MUSIC
Groove On
Record shops weather the pandemic as vinyl popularity flourishes Wuxtry Records in Decatur
By Mark Woolsey The dark-haired young lady knew exactly what she wanted. “What do you have by Minnie Riperton?” she asked Mark Methe, co-owner of Decatur’s Wuxtry Records. “Come with me and I’ll show you,” said the genial, somewhat garrulous senior, leading his prospective customer through a small store that’s a riot of organized clutter, a process that rinses-and-repeats regularly. You could say that Methe, pushing 70, has grown old in the service of vinyl, with his store having opened in 1978. Wuxtry is one of a half-dozen or so Intown independent spots specializing in vinyl, most of which have been around since the heyday of arena rock and disco. The mainly modest enterprises have been subject to two centers of gravity pulling them in different directions. One is the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to multimonth closures (except for online and curbside service in some cases) last spring. The other is increasing interest in vinyl, with healthy pressings of new product as well as re-issues from the days when CDs ruled the musical roost and pressings were an afterthought. Think albums like Nirvana’s “Nevermind.” It’s made for a roller coaster ride akin to watching the gyrations of a long-neglected and warped album. There’s Methe, who at one
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point used the term “scraping by” and points out “I never went to business school” while allowing that between his store and another location in Athens, they did about a million dollars’ worth of sales in 2020. He adds that they were closed for a couple of months during the first wave of the pandemic but that Christmas brought them a burst of sales. There are some numbers that pump up the volume on that last assertion. Billboard magazine, quoting Nielsen Music/MRC Data, says a record 1,842,000 records were sold in the week ending Dec. 24, buoyed by Christmas sales and easily eclipsing compact discs. That’s the highest number since Nielsen began tracking vinyl sales in 1991. The website Statista quotes Nielsen as saying vinyl sales grew for the 14th consecutive year in 2020. On the less rosy side, Wax’ n’ Facts, a longtimer in Little Five Points, closed for almost three months and resorted to a GoFundMe campaign which raised some $12,000 to stay afloat and cover employees lost wages. The store is also only open half its former hours and had to let a parttimer go. But not all of the previously pandemic-darkened stores are on an equal footing. Open since 1976, Buckhead mainstay Fantasyland Records has seen vinyl sales rise considerably, especially that of new product, despite their spring in the
MARCH 2021 | AtlantaSeniorLife.com
wilderness. “I would say for us it probably goes up 10% each year,” said longtime manager (since 1981) Mark Gunter, including 2020 in that skein. “We’ve been busier than ever since we reopened in mid-May. And we probably had our best in December in the past
five years.” Not only were vinyl purchases robust he added—their sale of turntables scored a five— year high. Gunter said a good percentage of sellers are those who stored their records away for a good long while, with many of them now downsizing. Rock is their biggest category. At Criminal Records in Little Five Points, you’ll find folks like Sean Zearfoss. No greybeard, he’s in his mid-30s but loves vinyl and is firmly in the camp of those regarding it as a warmer and richer-sounding medium than digital. “It’s kind of an experience,” he said. “Give me your best 40 minutes on a vinyl record and let’s see what you’ve got.” Zearfoss explained that “We’ve sold a lot of hip-hop and R&B in part, I think, because Atlanta really is a hip-hop town.” Childish Gambino’s “Awaken, my Love!” is the top seller in that space, he noted. Other stores said they’re sending customers out the door with plenty of Kanye West and Kendrick Lamar albums and that with their status as local icons, it’s hard to keep anything by Outkast in stock. But rock and classic rock is still
Wax ‘n Facts in Little Five Points
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