Record Store Day is held on one Saturday in April every year. this year it will be celebrated on April 20. The first Record Store Day took place on April 19, 2008, to celebrate the culture of independently owned record stores across the United States. As the day grew and gained more recognition — record stores from other countries began celebrating the day.
Today, Record Store Day is celebrated on every continent except Antarctica. The day aims to celebrate every individual who contributes to the existence of independently owned record stores — the staff, the artists and the customers. It is celebrated on a different day every year.
- 1877 – Thomas Edison invents the phonograph.
- 1894 – Reported as the oldest record store in the world, Spillers Record in Cardiff, Wales, was founded in this year.
- 1925 – Digital recording is made possible by “Western Electric.”
- 1945 – Magnetic tape recording is made available to allied powers.
- 1948 – The first vinyl record was introduced in 1948 and since then, vinyl records have been a popular way to listen to music.
- 2007 – Dreamed up at a gathering of independent record store owners, National Record Store Day is created
- 2008 – On April 19, Record Store Day is founded. With the mission to promote the more than 1400 independently owned record stores in the US and thousands worldwide.
- 2009 – Recognizing how important independent record stores are to musicians, Jesse “Boots Electric” Hughes from Eagles of Death Metal proclaims himself the ambassador.
- 2019 – Located in Birmingham, England, HMV Vault opens its doors and is considered the world’s largest at the time of opening.
- The grooves on a vinyl record are incredibly small, usually less than a thousandth of an inch wide.
- Sony, in collaboration with Philips, created the very first compact disk (C.D.) to store recorded sound.
- The first edition of The Beatles’ “White Album No. 000001” is the rarest vinyl album.
- The Beatles are the best-selling artists of all time.
- A song that gets stuck in your head is called an “earworm.”
- Monaco has more people in its military band than it does in its army.
- The most expensive vinyl record is certainly not the most collectible because, well, only one was ever made. In 2015, hip hop group Wu-Tang Clan produced a single copy of Once Upon a Time in Shaolin. The album was purchased for 2 million dollars.
- Finland has the most metal bands per capita.
- Each year, a list of special releases is prepared exclusively for National Record Store Day. These often include limited edition vinyl records, picture discs, and box sets by a wide range of artists, from up-and-coming bands to established acts.
- National Record Store Day has been credited with spurring a resurgence in vinyl record sales. This event has helped vinyl become popular again, with sales reaching heights not seen since the 1980s.
- Sam Goody history –
- 1938 Sam Gutowitz, a toy-and-novelty shop owner in lower Manhattan, was asked by a customer if he had any records for sale. “Why records?” Gutowitz asked quizzically, believing such discs were antiquated relics. The customer said that he’d pay well for the titles he was after. So Gutowitz promptly (and cheaply) packed up a pile of old 78s that he’d noticed in his apartment building’s basement and re-sold them to the customer for a cool $25 – the Depression-era equivalent of more than $400 today. So began the new career of Gutowitz, better known as Sam Goody, founder of the first independently owned record store chain in the United States. The Sam Goody chain filed for bankruptcy in 2006.
- Vinyl albums come in a variety of formats, including 12-inch LP (long play) records, 10-inch records, and 7-inch singles. Each format has its own unique sound and musical characteristics, making them appealing to different types of music lovers.
- Vinyl record sales surged during the pandemic growing 29%, as music lovers fattened their collections, and audio cassettes began a comeback as well, keeping business spinning at record stores.
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