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Tower records online store8/12/2023 The documentary film this month, “All Things Must Pass,” about the rise and fall of Tower Records, is a kind of rock ’n’ roll syllabus of teachable moments about money and business, including how to launch a startup. For many, it was a kind of temple for worshippers of music. stores 18 years ago this week. The chain was much more than iTunes in brick-and-mortar form. One of those missed spaces included Tower Records, which closed its last U.S. In 2015, Colin Hanks directed All Things Must Pass, a documentary covering the rise and fall of Tower Records and its founder, Russ Solomon.Do you pine for a retail space that was important to you but is no more? We got a big response from listeners when we asked that question a while back. The movie, which starred Brad Pitt, George Clooney, John Malkovich and Frances McDormand, turned the vacant record store into Hardbodies Gym. The 2008 Coen Brothers film, Burn After Reading, used the former Tower Records building in Paramus as one of its filming locations. Mick Jagger visit: Rolling Stones got satisfaction at Tick Tock in Clifton before MetLife show Life after Tower Records Nostalgia: 20 NJ stores we used to love to shop at that are now out of business Saying goodbye: After 40 years, teacher supply store Bosland's will soon close its doors Today, the building retains its shape, but its red hue is tinted blue. The chain had amassed too much debt in a race for global expansion amid the continuing rise of digital downloads. Tower held on until 2006, when it declared bankruptcy. In 1999, the music-sharing program Napster debuted online and transmitted Tower Records’ product for free to homes worldwide. The company doubled down after the advent of the MP3 and sold a nine-figure bond in 1998 to support its global dominance. Locally-based bands such as Dream Theater and Dog Eat Dog performed at the store.ĭirector Ernest Dickerson, former New York Yankee Willie Randolph and Gordon Willis, the cinematographer who shot The Godfather, browsed the video section.ĭuring the CD boom of the 1990s, Tower Records may have trusted its ability to draw customers too much. The Ramones, the Misfits, Anthrax and Steven Van Zandt of the E Street Band and The Sopranos signed autographs there. Bright, bold banners declared sales beyond the full-length storefront glass. Patrons packed the narrow aisles, peering behind white plastic dividers to find gems amid a thin forest of red load-bearing poles. There’s still one in Tokyo.īefore it closed in 2006, the Paramus store was a magnet for music fans seeking new records, deep cuts, and wristbands that gave them a chance to buy concert tickets. The buyers were so influential - shaping sales charts through their selections - and the company so ubiquitous that Tower Records was permitted to return as much as 20 percent of its unsold records.Īt its height, Solomon’s yellow-and-red empire had nearly 200 stores around the world. The strategy worked at scale because Tower Records buyers had the ability to take risks, while buying at deep discount. The “deep catalog” strategy would keep even hyper-focused genre divers intrigued. At 16, founder Russ Solomon cobbled together a vast inventory in the back of his Sacramento, Calif., shop, Tower Drugstore. Turntables on hip-high shelves let patrons sample music, as long as they were willing to share an earphone with a friend. The transmission, however, was social, gradual and often more informative. The concept was real-life Pandora - if you like this song, then you’ll probably like this other one. Selections were made to bring people in and keep them coming back. There was so much mystery, these things just popping out - Nirvana and Pearl Jam and all these great bands.”Īkin to today’s eclectic curators of Spotify playlists, the buyers for Tower Records stores had liberty to select the records, cassette tapes and CDs that would hit the slanted racks.įrom country to rock, employees were assigned to buy music to stock their particular sections, so they had to know local tastes for example, in New Jersey, there would be a lot more Springsteen titles available. “I’d go there with my parents and they’d be like, ‘You get two CDs,’” he told Billboard in 2014.
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