Record Mart

RIP Record Mart, where I spent most of my childhood. Much of what they had was a little beat-​up and you had to climb a dodgy staircase to get there but it was easy to get lost inside and emerge with an impressive stack. The majority of my income was spent there and the records I bought there shaped my tastes in music and formed the basis for a collection that’s still growing. Jerry, Howard, Daniel, and Lobo were all really knowledgeable and cool. You could spend hours in there. The prices were really reasonable too. Sadly, come the mp3/​big-​box revolution, the Mart was among the first to go. A sequel of sorts, Lunadisc, operated in the same space for a few more years but was never able to get it together enough to make it, which is too bad.