All record stores have disappeared one by one in my neighborhood, Virgin, Tower records, they are all gone except Amoeba music, the only one standing!
So if this post looks a little bit like a free ad for Amoeba, forgive me, as I feel I own them something.
It opened in 2001 in Hollywood, and proclaimed itself the largest independent record store in the world. I know that the CDs are gone or almost, but Amoeba still sells many every day, because they are cheap and the store is gigantesque. A friend of mine said it was the Target store of music. It’s simple, they have everything, pop, rock, jazz, country, punk, electronic, reggae, world, rap, classic, soundtracks,…
The place is constantly busy, every time I go, and the crowd is always interesting, from family with children to Silver Lake punk rockers to celebrities. Hey, I even spotted Juliette Lewis at the cashier once.
One of Amoeba’s forces is its free in-store shows, which happen several times each month and can bring a herd of people, depending on the band. But I saw Elvis Costello, Paul McCartney, The Flaming Lips, The Shins, Patti Smith, Supergrass, Aimee Mann, for free, so thanks Amoeba!
The other force is the Vinyl collection, huuuuge! And I forgot the DVDs!
There are 3 Amoeba stores in the world, they are all in California, but the biggest is in LA. Also the employees know what they are doing, they are friendly and most of them are musicians in the making or have a second job related to music.
Plus they have this ‘What’s In My Bag?’ series on their website where artists, celebrities, and staff are telling what they are buying at Amoeba: so Ben Stiller bought old DVDs for his kids, Rosanna Arquette likes Prince, Neil Young, Super Furry Animals, Devendra Banhart among many others, Noel Gallagher really likes David Axelrod as he bought 3 albums of his, and Jon Brion bought two albums of Of Montreal for his friend.
Now it does not work each time someone famous is in the store, in a recent interview, Daniel Tures, the manager of the Hollywood store, remembers asking Mick Jones, for a ‘What’s in My Bag’, as no employee dared to do it, but it turned out Jones was not in the mood and refused to do it!
So I don’t know if we will end up shopping only at Amazon and iTunes in a few years, but as long as stores like this one exist, I will hang out with the Amoeba crowd.