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Fopp Closing


Stephen

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Nope, people may have moved between shops but both stores existed together - I'm another who did the Saturday round of them all too often.

Pedants corer. Nope. It started in Happy trails then moved further up the road to Rosemount Viaduct (no. 75 if I recall). Hippy and 75 co-existed for as long as it need to shift the stock ie. over the weekend?). George St and 75 RV co-existed though as I thought I said as I never understood why have two shops and two sets of overheads. Made sense to move into one in Diamond St.

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Ah the Saturday vinyl trawl - wonderful memories ! Grooves,Thistle,Bruce Millers,1-up (Rosemount),The Other Record Shop plus chains that had record depts (and therefore sales!!!) like Menzies,Boots,etc Just ain't the same anymore *sigh*

Shame about Fopp if it's true :down:

Woolies used to do ex chart singles cheap!

Aye, I shame about Fopp indeed.

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Hippy and 75 co-existed for as long as it need to shift the stock ie. over the weekend?).

Nope. They operated side by side for a lot longer - or another firm (the one with the big hall in Fountainbridge) took over HT's buisness. I went between the two stores for some considrable time.

Didn't go down the George St stores much tho. They always seemed the poor relations for stock to me.

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Nope. They operated side by side for a lot longer - or another firm (the one with the big hall in Fountainbridge) took over HT's buisness. I went between the two stores for some considrable time.

Some body else moved in to the back of HT (but it wasn't 1 Up). Great we are both right!

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Woolies used to do ex chart singles cheap!

Was it not Telemech in Marischal St who used to do the old wooden Hay's lemonade boxes full of Ex-DJ singles for pennies, along with the hole adaptors at a stupid price? I got loads from there IIRC.

And bashed my head more than a few times on the low door to the basement! :D

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Firstly, Viva 1Up, best in town, I first went there in 1983 when it was on Rosemount Viaduct. 1st purchase? 'I am, I'm Me' by Twisted Sister on 7", it has always been the only recordshop with musical integrity in town, back then the only real competition was from the Other Record Shop, apart from that there was Woolies branches, the aforementioned Telemech and Thistle Records down Ashvale Place (I don't count Newmarket Tapes)

Secondly though, Fopp has been good, essentially through correct charging for back catalogue. A fiver for an old album that long since redeemed the cost of its recording is a fair price for all concerned. The Aberdeen Markies branch used to have good vinyl and I bought many a thing there, and anything that allows other stores to charge up to a tenner for old catalogue is sheer robbery, and cannot be countenanced. So I hope it stays open, Fuck Beardo Branson, the man is obviously some kind of sociopath anyway.

I will check the Byres Rd branch and report back.

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The Rosemount Viaduct were the glory days though. I remember people being scared of going in there because of Scars and Hen.

.

Scars? was that the punk bloke with a Ghengis Khan-esque topknot? I was only 12 when I first went in, so it was scary a bit, but also one of the coolest places I had ever seen up to that point.

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Scars? was that the punk bloke with a Ghengis Khan-esque topknot? I was only 12 when I first went in, so it was scary a bit, but also one of the coolest places I had ever seen up to that point.

Did he have a top knot? He may have at some point. Probably. He was called Scars because he had Scars painted on the back of his leather. After the Embra band.

I know, how stunningly original and who could have ever thought that one up?

Does anyone remember the original (?) Fopp in Glasgow? Down from the end of Sauchiehall St somewhere near a multiplex cinema if I recall... I quite liked that one and usually bought something every time I was in the locality. I was never impressed with the Embra branch though (I guess it could never match the personal service I got from Avalanche).

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I think what Kimy is saying that your musical purchases (and by extension taste) appears to be dictated purely by price i.e what ends up in the sales rack, rather than any other factor. Put simply if it aint cheap you aint buying it.

Yeah I know, it was just a stupid thing to say.

Everyone is referring to a "sales rack". Why? Half the CDs in the entire shop are a fiver or under.

I don't buy CDs because they are cheap. What would be the point in that? I'll give an example - last week I bought an older Tom MacRae album, having purchased the latest one and enjoyed it. At Fopp, it cost me a fiver, in Virgin it was 11.99

In conclusion, Kimy is a tit.

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Secondly though, Fopp has been good, essentially through correct charging for back catalogue. A fiver for an old album that long since redeemed the cost of its recording is a fair price for all concerned.

True. Though, not all the CDs that are cheap are THAT old. I got the latest Muse album for 5 a couple of days ago.

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I don't buy CDs because they are cheap. What would be the point in that? I'll give an example - last week I bought an older Tom MacRae album, having purchased the latest one and enjoyed it. At Fopp, it cost me a fiver, in Virgin it was 11.99.

There's just nothing like an isolated example to act as a generalisation for an entire argument!!

In reality, there's no debate as, clearly, we have different music tastes. Recently I've rarely been able to find anything I want in Aberdeen, let alone for under a tenner.

Talking of second-hand sections - Amazon..

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There's just nothing like an isolated example to act as a generalisation for an entire argument!!

In reality, there's no debate as, clearly, we have different music tastes. Recently I've rarely been able to find anything I want in Aberdeen, let alone for under a tenner.

Talking of second-hand sections - Amazon..

Agreed. I just don't like being told what my music taste is/how I decide it by some random who doesn't really know what they're talking about.

Moving on, Amazon market place is quality. Have you ever had problems with people not sending you stuff? I find it's a lot more reliable than ebay.

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Amazon market place is quality. Have you ever had problems with people not sending you stuff? I find it's a lot more reliable than ebay.

IME, Amazon marketplace can be bloody awful for getting stuff IME. If they don't have it in stock & waiting, forgret it. Even then, so many are dealers who will list an item as stocked but only start looking for it when you place an order - Most usually fruitlessly. There is a name for this practice, which I forget.

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Was in Fopp on Cockburn Street on Saturday and there were massive gaps on the racks. Looked like they weren't restocking at all. The website was also not taking any orders (and still seems not to be).

The problem with Fopp is that they opened far too many stores far to quickly at a time when the demand for CDs was dropping off dramatically. Why they opened the branch on Rose Street (literally three minutes walk from Cockburn Street), I'll never know. Instead of having one really good shop, they had two pretty poorly stocked ones. It was of course even better back in the day when it was on the other side of Cockburn Street and just a wee independent franchise.

Avalanche is also down to one store now - used to be 4 in Edinburgh at its peak - and they've kept open what is (in my opinion anyway) the worst one, on Cockburn Street (and the stock in it is shit). The best one was the tiny wee one on Lady Lawson Street which inspite of only having a few hundred CDs always, ALWAYS had what you went in for. Plus the bloke behind the counter was a really good lad.

And of course, HMV and Virgin will just bump their prices in the face of reduced competition.

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