Does anyone still shop at HMV?

When Tower first opened a Piccadilly it had the most massive selection of 7" singles you've ever seen, too, including many incredible American imports and the like (distinctly remember buying 'I Wanna Testify' by the Parliaments there on my first visit.)

While I was there, the jazz and classical sections were managed by the son of a p well known English jazz trumpeter and radio personality - so the shelves were always well stocked with his Dad's CDs...

Can't remember if it was Tower or HMV, but one of them had this classical department that was slap bang in the middle of the shop floor (in the basement IIRC) but shut off from the rest of the store with glass walls. The soundproofing was magnificent, you walked in and suddenly the hubbub of the whole place was cut out completely and replaced with this atmosphere of rarefied calm. Not that I ever bought anything from there, mind.

That was HMV I think.

That was the HMV on Oxford St - prob the biggest classical music dept ever seen in the UK. Great place to put Morton Feldman on the sound system, as I was wont to do if I was covering someone's lunch break.
One of the regular customers used to come in with their pet cat on their shoulder, that's how mellow it was.

They had a very similar classical section in Piccadilly Tower. Bought loads of stuff there, including Xenakis, Crumb and even some Stockhausen (including the self-reissued stuff, much cheaper than in Harold Moores Records up the road)!

Didn't Mole Jazz end up operating out of Harold Moores in the end?

i loved the jazz section of Tower Piccadilly, with its massive murals of Bitches Brew, etc, up the staircase. i miss all these places... you never think they're going to disappear when you grow up with them.

Mole Jazz was upstairs at Harold Moores for about a month, I think, then went online only, although buggered if I can find them there now.

First time I ever went in the big HMV was around the time of my 10th birthday. I was very much into birdwatching as a kid and I really wanted to get a record of bird calls cos I'd read that this was what you had to do if you were serious (and boy was I ever). Me and my mum traipsed in & out of what seems like loads of different places in the west end and mostly got totally blank looks. Finally got to HMV though and they had this whole rack of wildlife field recordings, was pretty flummoxed by the choice in fact. Ended up with some BBC thing, Tony Soper recorded hiding in a bush somewhere at dawn, hushedly rhapsodising about the distant clack of the fieldfare, the snore and sneeze of the woodcock and the yellowhammer asking for his little-bit-of-bread-and-no-cheeeeeese. But they had all sorts there - records dedicated to individual families, could have had sides full of raptor squawks, badger grunts and whatnot.

Yeah, the basement section used to be very good for that kind of thing - used to sell lots of cds of things like national anthems, sea shanties, famous speeches, etc. Exactly the kind of stuff ppl now happily download.

HMV oxford st today,

I found a Electronic music CD that was free with Mojo magazine in the dance compilation racks today and the guy at the desk had to give me it for free as it had NOT FOR RESALE on the cover....

Its a good CD as well.

http://www.mojocovercds.com/cd/2064

No wonder they are in financial trouble!

It is a good CD, I remember it.

Shame about the Trocadero branch. They'd only recently reorganised the upstairs bit (after the Bond St branch closed) and it was actually a pleasure to shop for music there.

So, is the Troc catching that 'shopping centre of the past' disease?

The basement used to be wonderful, loads of marketty stalls. Now it's games machines..

The bit along from it underneath is the sort of place The Face would do articles about: Loads of hipster kids practicing hip-hop dance moves..

Still heartbreaking to pass that awful "THE STING" fashion place at Piccadilly and think to myself: "But this should be TOWER RECORDS."

what the fuck is that place - I've found it slightly mystifying ever since they had the advertising hoardings up about a year ago.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/21493542

I find it interesting that the digital market seems to be the rationale behind why HMV has failed on the high street. No mention of supermarket competition, the fact that it started to dilute its main offer with ribena and shitty phone covers or that senior management fucked up. No straight to the e-commerce channel.

The repeated falsehood that will prevent them sorting themselves out, very true.

dont forget their old friend - the blame of illegal downloading.

That is the reason though, isn't it? Plus whatever factors have driven prices down. They might have managed their decline better, but there isn't going to be such a big music chain again, no matter how well-run it is.

well if retailers didnt charge up to £18.99 for cds in the 90s then maybe downloading would not have taken off quite like it did. And supermarkets seem to have no problem shifting cds at £7.99

I looked at a pile of cds yesterday that were all bought early to late 90s. they ranged from £12.99 - £16 (i refused to ever buy a single cd that was more than that, but hmv used to sell cds at £17.99 back then if they were non-discounted releases - imports were even more). Ridiculous how much they charged.

Do you think a music retailer could turn a profit on the high street selling CDs at £7.99?

supermarkets seem to have no problem shifting cds at £7.99

Supermarkets also have no problem shifting beer at less than the cost of beer - supermarkets are not really representative here as they sell such a range of things that they can take hits on certain items to attract customers. Supermarkets might have problems shifting anything slightly removed from the mainstream because they don't like using up shelf space for thing that aren't popular - I reckon less than 2% of your music collection has ever been available in Tesco.

my point is they cheated us for years with high prices. If they hadn't done that then maybe people would have stayed loyal.
And onimo is right most of my music was bought from indie shops or our price in hamilton.

That BBC link - why do they always find "record collectors" who look like serial killers?

they dont go out of London?

my point is they cheated us for years with high prices.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-AkCU0tSKErA/TqFZk_eep8I/AAAAAAAALZg/cauE8yGCvO4/s1600/capitalism_creates_jobs_and_wealth_e1hq.png

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_elasticity_of_demand

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profit_(accounting)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_limited_company

http://tiki.oneworld.net/sustain/sustain5.html

I'd pay £10 for any album I wanted on CD.

Also their clientele today isn't the people who were cheated in the 90s, it's their kids. Loyalty doesn't come into it.

you're saying only kids are interested in music? Those who bought music in the 90s just stopped buying it as they're too old?

it's a weird use of the word "cheated" as if people in 90s HMV were being chatted up by alluring pretend shoppers who slipped them a Mickey and when they came round they found at they'd been overcharged for a Dodgy cd

The role that supermarkets have to play is that they are instrumental to driving the consumer away from the high street, selling new releases on all entertainment and being able to sell at more competative prices. You could argue that a savvy business understands the markets and acclimatises accordingly. I get the feeling that HMV were too late, too arrogant or too lazy to develop their offer to meet the changing retail climate.

I'm saying mostly kids consume music; new music by new acts anyway.

I'm also saying that loyalty, insofar as relevant, is loyalty to the acts, not to the retailer. The retailer is at best peripheral to the relationship.

I dunno a lot of people go to the same record shops and that's not just restricted to indie shops. If they have a good selection suited to their tastes or think the staff is knowledgeable and get to know them and can recommend stuff. Andy in Tower Records soul/funk section in the 1990s was like that. I bought nearly all my funk from them or fopp because they had staff who knew my tastes well. Just like the staff in Our Price did or in missing or do in avalanche or monorail. Supposedly HMV used to be like that for people. Centralised stocking from head office clearly had a bad effect on these places. Shops used to know their customers and cater to them. The good indie shops still do.

a percentage of customers do/did have that kind of relationship with stores yeah, but once again the evil empire of the internet has replaced that for a lot of people thru the availability of information as well as purchase/intellectual property theft

I worked for HMV in the early 00's, at this point they should have been investing in creating an online shop to rival amazon and the like. Instead we were asked to sell store credit to customers and sell the shitty new releases from a top ten chart owned by the fat cat distributers. Had they focused on customer service and creating a USP things may have been different. I'm just not convinced the internet killed HMV, I think it was poor retailing.

my point is they cheated us for years with high prices.

I don't disagree, but I don't think this entirely or remotely explains or excuses illegal downloading. artists didn't cheat the fans with higher prices, artists rarely saw higher profits, but its artists that are primarily suffering.

there shd probably be a broader thread for looking at the relationships between producers, merchants/distributors and consumers and the impact of the internet on this, plus the High Street as conceptual and functional space, cos the discussion is scattered over a few different threads, and it's much bigger than individuals' sentimental (trying to use that in a neutral-ish sense) attachment to particular retail brands.

maybe once i've had a better night's sleep tho.

I suppose it's the artists who don't chart - who only appeal to specialist minority niches - who have to get the big price mark-ups since it's their livelihood at stake rather than major label loss-leaders.

Then again, Rough Trade, Ray's etc. sell CDs (generally) more cheaply than HMV so you do wonder whether you're paying the artist or HMV's business rates.

Not that I'm sobbing too much about it, but how does Adele get paid anything when her CD is £5 in HMV?

Standard economy of scale; it's cheaper to press 4 million of the same thing than 10,000 of 400 things.

Or do I mean 40? You know what I mean.

Yes, but.

xpost no but.

About 50p, same as ever, I'd guess.

Another 37 shops to close.

(I'd link the BBC news page, but that's pretty much all it says)

no mention of which shops?

Not yet