A Visit to the New Amoeba Records Hollywood

 

Chewie, we're home. (But for the record, as fun as it is to shop Amoeba, the store is so popular that it's nearly impossible to discover "finds" while digging through the stacks. The used stock is picked over, leaving mostly new albums.)

Help Save Amoeba Records

Donating to a business to keep it afloat seems a bit odd, but Amoeba Records isn't just any business. It's the last mega-sized record store in Los Angeles, in an age where stalwarts like Aron's, Rhino, Tower and Virgin Megastore went away, and only smaller stores still remain. It's still a wonderland where you can spend hours and never tire of discovering all sorts of finds. Which is why I wound up donating to a Go Fund Me (a clearly sentimental move that surprised even my own cheapskate self). After all, I don't want to live in a Los Angeles without Amoeba!

Amoeba is now halfway to its $400,000 goal — you can donate here.

My Variety colleague Chris Willman describes the draw, and why thousands of people like me have also donated, in an interview he did with Amoeba co-founder Marc Weinstein. Amoeba's 400 employees (between the Hollywood location and its two Bay Area spots) are currently furloughed, and the Hollywood location's move to a new spot — as its current location is about to be redeveloped — is in a bit of a limbo at the moment.

"We are launching the GoFundMe campaign before everyone’s tapped out to try to give our fans a chance to help us here," Weinstein told Willman. "There are still so many unanswered questions about where we’re going to end up. We’re really just trying to get to opening our new store on Hollywood Blvd. We have this cool new space and a plan to get in there. But between now and then, we are trying to get whatever resources we can to help with the move and help us cover our staff. Every one of our staff is on unemployment now. We’re chipping in, in that we’re covering all their benefits, making sure everybody has health. But otherwise, everyone that works for us is on unemployment right now. Including me."

Read more here.

Amoeba Records: Pre-Sad About Its Impending Move

Amoeba Music is moving, now that the City Council has approved a new 26-story tower on the site. But no one knows where Amoeba is moving to — and I can't imagine, wherever it ends up, that the new location will be nearly as large or exciting as its current digs.

Amoeba, of course, is the last of the great monster-sized music shops. There are still plenty of other record stores in Los Angeles, but none of them are very large. Stores like Rockaway Records have survived by downsizing their space. Large retailers like Tower Records and Virgin Megastore are long gone, and even decent-sized stores like Aron's Records have disappeared.

That's why we've got to savor the Amoeba Hollywood experience while we can. I spent several hours there on a recent Saturday night, and could have spent several hours more. 

Writes the L.A. Times: "The retailer’s Hollywood location, which opened to great fanfare in 2001, has been in a kind of holding pattern since news of the possible development came to light a few years ago. The store sold the building to developer GPI Cos. in 2015 for $34 million."

The Times also notes that Amoeba has repeatedly promised to reveal its plans, yet hasn't yet — which gives me cause for concern. Adds the paper:

“Amoeba has every intention of remaining in L.A.,” Amoeba’s Jim Henderson told The Times in 2017, citing the store’s statement on Facebook as the most complete update on its future at 6400 Sunset Blvd. “Rest assured, we are NOT closing, but we are now in a position where we may have to change locations in the coming years.”

On Tuesday morning, Henderson seemed unconcerned with the City Council’s vote. Amoeba’s move is a foregone conclusion, he said. The store has a lease that will carry it in its current location “for about another year,” he said, with a few brief extension opportunities.

“But I can also tell you that if we find something that’s a fit, then obviously we won’t be taking those extensions and GPI can get on with their business and we can get on with ours,” Henderson added.

The council’s vote was the final hurdle facing the development, which will replace the two-story Amoeba building with a mixed-use tower slated to contain up to 200 residential units. The ground floor will provide 7,000 square feet of commercial space, but there are no indications that Amoeba will remain at the address.

Save Amoeba!

Mike on TV: Showing "Kissy Sell Out" The Joys of Amoeba

You may remember last week I shared this video of me showing British DJ Kissy Sell Out the joys of L.A. food trucks for a TV pilot. Here's one more segment, as I take Kissy to Amoeba Records.

Eagle Rock Comes Alive for Its 11th Annual Music Festival

Above, kids groove (including a few pint-sized breakdancers) to the husband-and-wife duo Ellen and Matt at the Eagle Rock Music Festival's Family Stage. The festival is an annual event for the Franklin Avenue Quartet, and as they get older the kids can appreciate the performers and music a bit more. (The Blogger Toddler brought along his toy guitar -- and got upset when the performers on stage drowned out his strumming.)

This year's event also included many more food vendors, in addition to the growing number of restaurants up and down Colorado. And once again, we got there early enough to find a parking spot a few blocks away (on Ellenwood). The Center for the Arts Eagle Rock does a great job in organizing the event -- although I do fear that it's getting too big for its own good. We left before 8 p.m., before things really got crowded, and if Tweets were any indication, it sounds like the crowds -- particularly, the young kids -- got unruly.

But as one of the most kid-friendly music festivals out there, the Eagle Rock Music Festival remains a "must" in our books. A few pics:


The group Gangi performs at the Kingsize stage.


DJ spins at the Low End Theory stage.


Bands perform at the Emerging Stage.


Mia Doi Todd at the Dublab "Future Roots" Stage


The crowds get bigger each year.


Nestled among the tables for special causes: AEG fielded a booth promoting its Farmers Field proposal, and asking residents to sign postcards of support. Hmm.


Also among the "causes": Folks holding a torch for high-speed rail in California.


Now here's a cause I can support: XL-sized chocolate chip cookies from Auntie Em's.


Eagle Rock has a storied history, and boasts a very active historical society.


Spotted on the side of the abandoned Blockbuster store near Colorado and Eagle Rock Boulevards.


Vendors included Amoeba Records.


Food vendors at the Eagle Rock Music Festival food court included Hawaiian food booth "The Haole Way." Now -- as a haole from Hawaii, I'm very suspect. WHY would you call your Hawaiian food business "The Haole Way"? That's like telling the world, "Yeah, I don't really know much about this food, but whatever. Here's some spam musubi." For the record: The spam musubi was fine, as was the chicken and rice. But the mac salad -- key to any plate lunch -- was not only warm, but tasted like it might be spoiled. I tossed it out. EH HAOLE, NO LIKE. NO BROKE DA MOUT.

Record Store Day: Is Amoeba Hollywood The Best Record Store in the Country?

With Record Store Day on tap for tomorrow, Paste magazine has put together its list of the 17 Coolest Record Stores in America.

Our own Amoeba, which is actually a relatively recent entry in the world of record stores -- having been imported to L.A. in 2001, from the Bay Area -- is named "The Best Store in the World. Not Just Music. But Store. Including Target."

Pretty nice, right? Here's the write-up:

Tour posters climb the 50-foot walls, surrounding you as you join the skinny-jeans-wearing bass players and bespectacled screenwriters who listen to an in-store performance from The Bird and the Bee. You can then wander off in search of a red-vinyl Vince Guaraldi album or Tom Jones’ Live at Caesar’s or the latest posthumous Tupac release. Looks like L.A. doesn’t suck after all.

Hold it. What? Who, exactly said L.A. sucked, Paste? Unnecessary L.A. dig alert.

Too bad that Record Store Day seems to land every year on the same weekend as the Coachella Festival -- but hey, that just means more room for me to shop tomorrow at Amoeba and Rockaway.

FREE L.A.: Amoeba Records' Music Downloads Page

Where iTunes usually offers just one or two free song downloads a week -- and they can be very hit or miss -- Amoeba's extensive free downloads pages are chock full of good stuff.

Plus, I trust the Amoeba team's music taste a whole lot more than I trust iTunes. Find 12 pages of the downloads here.

Save Your Local Record Store

Growing up, I spent more time in record stores than virtually any other retail establishment. Heading to the mall? Straight to the record store. Looking for a late-night place to hang? The record store. Looking for something to do over the weekend? You get the idea.

It's still stunning to me how quickly the music retail space has disappeared. Tower Records, gone; Virgin Megastore, about the disappear. The Wherehouse? History. And L.A. indie music shops, like Aron's and Rhino? All gone.

Thankfully, a handful survive. Amoeba Records -- actually a relatively recent addition to the scene -- continues, as do other locals like Rockaway in Silver Lake.

I recently spent some time at Rockaway -- the first time in a while that I had a spare moment to go CD shopping. Once upon a time, I hit the music stores several times a week. But you get older. Your time becomes limited. And you miss out on joys like that.

So it was quite a treat last Friday when Evan and Maria both took a nap... and I found myself with some actual time to hit the store. It all came back to me -- that sense of discovery as you pursue through stacks; losing track of time as I painstakingly looked at track listings and covers.

I hate to think of a time when the record store completely disappears. So do the folks at the annual Record Store Day, which is taking place this weekend.

Record Store Day, which takes place this Saturday, April 18, is sponsored by the Music Monitor Network, the Coalition of Independent Music Stores (CIMS), Alliance of Independent Media Stores (AIMS) and Newbury and sponsored this year by NARM (National Association of Recording Merchandisers).

Details:

Premiere artists from practically every corner of the musical spectrum have chosen to celebrate with in-store signings and performances. Among them, the Eagles Of Death Metal, whose Jesse “Boots Electric” Hughes will play official Record Store Day Ambassador and who are slated for an in-store set at Rhino Records in Claremont, CA, releasing their acclaimed album Heart On on vinyl. The Breeders’ Kim and Kelly Deal will rock Shake It in Cincinnati, as will Chris Cornell and The Bad Plus at Electric Fetus in Minneapolis, Ra Ra Riot at Flat Black and Circular, East Lansing, MI (acoustic set), The Toadies at Silver Platters, Bellevue, WA, Scott Ian from Anthrax will make an appearance at Hollywood’s Amoeba Music, Manchester Orchestra at Criminal Records, Atlanta, GA, The Bouncing Souls at Generation Records, NYC and the fantastic list goes on. All confirmed in-stores are listed on http://www.recordstoreday.com

You may have also realized that Record Store Day falls smack in the middle of Coachella. The world-renowned music festival set to take place on April 17-19 in Indio, California, has chosen Record Store Day to run the event’s popular on-site record store, with management provided by popular Southwest-based indie retailer, Zia Record Exchange. The on-site Coachella store, previously operated by Virgin, is noted for its high profile foot traffic and good vibe and will host a number of in-store signings from various performing artists including, The Airborne Toxic Event, Noah And The Whale, Silversun Pickups, Franz Ferdinand, Steve Aoki, Electric Touch, Bob Mould, Booker T., Peter Bjorn & John, The Gaslight Anthem, The Kills, Amanda Palmer and others being confirmed all the time (Mastodon, Superchunk and Dhani Harrison being the most recent additions)

Good news for people who love to shop for CDs while suffering from heat stroke!