I used to enjoy delving in the basement of Raves’ late lamented Warminster store. Huge space with lots of alcoves and you never knew what you would find there. Particularly good for easy listening, soul and pop. You could spend a whole afternoon there lost amongst racks and crates and rarely see another person. Very dusty too so sneezing fits inevitable.
On Record Store Day they were great as the queues were small compared with Frome !
Gramex - weird place not far from Waterloo. Most of the staff looked well beyond retirement age. Reminded me of Gringots !
Memories - Bayes Recordium in King’s Lynn - four of us crammed into a listening booth for the new Hatfield & The North - all smoking natch!
As a teenager I remember the Essex / Suffolk branches of Parrot Records well, as we used to stay with relatives who lived near Colchester every summer. I spent quite a bit of money in the shops in Colchester and Ipswich. I didn’t realise they had a branch in Kent.
Used to enjoy browsing through the racks at Acorn Records in Yeovil, back in the 70s and 80s. Apparently PJ Harvey used to pop in regularly a bit later. The store survived until the 2000s, when surviving founder Chris retired. Particularly strong I recall on prog rock.
Met Chris a few times when I visited the store with one of the sales team I used to manage, really nice guy.
Just come across a picture on the website provided by Andy P from 25 years ago that I was in…
Another shop I got the boot from. Called them and asked if they had a CD it was £12.99 and asked if they would do it for £10 as I’d seen it at £9.99
Went over there after work and they said it’s £12.99 I said you said you’d do it for £10. Chap behind the counter asked me to step outside and got me up against the wall saying don’t come in here again.
The joys of record collecting in London.
Thank you Ray (who are now in Foyles).
Wow - was that in Ray’s? Usually a fairly benign experience when I was in there in the Shaftesbury Avenue store but like Mole Jazz, the counter staff could be a bit remote and intimidating to us mere mortals.
Mole was an ‘experience’. Bobby Wellins apparently frequented the Kings Cross shop and said that the view of balding middle aged punters flipping privately through the racks reminded him of a public urinal !
Yes - it was a bit of a shock. It’s all a bit more civilised in Foyles nowadays.
Carnival Records, Malvern
wonderful friendly store with wide range of new/used vinyl . Listed by the Guardian in its 10 best stores !!!
Knowledgable and friendly staff, my wife is now deeply concerned as I am on first name terms with them , rare i ever leave empty handed and always have long chats on prog rock, krautrock etc.
It reminds me very much of the original virgin records at the far end of corporation street in Birmingham, same vibe and where i spent many an hour and cash from 1971-75
Stephen
In my young days buying LPs in the late seventies I used to go to ‘Terry Blood’ and ‘The Spin Inn’ and a small shop called ‘Jackson’s’ I think which was on Nantwich Road, all of which were in Crewe. Perhaps a long shot but does anyone remember these? When I went to study in Manchester I found ‘Robinson’s Records’ in Blackfriars St, as you enter Salford over the River Irwell.
I was in there yesterday close to Cambridge Circus and bought nothing. A couple of years ago the ground floor usually had 4 or 5 CDs I wanted to buy but always at competitive prices. No longer, everything at full price and too much space for T shirts and DVDs. I walked away thinking I probably won’t go back, made me feel a little bit sad to be honest. Browsing in record stores has been a pastime for me for decades.
Didn’t recognise you without your staff, David. 
When I was a teenager in the late seventies my first stop for records in Birmingham was the basement of WH Smith in Union St. Subdued lighting, smell of plastic LP covers, brown carpet and sepia toned glass. How times change. When I was last in Birmingham (2019) I visited the WH Smith which is now basically a newsagent with one floor only and what seemed to be the same brown carpet. Mentioned the basement to a sales assistant who looked blank.
Seismic Records in Leamington Spa, not huge but a great range, run by Stu who is one of the nicest people you could hope to meet. If second hand is your thing Leamington Records have a reasonable selection.
By 1979 I was working close by at the Trident electrical store in Dale End, which is now the HMV Vault. I remember buying lps in WH Smiths. Most lunchbreaks would be spent in the local record shops…still a favourite past time.
In Nelson Lancashire there is the music box
Kevin the owner sells new , old ,records ,cd, and dvd
Very friendly fella and a huge selection at very good prices
He also has a shop in colne I’ve not visited that shop so can’t comment much
The Nelson shop is open Monday to Friday he’s shut Saturday as he goes to the other shop
I remember my local WH Smiths in the 70s having racks full of US deletions - Atlantic, Stax, Motown etc.
