Why Major Records should carry independent music

[Dazed and Brutal]

I have grown entirely sick of having to order shit of the internet! Being 17 I have to nag my parents, as pathetic as it is, to let me borrow their credit card. And though I end up giving them cash, they hate me doing this. Also, the only independent stores I know that carry metal are too far for me to regularly visit like I want to. I have two major record stores located near me, FYE and I forgot the name of the other, but they're always changing because they're goin out of bussiness. With mainstream music seeing a drop in sales with downloading and also the fact that once something fades it will no longer be purchased. However, independent record stores tend to thrive. Fans always are always supporting the lesser known artists and older releases keep appeal if not gain more overtime. The cash flow will stay consistently good. So, why in the hell don't these major corporations catch on? I mean you can continue to sell the mainstream stuff, but independent releases would be something to fallback on.

 

[Rabid Headbanger]

Because there is no God.

On a side note I've always wanted to open a record store.

 

[skeptik]

Independent shit will never sell. The fucking Hellhammer release only sold 667 copies in its first week.

 

[Rabid Headbanger]

Thats an almost ironic number.

 

[Alter]

Independent shit will never sell. The fucking Hellhammer release only sold 667 copies in its first week.

Wrong, over here in Chicago Metal Haven has stayed open a little over ten years and 8 of them in the middle of Boy Town, the gay side of Chicago.

 

[Zephyrus]

Dude, chill out. You'll be 18 in a year or less, and at that time you'll be able to tolerate the status quo, which I find to be perfectly acceptable. I was in your predicament a year ago and I had the same sentiments, but my patience paid off.

 

[Cythraul]

If I'm not mistaken even the highest selling death metal bands (Cannibal Corpse, Deicide, Morbid Angel) have never reached sales figures anywhere close to those of most mainstream artists. This kind of music clearly is not very profitable, plus I don't think majors really know how to deal with bands at an underground level.

 

[skeptik]

Wrong, over here in Chicago Metal Haven has stayed open a little over ten years and 8 of them in the middle of Boy Town, the gay side of Chicago.

Metal Haven is not a Major Record Store. Neither is Vintage Vinyl, which has been open much longer than Metal Haven.

 

[Cythraul]

In Phoenix we have Metal Devastation which has been open for a good number of years, but I don't know how it stays in business since the guy who owns it overprices everything (he charges $18 for just about every cd, even if it's an EP).

 

[skeptik]

Fucking jew.

 

[Cythraul]

Fucking jew.

Actually, he's Mexican.

 

[The Ozzman]

The only two independent stores I know of in Cincy are Everybody's Records and Shake-It! Records

Both carry independent releases (Everybody's has stuff from NWN, for example, but they mostly carry punk stuff) and I've never been to Shake-It Records, which I need to change in the near future because I heard it is better than Everybody's

 

[Zephyrus]

I doubt D&B would have this problem if he lived in eastern New England. Newbury Comics has the best selection of metal by far of every record store I've been in, local or chain. And their prices are the cheapest as well.

 

[Matt]

We had a vinage vinyl here, but it closed. We also have this bullshit Metal store that has about 150 cds and is filled with poser shit. Now I have to go 40 minutes to St. Louis to get to a VV.

 

[mutantllama]

I doubt D&B would have this problem if he lived in eastern New England. Newbury Comics has the best selection of metal by far of every record store I've been in, local or chain. And their prices are the cheapest as well.

I've been to one of Newbury's stores. They do have a pretty good selection.

 

[Alter]

Metal Haven is not a Major Record Store. Neither is Vintage Vinyl, which has been open much longer than Metal Haven.

Sorry, I thought you meant indie record shops wont sell records long enough to stay in business.

 

[General Zaroff]

On a side note I've always wanted to open a record store.

Same here.

 

[Rabid Headbanger]

I'm just wondering what to stalk and how much it'll cost.

 

[Matt]

You wanna stalk stuff?

If I ever get enough capital to pursue such a venture, I'll probably have a lot of everything - rock, metalcore, etc - popular stuff so I don't go out of business. Then I'll have a fuckin huge metal section, including a large used section. I'll probably have a merch section and sell odd stuff like used record players/lps as well. And good metal mags. And concert tix, etc.

 

[BlackMetalWhiteGuy]

The closest and only music store near me that I know about is the FYE in Oneonta's Southside Mall, which is about half an hour away. Their metal section is about three times the size it was when I first started shopping there in high school, but their selection still sucks and everything is way over priced, except for their classical music, which I can usually get for $5.00 to $10.00, sometimes less.

I still don't buy music from the internet though, except for eBay on rare occasions. I used to try to special order stuff from FYE, since that was about the only chance I had of getting most of what I wanted, but they rarely had what I was looking for. One time when I wasn't able to go for whatever reason, my mom went for me, to try to to special order Kalmah's Swampsong album and the idiot at the register kept insisting that Kalmah wasn't a real band and that I was probably looking for Camilla, or something like that. Fortunately, my mom is awesome and knows who Kalmah is, so she walked out without purchasing the wrong thing.

Later, after the Black Waltz was released, I tried to special order that too, and they were able to find Kalmah because I spelled it for them, but as far as they could tell, the Black Waltz didn't even exist. Consequently, I ended up downloading it, which I didn't want to do, because I actually feel like Kalmah's worth the money.