Just an average night at the Hollywood Tower Records Store in 1971

[Frantic]

Man, do I long for these days. The film was made by Sacramento City College professor Darrell Forney in 1971 and shows customers shopping in the store in the evening.

https://archive.org/details/casacsh_000018

 

[HarvestmanMan]

Man, do I long for these days.

I'm with you there. I'd give anything just to see the cutout bins!

 

[Frantic]

I'm with you there. I'd give anything just to see the cutout bins!

99 cent lp's by Stooges, Kak, Velvet Underground etc.

 

[greenfuzz]

I spent most of my 20s in a Tower Records store somewhere.

 

[beccabear67]

And then came the announcement of shame... "Price check on Tiny Tim on 8-Track." The entire store turned to see. Lester quickly hid behind a display of the new Hollies album.

 

[Rich Strauss]

I was living in Santa Monica in 1971. I frequented the Sunset Strip Tower store. But in one viewing of the documentary, I didn't see myself. Cool film, though. Took me back.

-- Rich

 

[Don Julio]

What a document! I went there once, in 2005.

 

[bosshoss]

I was there in 1976, and many times in 1981. It seemed different though, not quite so much stock piled up as seen in the film. It wasn't as good as Rather Ripped Records in SanFrancisco, which I also visited in 1976. Going back in time to visit that one would be something to really long for! They had piles of 13 Floor Elevators and Power Plant LPs, instead of George Harrison.
Maybe not "piles", but they had lots.

 

[depravedskippy66]

Would love to see the bargain bins as well as what was in the imports section. No doubt a lot of records that command stupid amounts of money in the here and now.

Of course, by the time Tower came to Massachusetts, the CD era was well underway.

 

[JohnH]

I remember when it was announced the chain was closing. I immediately thought about borrowing the video recorder at Rhino to document the place so that people could see what a real catalog record store looked like; by the time I got a little more serious about it, the store was pretty picked through. So I'm glad this exists!

I'm not sure if - beyond places that specialize in a particular style of music - there are any true catalog stores left (ie., ones where the buyers make it a point to stock older titles they considered worthy in the hopes they'd be discovered in the bins), though Amoeba here in L.A. comes close. Still have the couple things I snagged from Tower Sunset's last night...

 

[HarvestmanMan]

There's a place here in Cincy that still has thousands of old store stock LPs available for sale...in bulk. I don't believe they have any connection with any of the local stores and haven't heard from anyone who's bought from them - they're not bargain-bin material in most cases and are priced accordingly.

I believe Amoeba may be the closest modern equivalent...