THESE FORUMS NOW CLOSED (read only)

  • 26 Jun 2025, 12:53
  • Welcome, Guest
Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Advanced search  
Pages: [1]   Go Down

Author Topic: London Indie Cd stores  (Read 7525 times)

Grumpus

  • Guest
London Indie Cd stores
« on: 07 Apr 2006, 18:46 »
In a about a week I will be going on a trip wih my family to Spain, France & finally London.

While I'm in London I'm looking to purchase some music so If anyone knows any really good stores then it'd be nice if they could post a location and a description, thanks.
Logged

Inlander

  • coprophage
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 7,152
  • Hug your local saintly donkey.
    • Instant Life Substitute
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #1 on: 07 Apr 2006, 18:52 »
To tell the truth, I did most of my C.D. shopping in London at the Virgin and H.M.V. megastores on Oxford Street.  Yeah, not very "indie", but they're absolutely huge and the range is mind-boggling.  If I can go to one store and buy a Richard Hell C.D., a Nanci Griffith C.D., a Ewan MacColl C.D., and a Betty Carter C.D., it gets a thumbs up from me.

And for a couple of vague and perhaps not very useful recommendations: if you like soul there's a good store the name of which I can't remember, in a suburb I can't remember, right on the edge of Zone 1/Zone 2 for the underground.  It's in the Yellow Pages.  For jazz, a pretty handy shop is upstairs from a famous (and large) independent book shop I also can't remember the name of, on Charing Cross Road.
Logged

edscoble

  • Guest
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #2 on: 07 Apr 2006, 18:55 »
Portobello Road mate, brilliant market, lots of privately owned CD/Vinyl shop where you can pick up a classic from next to nowt, geezer know what they're talking about there, expect them pretentious cunt.

Saturday the best time to visit Portobello Road, it's at Notting Hill Gate, take the district line to get there (that's the green line)

Covent Garden a good one, tad more expensive fort, there's literally million of those cool little indies street in London, London practically spewed out Indies in certain area, lots of great music store like me local v



Quote from: Inlander
To tell the truth, I did most of my C.D. shopping in London at the Virgin and H.M.V. megastores on Oxford Street.  Yeah, not very "indie", but they're absolutely huge and the range is mind-boggling.  


he's right about that, even thought it's a chain store, (HMV's better) they have everything every CD from A to Z, without missing anything, thought the experience won't be that much, I can find the oldest Decemberists CD which most privately owned CD shop probably never heard of it and still playing the fucking sex pistols, and I like the sex pistols, but for sod sake, STOP PLAYING IT!.

Quote from: Inlander
if you like soul there's a good store the name of which I can't remember, in a suburb I can't remember, right on the edge of Zone 1/Zone 2 for the underground.


yeah, that'll narrow it down, no name, no station, and the edge of Zone 1 has already got too many stations as it is, Mornington crescent? Liverpool Street? Aldgate East? London Bridge? Elephant and Castle? Vauxhall? Earl's Court? Notting Hill Gate? High Street Kensington? Paddington? St. John's Wood? Royal Oak? Great Portland Street? etc?.

suburban usually Zone 3.
Logged

KharBevNor

  • Awakened
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 10,456
  • broadly tolerated
    • http://mirkgard.blogspot.com/
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #3 on: 08 Apr 2006, 01:03 »
The Virgin Megastore in London is insane. I almost cried with joy upon entering it. It had seperate sections for hardcore, nu-metal, goth and metal, ALL WITH THE CORRECT BANDS IN THEM. The metal section was absolutely incredible...I could have spent easily £1000 there.
Logged
[22:25] Dovey: i don't get sigquoted much
[22:26] Dovey: like, maybe, 4 or 5 times that i know of?
[22:26] Dovey: and at least one of those was a blatant ploy at getting sigquoted

http://panzerdivisio

edscoble

  • Guest
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #4 on: 08 Apr 2006, 02:39 »
sometime in Virgin you'd get the most elaborate cutest gothic ever working there.
Logged

Inlander

  • coprophage
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 7,152
  • Hug your local saintly donkey.
    • Instant Life Substitute
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #5 on: 08 Apr 2006, 05:36 »
Quote from: edscoble
Quote from: Inlander
if you like soul there's a good store the name of which I can't remember, in a suburb I can't remember, right on the edge of Zone 1/Zone 2 for the underground.


yeah, that'll narrow it down, no name, no station, and the edge of Zone 1 has already got too many stations as it is, Mornington crescent? Liverpool Street? Aldgate East? London Bridge? Elephant and Castle? Vauxhall? Earl's Court? Notting Hill Gate? High Street Kensington? Paddington? St. John's Wood? Royal Oak? Great Portland Street? etc?.

suburban usually Zone 3.


Well that was the facetious part of the post!  But they had an ad in the yellow pages when I was there, it was the only shop that proclaimed themselves to be soul specialists, so if you wanted to find them I'm sure you could.

Also, "suburb" has a different meaning in Australia to the rest of the world.  We'd call Kensington, say, or Chelsea,  a "suburb".  Because it's a locality in a city that has a unique name, basically.
Logged

KharBevNor

  • Awakened
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 10,456
  • broadly tolerated
    • http://mirkgard.blogspot.com/
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #6 on: 08 Apr 2006, 15:21 »
I wouldn't. The Virgin megastore had full selections of Amorphis and Agalloch CDs. This just has the big, and generally shit, names of metal, and thinks Aerosmith and Alice Cooper are metal. And (one CD of) Anorexia Nervosa is in a goth section which is pretty much bare essentials. A British record store claiming some sort of redeeming quality and obscurantism and stocking no Killing Miranda or Carfax Abbey CDs? Not to mention not even any Bal-Sagoth in the metal section? Jeez, they're a big band! I'm not even gonna bother looking for Ewigkeit, Crimson Altar or the Meads of Asphodel.

Not my sort of place. Obviously doesn't care about niche interests beyond covering their bases. I'm sure their indie collection is astounding, but meh, fuck 'em.
Logged
[22:25] Dovey: i don't get sigquoted much
[22:26] Dovey: like, maybe, 4 or 5 times that i know of?
[22:26] Dovey: and at least one of those was a blatant ploy at getting sigquoted

http://panzerdivisio

edscoble

  • Guest
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #7 on: 08 Apr 2006, 15:43 »
it's always varies on the store, remember the staff put them in the catalogue, fulham boardway Virgin has everything in the each order, but the one in Brixton is completely like a mix'n'max section
Logged

Kai

  • ASDFSFAALYG8A@*& ^$%O
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4,847
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #8 on: 09 Apr 2006, 11:45 »
Too bad most of the indie stores here blow. Except for the FUCKING HUGE one that has lotsa jazz n avant garde shit. But it's closing soon, so.
Logged
Quote from: Mr. Doctor on 21 Sep 2009, 12:01
but the music sucks because the keyboards don't have the cold/mechanical sound they had but a wannabe techno sound that it's pathetic for Rammstein standars.

Inlander

  • coprophage
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 7,152
  • Hug your local saintly donkey.
    • Instant Life Substitute
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #9 on: 09 Apr 2006, 16:23 »
Quote from: tommydski
when push comes to shove, you should really be supporting the independent record store. you already know why at heart, so i'm not going to bore you with my heavy-handed moral bullshit.


The way I look at it is: I'll preferentially shop at the indie store, but if they don't have what I want and the big chain-store does then I'm buying it today from the chain-store insetad of waiting three weeks for it to be ordered in by the indie store.
Logged

Kai

  • ASDFSFAALYG8A@*& ^$%O
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4,847
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #10 on: 09 Apr 2006, 16:40 »
Exactly.


In other news, as much as I hate to say it, Borders has a fairly good CD collection. Can anyone say fucking Crotchduster?
Logged
Quote from: Mr. Doctor on 21 Sep 2009, 12:01
but the music sucks because the keyboards don't have the cold/mechanical sound they had but a wannabe techno sound that it's pathetic for Rammstein standars.

nescience

  • Guest
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #11 on: 10 Apr 2006, 02:05 »
Go to Rough Trade so you can say you've been to Rough Trade.  The selection isn't bad either.
Logged

pat101

  • 1-800-SCABIES
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 814
    • A Minor Mass
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #12 on: 11 Apr 2006, 20:36 »
Quote from: tommydski
i know what you mean. i don't support indie stores that have stupidly high prices obviously. even i will go to a chain eventually if i can't find it in an indie.

however, if you go to a megastore you will miss out on an essential part of every young punks life - having a crush on the older hot chick that works at the independent record store. *sigh*


ahh been there.
Logged

trolley

  • Guest
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #13 on: 12 Apr 2006, 01:52 »
I shop at HMV and Virgin at Bluewater. Shopping to support the indie stores is a nice idea, but there's a reason they smell and are only open 4 hours a day.


It's because they're crap.
Logged

Bumface

  • Guest
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #14 on: 12 Apr 2006, 03:08 »
Quote from: KharBevNor
The Virgin Megastore in London is insane. I almost cried with joy upon entering it. It had seperate sections for hardcore, nu-metal, goth and metal, ALL WITH THE CORRECT BANDS IN THEM. The metal section was absolutely incredible...I could have spent easily £1000 there.


Was it quite a while ago you went there? Because that sounds like what I remember their downstairs used to be like. They turned that into a musical instruments and equipment store a couple of years ago.

Although I just realised you never mentioned the Oxford St one specficially, but that tends to be the one people refer to. Either way, the Oxford St one really is awful, shit range, shit prices.

Oxford St HMV and a few of the little ones down Berwick St (side street roughly opposite HMV) like Sister Ray, Reckless Records and Music/Video Exchange are all pretty decent places to buy records.
Logged

amok

  • Duck attack survivor
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1,834
  • low AI ketamine android
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #15 on: 12 Apr 2006, 10:16 »
Quote from: KharBevNor
and obscurantism and stocking no Killing Miranda or Carfax Abbey CDs?


Sorry to totally hijack this thread, but do Carfax Abbey have more than one CD then? I have "Second Skin" and love it, but due to the incredibly tiny amount of information about them available on the internet, I've not been able to find a discography or anything.

Back on topic, Resurrection Records in Camden is really good for industrial, goth and metal stuff. They have lots of old 80s goth vinyls and stuff. It's a fun store to poke around in. Metal selection is a bit limited though, on account of the size of the shop. (It's the basement of a headshop, quite clearly signposted on the outside though.)
Logged

nescience

  • Guest
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #16 on: 12 Apr 2006, 13:41 »
Quote from: trolley
I shop at HMV and Virgin at Bluewater. Shopping to support the indie stores is a nice idea, but there's a reason they smell and are only open 4 hours a day.


It's because they're crap.


See, this is why Amoeba Records in San Francisco is hands-down the best record store in the world.

Because it's good.
Logged

tomgadd

  • Guest
London Indie Cd stores
« Reply #17 on: 19 Apr 2006, 07:07 »
Quote from: nescience
Go to Rough Trade so you can say you've been to Rough Trade.  The selection isn't bad either.


Haha, I love Rough Trade.
I got my AiH and British Sea Power there, and also a nostalgiac (and practically antique) Conflict first-printing of "Employing All Means Necessary." That one is on my wall. The other two are on my ipod.
Logged
Pages: [1]   Go Up
« previous next »