By Thommygirl_70 (152.163.252.68) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 02:15 am:

Hi everyone! I was getting ready to take a trip to NYC pretty soon and I was wondering if anyone who lives in the New York City area would know of any oldies recordstores and shops that have musical memorabilia and obscure soul music collector's items that people may purchase? Thanks a lot in advance

By John Lester (213.123.134.112) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 02:20 am:

Thommygirl_70

Blecker Street has a few nice shops that are worth looking at

Try also St Mark's Place

Both are at in the Greenwich Village area.

and if you find any rare Tammi tracks..you make sure you tell us about them!! Have fun

By Funkyone D J Dollar BILL (216.221.81.96) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 02:29 am:

A-1 Records 439 E. 6th St. between 1st Ave. & A
This is my favorite shop in the city.I am hoping to get back down in August and meet KevGo.

By Eli (151.197.181.206) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 09:47 am:

Thommygirl,

It might be worth your while to come down to Philly for a day and visit Val Shivelys, R&B records on Garrett rd in Upper Darby for he has one of the largest inventories of "oldies" a 5,000,000 and counting!!
The phone # is 610-352-2520.

By keithsally50@hotmail.com (217.137.88.64) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 10:14 am:

Eli. I agree about Philly and the sign painted on his wall as you approach from the Media side is awesome. But I can't shop there too well as nothing is priced! Val obviously likes it that way but how does anyone else who has been there cope? Thommygirl, if you drive down to Philly, call in at Princeton Records on the way. Keith

By Eli (151.197.181.206) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 10:57 am:

Keith,
I agree that Val's records should definitely be priced and put into a data base as well.
There is a vast amount of inventory and more coming every day but there should be a system devised for the buyer's benefit.
He is the biggest on the East Coast though.

By Soul Sister (68.73.167.246) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 12:12 pm:

Tommygirl;
Check out the folowing record stores:

1. Colony Records on Broadway & 49th. St.by the Brill Building *Tin Pan Allley, where music was happening back in the day, and originally started.
2. Footlight Records 113 E.12th. Street
3. Smash Records St. Mark's Place, East Village
4. Can't think of the name of that store but its on Bleeker St. in the West (Greenwich) Village (I know use to be a good one).
5. Bobby Robinson's St. Nicholas Ave. right off W.125th. St. down from the Apollo, for a nastalgia trip!
6. Mooncruiser Records on City Island in the Bronx, the owner is Roger Roberge he is a knowledgeable 82 year old if your looking for very rare & old 78's or our^50's & 60's 45's & LP's.
6. Stan's Square Records 737 Bergen Ave.(McKinley Square) Jersey City, N.J. just a 15- minute ride on the Path train from Manhattan, I HIGHLY reccomend this one, Stan & his wife Ewa are extremely knowledgeable about the business., it's players, the artists,& the music of R&B and Soul, plus has glossys & tons of memorbilia around, sells 33's, 45's & RARE SOUL CD's!
DJ's, collector's, recording artists often drop by there, particularly on a saturday afternoon.

All these places are in or close to the Manhattan vicinity. I hope this helps.
S.S.

By Soul Sister (68.73.167.246) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 12:17 pm:

Funkyone DJ Dollar Bill;
My girlfriend who lives in the east village told me about that one too, another great call!
A-1 Records, I'm only sorry I never checked it out when I lived there, have to do it on our next "gig" in N.Y.C. in October.
S.S.

By Thommygirl_70 (205.188.209.109) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 02:08 pm:

Thank you all soooooooooo much for all of this great information. I'm gonna definitely try to visit as many of these places as I can. You've provided me with some great stuff and LOL at John Lester!! You all have been very helpful!

By Greg C. (207.103.134.25) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 05:49 pm:

Check out Bondy's in downtown Manhattan on Park Row across from City Hall. They have an EXCELLENT selection of soul and R&B classics on CD. They also have an excellent assortment of import soul and R&B CD's as well. You'll go crazy because they have SO much to choose from! You'll swoon! I go there all of the time. The staff is friendly and knowledgeable.

By Common (152.163.252.68) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 06:10 pm:

Hello everyone!

I just picked up some additional places myself to go to do more extensive record hunting. Don't forget J&R music world has a huge oldies section upstairs. There also was a place called "Downstairs records" that sold old 45's but they moved from their location @ 43-44th & 6 Av. to the 30's(can't remember where). They may still be there. There are also a couple of record shops in Brooklyn that sell used CD's & LPs. I know where they are but their names escape me right now.

Soulsister: Colony's is not far from my workplace & to be honest, it's kinda steep. They do have old 33 LPs in good shape but be prepared to pay $$$$$. The other selections you posted, I will have to check out. I read about that one in the Bronx & I definitely need to get there! And the Jersey City record store sounds like a nice outing for a Saturday. Do you know what stop on the path train that you have to get off & how far it is from the station? The ones in the village that you mentioned are pretty reasonable. I buy at those shops all the time.

Eli: Is that record store far from a bus/train station? I would like to go there as well.

Wow! I just picked up some cool record spots myself & can't wait to visit them. Thommygirl, if you'd like to hook up, I'd be more than happy to join you on your record hunt. Let me know. :o)

By Soul Sister (68.73.167.246) on Sunday, June 29, 2003 - 06:38 pm:

Common;
Downstairs Records have been out of business for several years now, my good friend Steve Nicholas was the manager, he works with DJ Felix Hernandez "Rhythm Revue" best R&B/Soul music & rare records & artists history on the radio!

Colony is the highest price in town but you can find some 331/3 goodies there. George my friend for over 35 years is still there, he knew me thru my Jive Five days when I lived in their 'çrib' on 49th. Street, then when I was with "Smitty", now with Jimmy, we went in to say "Hello" to him last year.

Stan's is definately worth a visit, tell him I sent you there, we are old friends since my "Smitty" days, you may even run into one of the guys from Soul Generation or other groups.
You take the Path that goes to Newark, get off at Journal Square in Jersey City then walk a couple miles down Bergen Avenue heading south/east, just ask anyone where McKinley Square is, or take the Bergen Avenue bus it goes straight down Bergen Ave to Montgomery Street, cross it,and walk straight up half way up the block and your there, or take a cab, its not too far from the Path station. Have fun!!! I'm going there in October when I'm in town.
S.S.

By Common (209.2.55.170) on Monday, June 30, 2003 - 10:36 am:

Hello everyone,

Soulsister: Awwww, man, I didn't know that Downstairs went out of business. I used to love to go there to buy my 45s. Speaking of Felix, he now comes on KISS, 98.7 on Sundays from 7-9pm. It was a real treat listening to him last nite.

You're right about Colony having some cool LP treasures. I used to in there just look at some of the LP covers. I noticed that they pushed alot of LPs to the back & now it's mostly CDs they have now.

Thanks for the instructions on how to get to there. I'll definitely will be checking that out.

Aside: I read that Chaka Khan is supposed to be in Central Park this Saturday @ 3pm. Does anyone know if this is so? Thanks.

Peace!

By Soul Sister (68.73.167.246) on Monday, June 30, 2003 - 10:42 am:

Common;
Yes, I was disapointed too, Downstairs was, and my man Stan still is best in the vicinity!!
S.S.

By Soul Sister (68.73.167.246) on Monday, June 30, 2003 - 10:42 am:

Common;
Yes, I was disapointed too, Downstairs was, and my man Stan still is best in the vicinity!!
S.S.

By KevGo (64.115.26.80) on Monday, June 30, 2003 - 11:12 am:

Hey Folks:
Thommygirl - I'd be more than happy to meet with you when you come to the Big Apple. My office is on West 49th Street and Eighth Avenue, diagonally across the street from the headquarters of Universal Music Group (825 Eighth Ave).

First, Colony Music cut down their vinyl department two summers ago (I know because I remember when they were dumping a lot of their records in the garbage & my office is right on West 49th Street). Still, I would not buy any records from Colony (sorry, Soul Sister!). As Common said, their prices are way too steep even for a collector like myself.

Grec C. is right on regarding Bondy's on Park Row - excellent selection of oldies and soul on CD. It's right next to J&R Music World, which also has a strong oldies/soul and import section (I do believe they sell a lot of discontinued LPs as well).

In the Village, the following stores sell vinyl and are pretty affordable:

Bleeker Street Records - great LP section, especially R&B

Vinylmania (60 Carmine St) - classic dance records & CDs

Subterranean Records (5 Cornelia St) - WONDERFUL store filled with tons of LPs from the classic soul eras.

Bleecker Bob's (118 West 3rd St) - rock/soul LPs for cheap and lots of 45s

Rockit Scientist (43 Carmine St)- rock/soul/jazz LPs; decent selection

Also in Harlem, check out Rainbow Music Shop (102 West 125th St). Great selection of Gospel/R&B and the owner (her name is Phyllis) is a real sweetheart - she'll help you find what you want.

Finally, if you walk around Manhattan near the Village or around the Upper West Side, you'll see people sell records on the street along with books and knick-knacks. Many of these folks do not have a license to sell records on a public street (believe it or not, it is required), they do it anyway. You may be able to negotiate with these folks but make absolutely sure you check the records inside the jackets before you buy (I know it sounds stupid but trust me, you'd be surprised). Do I know of any such "vendors"? Well......let's just say my vinyl collection damned near quadrupled thanks to these thrifty "vendors".

Hope this helps and please email me directly as to when you'll be in the Big Apple so we can hook up.

Regards,
Kevin Goins - KevGo
kevingoins@juno.com

By Thommygirl_70 (64.12.97.7) on Monday, June 30, 2003 - 04:36 pm:

Wow, it looks like I'm gonna be quite busy on my day down in NYC! Thanks everyone for all of this information, and thank you both ((Common)) and ((Kevin)) for offering to show me around. I appreciate that so much I live about two hours away from Manhattan. I was gonna meet up with my father and he and I were going to drive down and visit as many of these stores as we can....attempting to get a parking space in NYC is gonna be quite an adventure tho, I know it,lol! But we were gonna make a day of it anyway and just have some fun! I have been to Bleeker Bob's before in Greenwich village and they have some cool stuff there. Thanks to all of you, I now know plenty of other good places to go to as well! Thank you all again for your help.
Cheers!