages there. Combined with the local used places like Planet, Nuggets, and Stereo Jacks, you felt like there was little you couldn't track down. *sigh*

[Rooster_Ties]

Anybody remember when Best Buy used to have quite a surprising number of imports in their jazz section??? Not Japanese BN's so much, but I seem to remember that I got quite a number of Japanese Miles CD's on Sony, of titles only available over there, before they ever came out domestically. (And even, occasionally, in Best Buys in places like Peoria, Illinois; or Davenport, Iowa -- neither of which are even towns with populations over 500,000)

I'm not saying Best Buy's selection was ever incredible, but there was a time (10 or 12 years ago) when you could find quite a number of unexpected gems at Best Buy, for really half-way decent prices.

Oh, this was a Tower thread, I almost forgot. Never having lived in a city with its own Tower, back during my College years (1987-1991), and even well into the mid-90's, I used to always love to visit every Tower I could get to (Chicago, Washington D.C., Boston, NYC, Austin, Toronto), and I'd always walk out having bought nearly $200 in discs, every damn time (even closer to $300 once, if I remember right). The Tower in Chicago (the one about 20 blocks north of The Loop, not the one downtown that used to be Rose Records), used to have THE best classical room I ever saw, anywhere.

But those days are long gone. The last two times that I was in a Tower was in NYC (Times Square) in about 1998, and in London (Piccadilly Circus) in 2001, and neither time was the classical room really anything to get all that excited about. And the jazz sections were even worse. Seriously, I think I bought about $100 worth of discs each time, and really didn't have to throw back very much to get down to that amount.

Though in Tower's defense, the Virgin Megastore in NYC (Times Square) had an even worse Classical room (than Tower). The one at Virgin was fairly big, but nearly everything was pretty much standard domestic issues. Sure, they had HUGE sections for mainstream composers, but those sections were that big only because they stocked nearly ever damn "common" title by those composers (so, pretty much everything that was in-print, but standard domestic issue). But nearly nothing in the way of interesting imports, or older stock that was technically out-of-print.

Edited June 16, 2004 by Rooster_Ties

[jazzbo]

RT, in the late nineties Columbia imported and released to the bins for sale a series of Miles Davis Sony discs and I believe these may have been the ones you saw in Best Buy . . . .

[7/4]

The last two times that I was in a Tower was in NYC (Times Square) in about 1998,

I don't think so. One on E. 4th and Broadway and one on the upper West side, 72nd and Broadway. But no Tower in Times Square.

[Rooster_Ties]

The last two times that I was in a Tower was in NYC (Times Square) in about 1998,

I don't think so. One on E. 4th and Broadway and one on the upper West side, 72nd and Broadway. But no Tower in Times Square.

Obviously got my locations mixed up. Anyway, it was somewhere in NYC. (I've only been to NYC once, and it was only for 3 days.)

[7/4]

The last two times that I was in a Tower was in NYC (Times Square) in about 1998,

I don't think so. One on E. 4th and Broadway and one on the upper West side, 72nd and Broadway. But no Tower in Times Square.

Obviously got my locations mixed up. Anyway, it was somewhere in NYC. (I've only been to NYC once, and it was only for 3 days.)

tiz ok, understandable.

[BeBop]

A bit of background on the motivation for this thread. I was Vegas a few days ago. I don't buy recorded music any more, and, even if I did, there are better places to buy in Vegas. I was driving up Sahara and there was a Tower. I couldn't help but pull in 'for old times' sake'. And by golly, it was still Tower. A somewhat deep catalog (and somewhat high prices). Some books... Heck, I ended up hanging around 20 minutes without really looking at anything.

Typically, when I go into a record store these days, I start to feel a little ill. The thought of buying another recording sickens me. Tower didn't have that effect, FWIW.

[jazzbo]

Interesting that you felt that way. Tower Austin closed it's doors Sunday; I was in at the middle of the afternoon and bought an eight cd set on RCA Red Seal of the Guarneri Quartet recordings of Beethoven String Quartets. With the discount it was 32 dollars. . . . I've had many nice purchases like that and many nice hours of browsing in that store. It seemed to invite me to appreciate music and look at new things. I don't feel that at Waterloo here in town or heaven forbid at the mall. I think this is a sort of "end" to a particular type of hunting and collecting and acquiring "feeling" in my life in this town!