Unf**k Your Record Store Day

Abigail Devoe partakes in record-buying tourism, and gets real about RSD

Never in my life would I be voluntarily awake at 4:30 in the morning for any reason whatsoever. This is a core principle of myself that holds true.

Or, it held true until this year's Record Store Day festivities.

To be clear: I didn’t wake up at 4:30 to be in line at 5:00. I didn’t even leave my house until 5:30 at the earliest. (Call me vain and I’ll agree. It takes a lot to get me ready to face the world!) Then there was breakfast as soon as the bagel spot opened at 6:00. Making time on the hours-long trip meant skipping coffee until after shopping – a decision I would sorely regret. The plan was to arrive about 40 minutes ahead of special opening time at 8:00 and wait in line for however long it took to get in.

Gerosa Records in Brookfield, Connecticut, isn’t local to me in the slightest. But I live in a record store drought. Any time I want to buy from an independent, brick-and-mortar store, I have to make a whole day of it. Add the niche-hobby-meets-Black-Friday brouhaha into the equation and the natural outcome is the whole Record Store Day thing.

I first visited Gerosa back in August, thanks to circumstances surrounding a YouTube video cold open. (The sole of one boot disintegrated inside Retro Spin Records. Ask Ron about that.) Since then, I’ve called Gerosa “the museum.” Record collectors tend to be collectors of other things, too. There are bits and bobs in every corner. A Patti Smith concert poster here, a Gary Grimshaw print there. Original “See Emily Play” promotional material behind the cash register. A guitar signed by Cheap Trick is kept in a surveilled corner. (The real gem is "ceiling Bowie," the karate-posed cutout dangling from a drop-ceiling tile.)

A Wurlitzer stands proudly in the entryway. Not to mention the “oh shit wall”: the rarities that record stores display on their back walls to entice big spenders. I was drooling over the Bowie bootlegs, the second-best Urge Overkill album, an original sealed copy of #1 Record, and the last Ramones album, which no one seems to like but me.

These charming curios better warrant the nickname “kuntskammer.” It’s Gerosa’s “audiophile” wall that warrants its “museum” monicker and hidden gem status. I can look and I can touch, but I certainly do not have the means to buy! There select releases by small international hi-fi imprints in stock, a few big-boy UHQRs, and I kid you not, entire shelves of Mobile Fidelity pressings. Most of them are sealed, and all are from decades before the digital-sourcing scandal was even a twinkle in MoFi’s eye. If you’re looking for the Beatles box set, Gerosa somehow has two.

No matter where I go, no matter what I do, I can't escape this album...

I didn’t choose Gerosa for their Record Store Day exclusives, though they did post their list to their Instagram page. I chose them for the rest of their stock. This is why I was disappointed with their people-moving flow on the Day. It was never too cramped, but there was a path customers were to follow: in through the door, down the “ROCK: Q-Z” aisle, around to the area they’d cleared for Record Store Day exclusives, and right to the cash register. Of course, I had to be That Guy and awkwardly shimmy out of line to browse elsewhere in the store. Getting back in line was no easy feat. I meant to ask the cashier if the 2022 Revolver box set at the other end of the store was for sale. Amid the people-moving hullabaloo, it completely escaped my mind. The poor college buddy I dragged along to this just got in, grabbed his Brandi Carlisle and Snarky Puppy albums, and got the hell out.

Speaking of the line: the sheer amount of people who showed up for Record Store Day this year – and how early they showed up – was a hot topic of discussion online. My first Record Store Day was in 2018 (I still feel a pang in my chest when I think of the Modest Mouse single I missed out on.) If you turned up with a sleeping bag and camped for Record Store 2018, you would have looked crazy. I’m not sure what changed things – the COVID-19 pandemic transformed vinyl collecting culture, and not always for the better – but the line of customers waiting to get into Gerosa was nothing compared to what I saw on my Instagram feed.

It’s irresponsible for stores to allow people to wait outside all night before Record Store Day. How they can’t see the potential liability there, I do not understand. If concert venues can turn campers away, so can stores. It’s on them, not the excitable Swifties.

The resellers, however...I saw no less than three smug, greasy guys in their camping chairs who might as well have been wearing black t-shirts with big white block lettering that said, “I AM A SCALPER.” They all had deliciously punch-able faces. Clearly I can’t say, “Punch your local scalper!” because that’s slightly illegal and would get you in trouble. But it’s no trouble to think it!

I know you think you’re soulmates with your favorite record store. This is a weird, lonely hobby for weird, lonely people. This is why you feel such a strong need to protect your favorite spot from the big, bad, corporate Record Store Day.

It’s time to get realistic about all this. In the almost 20 years since its inception, Record Store Day has spiraled out of control in more ways than just campers, resellers, and scalpers. One day of Black Friday-level foot traffic is just not enough to sustain a small, independent store for the rest of the year. The Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo releases will always sell out. Marketing to teenage girls always has been and always will be reliable. Trust me, I was once a teenage girl. But again, this isn’t the big bad problem with Record Store Day. The problem is the releases that don’t sell. This year was a good list, I'll give them that. But in the grand scheme of things, Record Store Day and its Black Friday counterpart have kind of lost the plot. Did we really need another pressing of Rumours? The album that, at one point, one in six American households owned a copy of? Or the Doors release on this year's list, which screams "scraping the bottom of the barrel?" Aside from Taylor and Olivia, it’s difficult to predict exactly what exclusives will and won’t sell.

Superfluous, stupid “exclusives” sit in record stores’ bins collecting dust, as will some of the good ones. The stores are forced to eat the cost of the ones that don’t. Running a brick-and-mortar record store has enough of an overhead cost as is, and profit margins get thinner by the day. Chain stores fare better on this front, but let’s face it. The chains are booooriiiing! Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t want to be surrounded by Funko Pops (landfill snacks) while I browse for music I like. I want to be surrounded by music-related stuff and people who like music. I want places with personality owned with people with personality.

I also saw a lot of commenters on Instagram and YouTube saying how they were priced out of Record Store Day this year, whether it was from the price of the exclusives themselves or having to go to work that morning. What does the future of Record Store Day – and independent record stores – look like with an ongoing cost of living crisis? Budgeting for an expensive hobby that takes up space isn't possible for everyone, especially the casual collector Record Store Day really should appeal to. These are all valid reasons to break up with the Day.

We left Gerosa by 9:30. Then I met up with another college friend for coffee. By the time I’d thanked all applicable gods for the caffeine, filled up on an omelette, and drove the seven minutes to Disc ’n’ Dat in Bethel, the Record Store Day festivities had died down. That’s honestly a good thing: the store is only about as big as my bedroom! There were six shoppers at Disc ’n’ Dat at most, including my party of three. Plenty of Record Store Day exclusives were still in stock, including one I wasn’t able to grab at Gerosa. I was able to freely walk around, take all the time I needed to explore, and sit on the floor to drag the “JAZZ – S” box out from under the table. My buddy excitedly talked up a Nirvana live album. He went ahead and bought it for me when I passed it up for a bootleg Loveless. Since there was no line outside (and I’m always the only girl in our party,) I made the guys stand outside while I took photos in front of the store. My experiences at Gerosa and Disc ’n’ Dat were totally different, and I thoroughly enjoyed them both.

If you’re feeling disillusioned with what Record Store Day has become, step outside your favorite store’s little bubble. Engage in a little vinyl tourism. Skip the exclusives altogether, and shop after the lines have cleared. Go to a store that doesn’t even stock exclusives! Most of them still run great discounts for the weekend. Unfuck your own Record Store Day, and keep the hissy fits off Facebook, please! It’s a bad look, especially for the store owners I saw partaking in the doom-and-gloom online. No one likes a bad sport, especially when expendable income is involved.

If your store has gone “full corporate” on Record Store Day, then it might be time to break up. But I saw girls giggling over the same Chappell Roan bumper sticker. A long-haired guy with a Judas Priest patch on the back of his battle jacket so visibly excited about the KISS release. Talented sketch artists brought in by store owners to draw caricatures of customers. College radio stations setting up booths, and little arts fairs inviting local crafters to sell their wares. A metalhead store employee and a guy with a perm who was clearly in some band way before I was born shooting the shit during the lull. I saw record stores – wonderful places for a wonderful, if socially-awkward community – creating little communities of their own.

Independent record stores pair people who might not shop there otherwise with the hobby they could spend the rest of their lives loving. I don’t know. I just can’t see how any of that is a bad thing. This is what Record Store Day is all about.

What I got (Gerosa Records):

King Crimson – 1974 Penn State University

Sonic Youth – Diamond Seas

Labi Siffre – Crying Laughing Loving Lying (Half-Speed Master)

John Coltrane Quartet – France 1965: The Complete Concerts

Pink Floyd – Live From the Los Angeles Sports Arena, April 26th, 1975

*The Yardbirds – Over Under Sideways Down (Mono, Get Back Records, Italy)

*Frank Zappa & The Mothers of Invention – Whisky A Go Go, 1968: Highlights

What I got (Disc ’n’ Dat):

Cream – Wheels of Fire: Live at the Fillmore and Winterland

*My Bloody Valentine – Loveless (bootleg)

*Gabor Szabo – The Sorcerer

*Gabor Szabo – More Sorcery

*The Mothers of Invention – Burnt Weeny Sandwich

*Nirvana – From The Muddy Banks of the Wishkah

What I missed out on:

Jackson C. Frank – S/T

* denotes used records. Record Store Day isn’t just about the exclusives. It’s about supporting your independent record store, dammit!