Comments on: Tower Records http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2006/10/09/tower-records/ First in Music Analysis Sun, 20 May 2012 13:07:01 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 By: RustedRobot » Blog Archive » You Can’t Sell That Stuff To Me http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2006/10/09/tower-records/#comment-51241 RustedRobot » Blog Archive » You Can’t Sell That Stuff To Me Thu, 19 Apr 2007 21:37:05 +0000 http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2006/10/09/tower-records/#comment-51241 [...] o the east coast, it was in its waning years anyway, so I never really fell for it the way Lefsetz did. Maybe they’d still be around if they catered to the [...] [...] o the east coast, it was in its waning years anyway, so I never really fell for it the way Lefsetz did. Maybe they’d still be around if they catered to the [...]

]]> By: Wings For Wheels » Blog Archive » Thoughts On Tower’s Demise http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2006/10/09/tower-records/#comment-10077 Wings For Wheels » Blog Archive » Thoughts On Tower’s Demise Wed, 11 Oct 2006 04:18:26 +0000 http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2006/10/09/tower-records/#comment-10077 [...] those CDs that sucked.     So before I sign off for a few days, let me point you to Bob Lefsetz, who nails the Tower situation perfectly. [...]

]]> By: varjak http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2006/10/09/tower-records/#comment-10038 varjak Tue, 10 Oct 2006 16:48:49 +0000 http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2006/10/09/tower-records/#comment-10038 When we moved out to LA in the mid 70's my first introduction to record stores was Tower on Sunset. Walking into that store as a ten year old that grew up around the music biz this was heaven on earth. I remember stacks and stacks of LP's and aisle after aisle of the stuff. But what I remember most was that there was a gas station set up inside promoting The Cars first album. For a kid from Boston this was it I arrived and records where my drug. My dad would take us once a month to load up and would tell us to pick out ten records while he would have a giant stack as well. The great thing was I could find anything I heard or saw on, Don Kirschner's Rock Concert, The Midnight Special or of course the radio. Imagine my surprise when I discovered Zappa’s in New York LP. Here held the infamous “Titties & Beer” I had frequently heard on Dr. Demento’s radio show. Being that I could load up on ten LP’s I quickly snatched nine other Zappa albums figuring they would all lead me to the promise land. Of course while checking out my dad was a bit perturbed that a ten year old would want ten Zappa LP’ and challenged me if I knew what I was buying. “Can you name one song?” was his question of course, and when I elicited no answer but said I needed them he said he was going to make me sit down and listen to them all. I didn’t care because I was now going to posses that one song. I still own that “In New York LP, though I don’t own the other nine anymore. This of course started me on a habit of scouring records stores for the next 30 years and an addiction to the music business. Since those days I’ve seen some personnel Tower highs that included a giant flagship store in Boston. Vacationing back in LA and going to the Tower Annex for several days only to load up a suitcase with ridiculously cheap imports. A low point was the raising of their prices to full list price. One thing was constant though there was always that pull that I always knew I was apt to find something unique in each store. Something not many stores could claim. It’s funny whenever I see a 25 count LP box I think of those days in the aisles of Tower filled with stacks of the glorious drug. I even watch Hanna and Her Sisters now and then just to see Woody and Dianne Wiest hanging out in a Tower. Bringing back those days of the hand drawn divider cards and what seemed like an unlimited resource of discovery. Now I have to do my digging in many of the dying used record stores or flee markets. Yet almost always I see a record that I once bought on the Sunset Strip and flash back to those days of being a kid and discovering the art of record albums. Something I feel sorry that kids these days will never experience. I must thank Russ Solomon for all this and all he did for kids like me. Plus of course my dad, for letting me buy ten Frank Zappa albums and starting me on a never ending journey of having to be surrounded by records just like those aisles that dwarfed me as a kid. When we moved out to LA in the mid 70′s my first introduction to record stores was Tower on Sunset. Walking into that store as a ten year old that grew up around the music biz this was heaven on earth. I remember stacks and stacks of LP’s and aisle after aisle of the stuff. But what I remember most was that there was a gas station set up inside promoting The Cars first album. For a kid from Boston this was it I arrived and records where my drug. My dad would take us once a month to load up and would tell us to pick out ten records while he would have a giant stack as well. The great thing was I could find anything I heard or saw on, Don Kirschner’s Rock Concert, The Midnight Special or of course the radio. Imagine my surprise when I discovered Zappa’s in New York LP. Here held the infamous “Titties & Beer” I had frequently heard on Dr. Demento’s radio show. Being that I could load up on ten LP’s I quickly snatched nine other Zappa albums figuring they would all lead me to the promise land.
Of course while checking out my dad was a bit perturbed that a ten year old would want ten Zappa LP’ and challenged me if I knew what I was buying. “Can you name one song?” was his question of course, and when I elicited no answer but said I needed them he said he was going to make me sit down and listen to them all. I didn’t care because I was now going to posses that one song. I still own that “In New York LP, though I don’t own the other nine anymore. This of course started me on a habit of scouring records stores for the next 30 years and an addiction to the music business.

Since those days I’ve seen some personnel Tower highs that included a giant flagship store in Boston. Vacationing back in LA and going to the Tower Annex for several days only to load up a suitcase with ridiculously cheap imports. A low point was the raising of their prices to full list price.
One thing was constant though there was always that pull that I always knew I was apt to find something unique in each store. Something not many stores could claim.

It’s funny whenever I see a 25 count LP box I think of those days in the aisles of Tower filled with stacks of the glorious drug. I even watch Hanna and Her Sisters now and then just to see Woody and Dianne Wiest hanging out in a Tower. Bringing back those days of the hand drawn divider cards and what seemed like an unlimited resource of discovery.
Now I have to do my digging in many of the dying used record stores or flee markets. Yet almost always I see a record that I once bought on the Sunset Strip and flash back to those days of being a kid and discovering the art of record albums. Something I feel sorry that kids these days will never experience.
I must thank Russ Solomon for all this and all he did for kids like me. Plus of course my dad, for letting me buy ten Frank Zappa albums and starting me on a never ending journey of having to be surrounded by records just like those aisles that dwarfed me as a kid.

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