Hey look at the bright-side, you won’t get the Backstage Pass, Magazine Subscriptions, Presales for overpriced releases,etc.etc. shoved up your ASS on the way out of these hell-holes either…

I’m shocked at some of these posts. I was a store manager for FYE for 7 years, my store was closed last year. You people know nothing about the cost of doing business. The stores are not making any money. When you margins are around 30% there is no money to be made.

The music industry is gone, and It will never be back. You can thank Wal-Mart, Circuit City, Best Buy and downloading.

For the idiot who posted, “charging $18.00 for a CD a bad business model.” Go kill yourself.

We are witnessing an entire industry go under. Think about all the people that have lost their jobs. The people that were in the music industry were not in for the money. They were in it because they loved music.

I think, (assume) it would be just too complex to be a well-rounded store in these times of humongus amounts of new CD releases.Last numb3rs I had was around 167 titles PER DAY.
Around these parts, Rock Stations are going country and the local Best Buy has a smattering of BIG release CD’s and very little else. They always say, “you can get it from our web-site”.
No shit? So why bother to come in here?
The survivors will be smaller independent stores run by people who would be 10-time winners on rocknroll Jeopardy. We cannot have a computer-generated business model trying to handle the splintered reality of modern music.
There are so many current and fresh sub-genres added to the vast HISTORY of pre-recorded music that a “little bit of eveything” just won’t float.
People who care and know will support the right stores.

I think it truly is a sign of the times. It’s unfortunate that the labels didn’t see this coming. It’s enough money being made to spread the wealth. Artists have been exploited for years and now it’s there time to turn the tables. Consumers have also felt gauged and unfortunately look for “free” as some sort of compensation for the years of being gauged.

re: KC | 1/21/2008, 10:21 am EST

“I can’t completely agree with the greed of artists as there are a whole lot more of them that are at the mercy of management and labels that are bleeding them dry with all the unnecessary people, perks, etc. that come out of the musician’s revenue.”

If the wealthy artists who have power and influence in the industry create a solution to rebuild the economics of the music industry, doesn’t that benefit EVERYONE?

hopefully Rolling Stone is next. Talk about past your prime.

I can’t completely agree with the greed of artists as there are a whole lot more of them that are at the mercy of management and labels that are bleeding them dry with all the unnecessary people, perks, etc. that come out of the musician’s revenue. Personally I buy my music at shows to provide bands with gas/food money.

As for FYE? Overpriced. Understocked. But in comparison to Circuit City, I don’t usually feel the need to go through and straighten out out all the CD stock when I find Travis Tritt in with Linkin Park.

Yeah, there’s a recession, but people generally can pull some cash out of their paycheck to buy some jams. This generation of people, quite frankly, don’t give a fuck! If they can get it for free, they’ll steal it.

A real good example is how many people didn’t even pay a nickel for In Rainbows. The idea was a disaster; it didn’t work. And these were so-called diehard fans.

I waited for the disc to come out. I got it for $7.99. Not bad. Do you know what’s funny? CD’s cost the same amount as vinyl did in the late 70s/early 80’s!

Go figure. But the record companies dumped vinyl-with those beautiful album covers, and lyric sheets you could actually read, for more cost effective CD’s.

If they never went digital, they’d be fine now. I never met one person in my life who said, “boy, vinyl sucks, I wish they would come out with somtehing new!”

And analog recording sounds better than digital, and vinyl sounds better than CD’s, MP3’s and yada yada yada!

And I almost cry when I think about the end of 45s. What charlatan bullshit!

Oh, well, maybe someone will come up with a solution. The Record companies and artists, quite frankly, are too money hungry not to figure something out.

When everyone was freaking about computers crashing, thus everthing else, New Year’s Eve 1999, the computer whizzes found a way out.

I think someone will come up with something to make people (not all) want to spend money for something (hopefully) worthwhile.

Perhaps I’m delusional. Maybe I should write a song about 45s coming back and post it on the weekend “Insane Song” list. Fuck it.

Do you think that maybe all this stuff with record shops closing and stuff has just been magnified by the looming recession?

I mean, if the American weren’t in the state, would the music industry be in as much trouble as it is?

maybe Rolling Stone will be next!!!!

(jus t fuckin’ ’round, don’t get excited!!!)

Yeah, I went into FYE they didn’t have one thing I wanted. I wanted a Maiden album, they didn’t have that. I wanted a Deep Purple record, no dice. I wanted the Best Of The Doors, denied.

Then I said, “well lemme take a look at the posters. They had Zeppelin one, A Hendrix one, and a G N’R one. I wanted the G N’ R one the least. First of all the posters were in disarray, the codes didn’t line up, so I asked a friendly store representative to help me. No go on the Zep or the Hendrix, but he had the G N’ R.

I usually don’t say anything but, “you know something, buddy, this is no way to run a store.” And I walked out.

The one where i live used to be a warehouse. They have no selection the store looks very ghetto and it is way overprice. You can go to Best Buy and get stuff for half the price.

I miss Tower records they were not the cheapest but they had good selections and had good sales.

Who’ve thought that charging $18 for a CD was a bad business model? Good riddance.